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Monday, June 30, 2003 - 10:43 p.m.

I've defeated you, Potter

(NOTE: Some plot discussion, so skip down past the first part if you're avoiding all talk of Harry Potter.)

Done and done.

From the day I cracked it open to the moment I thumped it shut, it took me nine days to read Harry Potter Orders a Phoenix -- no stupendous feat by any means, but certainly a noteworthy achievement for most. At 870 pages, that's just under 100 per day, and considering that there were days I barely found the time or energy to force my way through 30, I managed at a respectable clip.

The thing with Harry Potter and the Phoenix Suns is that you want to savor it because you know it could be a while before J.K. Rowling manages to pound out that sixth book yet you want to fly through it and devour it so quickly because it's captivating.

As I heaved the weighty tome onto the shelf at chest level next to the first four hardcover copies of the series, I marveled at how Rowling could keep the first two books so short. These last two books -- HP and the Goblet of Fire and Phoenix -- don't read like 800 pages (Goblet is 734); the first two, however, combined aren't as long as either of these (309 and 341, respectively). I don't know if she could write a book so short again if she wanted.

For the most part, I'm generally pleased with the fifth book. If I had two complaints, it's 1) that Harry acts like a bratty teenager demanding everything his way throughout the book and 2) that the climatic battle with Voldemort was so short. It seemed to me that it was over too quickly and, frankly, it didn't live up to expectations.

But really, it was a great book.

<><><>

In other news, the University of Miami and the ACC are arrogant, greedy holier-than-thou opportunists who like the attention they get from the idea that they are steering the course of college football. Virginia Tech is a lapdog, a hyper hanger-on who was ready to stand by its friends in the Big East until a bigger, badder friend (the ACC) made an offer to protect it.

I don't buy the argument that the ACC is now a football conference on par with the SEC or Big 12. They are in the sense that it is big and has the potential, beginning in the fall of 2004, to have maybe as many as seven schools with a shot at being in the top 25 at some point during the season. But it won't happen: several teams will no doubt be overrated, as will the conference, for sure. And by taking the two worst basketball teams the Big East had, the Big East is now surely stronger on the hardwood than the ACC, though few with "neutral" views will acknowledge it.

<><><>

This is one fucked up story. It was strange enough a few days ago when it was first announced that teammates were considered suspects, but to hear this story come out is downright surreal.

And Charlton Heston thinks gun control is unnecessary.

<><><>

I think I've seen three Katherine Hepburn movies, and On Golden Pond wasn't one of them. I've seen Desk Set, The Philadelphia Story and The African Queen. I think I taped Bringing Up Baby on AMC but never watched it. I suppose it may show up there at some time this week.

Of course, like many, I thought she'd died years ago. I think in college Bryan and I had that discussion, he being nearly positive she was alive; I was not so sure she was still around. That's when I found out she had pretty much retreated into retirement in Connecticut and that it was likely the next time we'd hear of her would be the day that came yesterday.

Ninety-six years old! Good show!

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