Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Bookworm

Lest you think that I'm faking this whole "Amber is a geek" thing so I can score with nerds, let me tell you about my weekend. I read the new Harry Potter book. And pretty much that's it.

Well, not entirely. Steve and Chris G. decided they would like to have pork for dinner Saturday, so they roasted a 100 pound pig and invited several hundred of their closest friends over to share. I stopped in for a few hours, but I couldn't fully perform the requisite mingling as my mind kept wandering back to the shiny new book I knew was sitting on my coffee table. The bartender had stopped over as well, but had to be at work by midnight, so I used the fact that he's been borrowing my car to get him to drop me off at home on his way to work (a figure of speech as coming from Steve and Chris' place, my house is not remotely on the way). That way I could get a few chapters in before bedtime (which, because I'm lame, is usually right about the time the parties are getting started anyway). I fell asleep at some point during the train ride to Hogwarts and dreamed of wands, and cauldrons, and bland English food.

I was jolted from my slumber at 5:45 in the morning on Sunday by a text message from the bartender, which was basically a commercial: SOCIAL DISTORTION AT HOB SEPT 25. TICKETS ON SALE NOW! I was briefly annoyed at being awakened at dawn on a Sunday to be told that there will be a concert two months from now. That is until I realized that as long as I was up anyway, I might as well use the time constructively and read me some Harry Potter. Consequently, when Fish arrived around 2:00 I was four chapters from the end while he was only four chapters in. This proved to be disastrous. I will not put any spoilers in here, but by the end of the book I was, quite literally, sobbing. Bad enough for Fish to get up and bring me some Kleenex. I was completely heartbroken. I needed someone to talk to, to commiserate with and pool our collective sorrow, and Fish was only on fucking chapter 10. I snapped at him when he put his book down to try and comfort me. "KEEP READING!" I shrieked. "The longer you try to make me feel better, the longer I have to wait to talk about it!" Of course he left before he finished it, so I had to wait all the way until today to talk about it with someone.

I really don't see how this is a children's book. I mean AT ALL. People die horrible deaths, or get gruesome injuries. There's a whole bunch of reanimated dead bodies running around doing whatever reanimated dead bodies do. People are swearing. People are sucking face like it's an Olympic sport. Don't get me wrong, the book is AWESOME. I just wouldn't give it to my 10 year old any faster than I'd give him a copy of Playboy or front row tickets to a beheading. I was so depressed by the end of it I started reading a book of Dilbert comics to cheer me up. Then I got all depressed again when I realized I would have to wait years, YEARS to find out how it all ends. That is just completely not fair. Oh Madam Rowling, you torment me so.