Air and Parchment
For the quill-and-ink version, please view this chapter here!
Dear Naj,
You may tell Evan that I wasn't previously annoyed with him, but I certainly am now. What a thing with which to begin one's correspondence! Really, Severus, you must restrain your impulses to have an appalling effect on our Evvie, however amusing or 'bracing' an effect you think it has on everyone when a gentleman of his stature forgoes all social grace. He is in fact a gentlewizard of some stature, however inconvenient you find the fact, and I'm sorry, darling, but there really is a limit to the number of ways in which one wizard can afford to misbehave in the same decade.
Thank you for asking after our collective health. Draco is getting less wobbly, but my kneazle takes longer naps. Hers are at least an hour long, as a rule, I'm sure, and if they aren't, I wouldn't know because she doesn't wake up noisily. I'm sure he recognizes his Mummy now, and you needn't laugh, because it's quite as inconvenient as it is lovely. I almost always look after him myself during the day, but of course I can't when we have guests, and Lucius won't hear of it at night. I'm afraid Draco doesn't respond very well to the elves. I think it might be because that Dobby always moves so abruptly, it startles the poor thing when he needs soothing. I don't think he can tell the difference between one elf and another yet, and although Dobby hasn't actually dropped him, well, you can imagine what it would be like, someone jolting you from side to side when they ought to be rocking you, and too young to even understand,, let alone to decide whether or not to trust the little oaf!
I insist that Lucius spend some time every day with him, but the poor man is completely at a loss. I think he's just reading out the accounts to Draco as he does them, and I'm sorry to say that he may be copying his father's dreadful behavior in this respect. I can hardly bring myself to blame him, though. He's terribly occupied these days—or, rather, I should say 'quite' occupied, as he's rather enjoying himself. Of course, he's not so well respected as his father yet, but at least the poor man's health being so bad has the silver lining of letting Lucius in on the ground floor of some new committees as his own man, as well as having to follow Abraxas's instructions in all of the ones where the members are all three times his age and have little interest in the opinions of anyone who hasn't been sitting at that table with them for fifty years. I'm afraid he's not quite resigned to the experience of sitting through the latter, though I've told him and told him it's only to be expected.
And now I shall give in and ask why Evvie thinks I've reached across the Channel to be annoyed with him from hundreds of miles away, although you needn't tell him I did. How are you finding the Balkans? You must let me know if you need anything, darling. You wouldn't accept a knut when I was so worried about Draco, so you mustn't be silly when it goes the other way.
Your devoted
Cerberus
Narcissa,
If Luke's reading anything aloud to Draco, it will be good for him. See if you can persuade him to hold the boy while he does, although I recognize this may be an uphill battle. Apply to my mother if you require cogent argumentation.
If you want Evan to wear his public-face mind when he writes you on matters personal (or, indeed, on matters of personal insanity), you'll have to tell him yourself. I'm not a monster, I hope.
I must say, however, that should you entertain any hopes of a travelogue sort of letter from either of us, I do advise you not to let Evan draw you into some sort of meaningless tiff. He used to be rather good at those (which is to say travelogue letters; tiffs only, as you well know, serve to make him confusedly sulky and paint at tragically slow speeds and redo all his canvasses thrice with a great deal of whinging about why nothing looks right), and I have no intention of making a fool of myself trying.
We did hear about a new department in its first stages of formation, just before we left. Neil Fudge seemed most impressed by Luke's input, although Fudge came late to the party and not all parties involved seemed inclined to be swayable. I was myself much struck by one of your good husband's personnel suggestions, and I'm sure he will understand what it meant to me to be presented with the opportunity to support him in it.
You shouldn't bring up a medical mystery if you don't want me to make enquiries. It's been a very long time with very little improvement or even alteration , by my estimate, except in the details. Or am I meant to take discretionary advantage of the change in locale and seek out brave new healers' journals accessible only through barely-adequate magical translators and human ones of limited-to-no medical education?
I'm not entirely sure why you think I would need that sort of assistance while travelling with your cousin—who is a wizard possessed, as you say, of both means and stature. Nor am I in fact myself either quite skint or without prospects or the means of trade just at the moment, as it happens, but I will endeavor not to be 'silly.' We have acquired bed and board without without catastrophe. Evan was not quite prepared for a convivial atmosphere rife with rakia, which is to say that failing to mention to stupid Englisher tourists that the local beverage may reach 190 proof is a common and classic game of hilarious baptism that a Slytherin as well traveled as he should bloody well have been expecting even the bulk of his peregrinations have been under parental aegis before now. Nevertheless, we must, I am informed at a length I will not call defensive, take some comfort that the consensus seems to be that he acquitted himself well.
To answer your question: as I understand matters, the Auror we both spoke to after the incident at the Portkey Office was alarmed at the idea of British wizards traipsing lamblike into the dens of vampires, and as a result the Balkan Preternatural Embassy (I think that's the best translation) has assigned us a guide. Evan doesn't like him. Take it as a complime
Disliking the man is not an appropriate way of talking about the issue, Cissa. Spike is prey to hideous understatement and this is one of the times we should patiently and lovingly ignore him. This person does not look like he is well named, but I assure you, Cissa, he is well named. What I mean by 'does not look like he is well named' is that after you read enough of Spike's more horrible books you do not expect an Igor to be tall and skinny and smoke revolting brown tobacco cigarettes. You do, however, expect one to look in an impertinent manner where they have no business
Evan has managed to conflate at least three different literary characters together with a grotesque amalgam that exists only in the collective imagination of muggles who have watched too many photographic-plays of a particular sort. I've no idea how he did it, unless it's to do with the way magic works the way we expect it to even though no one's ever come up with any theoretically coherent reason why it should. (One of my Sherwood connections recently reminded me of my burning desire to research the living blazes out of this question, but I suppose there's too much on my itinerary at the moment.)
I'm told I am woefully missing the point, but I shall defend my quill to… perhaps not the death, but Evan's not getting it again while he's drunk off his head, distraught over nothing, and making no sense whatever.
Although I will go so far as to agree that any wizard who smokes tobacco cigarettes, especially in a country so carpeted with such a variety of flora and well-supplied with craftswizards able to supply less poisonously and corrosively direct delivery methods for suffumitories, is not only a dullard with no self-respect but utterly lacks vision. Even thoroughly unimaginative muggles who are more concerned with aroma than mindscaping put lavender and rose petals in their hookahs and cloves in their roll-ups, so wizards have no excuse whatever. I suppose he thought he was slumming when the habit first caught him up, trying muggle drugs, terribly exciting, and surely no risk at all in one with such a mild effect, dear me no.
Yes, Evan, I will freely admit that the pipe that looked like a rabbit with its ears for the stem was moderately clever, albeit quite disturbing when you consider one would be mouthing the rabbit's ears and puffing smoke in and out of its brain. No, Evan, we shall not be returning to buy it for Reggie. No, Evan, that expression will not sway me, and it certainly will not sway Narcissa, who cannot see it.
Let us, Narcissa, prevent him from committing further international absurdities, at least until he sobers up. In pursuit of this modest ambition, we remain,
Ever yours,
Lance and Naj
PS—Spike had the rakia too. He just didn't have much because it was apricot and he said it was too sweet. I'll get him next time. They have other kinds, and some of them are more herby.
P.P.S.: The Igor-thing is vile! I'm sure it eats bugs. I don't care if that was someone else in the book, I'm sure this one does.
Spike says tobacco is an insecticide. That proves it! There are plenty of bees and things, but it's not as if the country's undergoing an infestation. If the man is so dedicated to always having an insecticide on his person that he'll even cling to a pretext that's turning his teeth brown, it's clearly because he so he can, at the shortest possible notice, kill any bugs that turn up and eat them.
P.P.P.S.: No. I will not: do not expect it, the notion is absurd. He is your cousin, you first inflicted him on me.
Dear Sev,
How are the mountains? Did you go to Bulgaria or Romania first?
Professor Dumbledore said you were fine, but I don't know if he's right and you're fine or he just means you weren't hurt. Are you all right? I couldn't believe it when I heard! I guess I shouldn't ask if you knew anything,
It's so scary, that something like that could happen right in the middle of the Ministry, in broad daylight, in the middle of a workday, with everyone there and all the security up and everything! Oh, I know, you 'just handled it,' I'm sure, but even if you weren't scared to be in the middle of it, it's still awful that it could happen. I think the Ministry got pretty scared, anyway.
Please tell Evan again that I'm very sorry about misunderstanding him like that. I suppose I ought to say I'm sorry for hitting him, but if I'd been right I wouldn't be sorry about that. What I mean is, I am, but I wouldn't have thought it was the right thing to do if he hadn't lied to me! Why are even your nice friends difficult?
I suppose that includes me, though, being difficult. I'm just so glad we can talk again. I really liked what Evan said about in-laws, Sev. I don't know if it was still hard for you by the time I got married, but I know it must have been at the start, even if I don't know what it was like. I keep thinking I have to talk to Jamie James about leaving you alone—because I swear, Sev, I thought he was doing, I really believed he'd changed more than that. And I keep thinking I have to have it out with him about it, that it's awful of me not to.
Only, I don't know why I'm not. What I mean is, I know I'm afraid to, a bit, because we had that fight for years before we started seeing each other, and it was just, ugh, dreary and frustrating and sneerful and neverending. You can't have that kind of thing with your husband once you've got to understand he's never going to see it your way and you certainly aren't going to agree with him, Sev, you just can't. He knew we couldn't live like that, that's why he lied to me, I knew we couldn't live like that. I'd never have started going out with him if I hadn't thought he'd stopped. I can't imagine what it must have been like for you, thinking I knew.
Sorry, gone off-track.
I was saying that I'm a bit afraid to dredge all that up again, but I hope if I were just afraid it wouldn't matter. I mean, he has stopped now, hasn't he? HASN'T HE? If he hasn't, please tell me, don't go all 'oh, I've drunk too much tea, I'll eat when I get home' about it. This is actually my business, Sev, and you're not a Stupid Beef-Brained Man man, and I think we've just proved why people shoving the wrong information at me isn't a good idea, haven't we? (I really am sorry, Evan!)
I know he talked to Dumbledore (James, I mean), and he went all funny and growly after Evan said that, he's been muttering to himself and he keeps telling Harry that family isn't intrinsically horrible no matter what Sirius says. What I mean is, I really think he might be…
I honestly think it might be better left alone, Sev. You know us lion-types, equal and opposite reaction. Sometimes not-pushing works better, although Lord knows it's only sometimes, just ask Remus. But I don't know if I'm being smart about it or just being a coward. You always said Gryffindors never could tell the difference between useless cowardice and good strategy—well, here's me saying this time (this time!) you're right. I can't tell, I'm too close to it. What do you think?
Love,
Lily
Lily,
The mountains are fine. We went to Bulgaria first. I need to talk to some people at Durmstrang. I'm not sure whether it will be necessary, possible, or wise to take more than day-trips to Romania. I suppose one ought to prefer to visit more places, but our lodgings are congenial, the surroundings are more than picturesque enough to keep Evan fruitfully and happily occupied, and the majority of what I ought to accomplish before Hogwarts opens can be done in the footsteps of Orpheus.
You may find this a poetic way of referring to the Rhodopes, but Evan, evidently forgetting that I am possessed of a more alarmist subconscious than he, has been insisting on reading Certain Literature, possibly in order that we might most perfectly offend those of whom I need to ask the very most impertinent and potentially species-threatening questions. I therefore prefer to dwell on other mythologies.
We weren't hurt and we're fine, although there were far too many idiots trying to maim each other by accident to look after all at once and Evan would keep trying to make himself conspicuous helping, so I can't say I enjoyed the experience, no.
We have a rule in Slytherin: Other People's Marriages: Do Not Fool Yourself You Will Ever Understand. I wouldn't dream of telling you how to manage your rhinoceros. You may or may not know him best, but you certainly know best how things work between you.
What do you mean, you think the Ministry got scared?
SS
Dear Lily,
I think you ought to know that took him more than three hours to write.
If you want him to say 'I forgive you for dating the self-proclaimed thug,' honestly, don't hold your breath. 'Forgive' is not a word he knows. I'm not sure I know it. Do you know what it means, really? What it really means? It's a very odd word, don't you think? He hates words that don't have a meaning you can pin down. You should hear him go off on 'nice,' it's brilliant!
You wrote about not-pushing—try it here. If you really do know him at all, you ought to know that apologies and hugs and all that make him dreadfully uncomfortable and he doesn't want to be anywhere near them. He's never going to apologize for doing what he thinks he was right to do, even if he didn't like doing it or didn't like what it did to you, and he doesn't want you to apologize to him. If you apologize, if you're sorry, it means you did the wrong thing and his pain wasn't spent on anything useful. So don't tell him that. Just make him believe you're going to stop hurting him.
And then do it, for Merlin's sake.
I, however, accept your apology in the spirit offered. Another time, if you don't want to be lied to, don't bring an enemy along, yeah?
(crumpled up, tossed in bin, retrieved and squirreled away by third party)
Dear Lily,
I think you ought to know that took him more than two hours to write.
Bulgaria is the mother of roses, so I've been getting teased by everyone I'm introduced to. But everything smells wonderful and you can't look out a window without seeing something pretty. If you know much about Durmstrang you'd probably expect that poor Severus and his delicate nose are gagging on the smell of beer and sauerkraut all day long, but I think he may actually be able to make it through the whole month on soup, salads, and kebab.
He's stealing bites and collecting recipes, mind you, but he says it's too hot for everything I'm eating. It's not that hot. And he's certainly acting more comfortable than everyone else, even in those stupid shirt-cuffs that anyone else would be baking in, between the way he never does mind the weather and his not having any insulation anyway. At any rate, he's found a soup that's distressingly like raita for something that calls itself a soup, and it's very sad for the rest of us. Adorable, but very, very sad. It does, as walnuts are a prominent ingredient, afford me the pleasure of remarking on how little wonder it is when he does something especially nutty, but his eyebrows haven't quite twitched off his face yet. I live in breathless anticipation.
Tell me, is it a woman thing, thinking a fellow will not only want to change who he is but also be able to, because of how he feels about someone? See, my cousin Narcissa thought she could make her husband a bit less self-conscious and silly, and good luck to her say I, and that's only a self-esteem thing, not something he's ever been willfully set on. That is to say, he is quite attached to his demon-birds, and they are quite silly, but he certainly doesn't want to always look over-polished, and I really don't think she's going to be able to do anything about it, considering he's a grown wizard set in his character, do you? If you're not prepared to live with all of who a person is, don't live with him, that's what I think, but of course you can't tell Narcissa anything. I blame Celestina Warbeck.
But I digress.
I shouldn't worry overmuch about Severus being traumatized by the stupidity in the Portkey Office, if that's what you were getting at. Being Severus, he was mostly annoyed, once he'd finished being pinpoint-focused and magnificent. He's been writing angry letters to Dumbledore about what 'had by-God-better' be included in the DADA curriculum, since Severus wasn't hired to enact it himself. Sadly, these are less well-peppered with references to his recent interviews with Durmstrang professors and ex-professors than good strategy would suggest. You should see if Dumbledore will let you read one of his replies before he sends it out next time—they're hysterical. By which I mean… you know that beyond-words-furious frustrated teakettle noise…?
To answer your question, all his friends are difficult because he has doesn't have the patience to be friends with anyone simple enough to think we live in simple times with simple answers to easy questions.
Speaking of which—
What do you mean, you think the Ministry got scared?
Regards,
E. Rosier.
Ev,
You're not subtle.
Spike-my-Spike
It's very wrong of you to read other people's mail, and if you keep making other people's national breakfast drinks interesting and more delicious than they're meant to be when they actually have 'boring' in the name, I'm dreadfully afraid we may find out what death-by-elf looks like one of these days. Why don't you join me when you're done with Professor Daskalov? I should be done with Polzin in time to get to Devil's Bridge by sunset. I think it's going to keep on quite warm tonight, don't you?
Ev
Ev,
NOT. SUBTLE.
Yes, fine, but you can do the explaining if questions are raised about the room not needing tidying.
Dear Sev
Thanks for all the really helpful advice, everyone's fine, thanks for asking.
I don't know why you've both gone over all emphatic and pressing about it, they're just being a bit extra-cautious about security. What would you expect?
Your bloke's a bit interfering, isn't he?
Love, Lily
PS: Sorry if I'm a bit short. You think you know about babies being fussy sometimes, but you don't really know till it happens.
Lily,
Not as a rule, he's not.
I didn't tell you to have one.
SS
P.S.: I don't wish to encourage Narcissesque hypochondria-by-proxy, but if he wasn't fussy before and is all of a sudden, a check-up would not be an unreasonable precaution. Colic's not unusual even this early. If he's just hungry all the time… they grow.
[Note attached to a wicker basket of ripe raspberries]
For Sev with just ever-so-many loads of love,
Lily
PS: Colic. They gave me a small-dose digestive potion for him, though I'm sure you don't want to know how it's delivered.
GODDAMNIT, WOMAN, MY EYES!
S
Evan,
What in Salazar's name did you say to Polkin? You were supposed to encourage him to work with Apostolis Avery.
L. Mfy
Dear Lucius,
I did. Very complimentary. Open trade relations so vital to the movement of a free society and all that. What's got you all in a twist?
Evan
Evan,
They were getting on very well and Avery was sure they were at most two meetings away from securing his support on a measure for a significant relaxation on restrictions on trading for parts of all beings classified as Beasts in either country concerned. Now he's gone over all chilly and he's pulling out all sorts of bylaws and the sorts of concessions he's demanding are not the sort you ask for if you truly want to make a deal.
L. Mfy
Dear Lucius,
Clearly he didn't like my waistcoat, then.
Look, old thing, I don't see why you want to blame me because he's gone over all virtuous. From the sound of it, I'd say his superiors got into his briefcase and told him he's on probation. And he asked to be painted rosacea and all, so don't go telling me I queered your deal on that count either, thank you kindly.
Spike says hullo and 'please divest yourself at once of the delusion that the universe is controllable,' and also says 'try to read Draco something containing more nouns and verbs than numbers on occasion, will you.'
Love to Cissa and the tadpole.
Evan
Severus,
Does your demented inamorato understand that his successes and failures have real-world consequences?
Lucius
Luke,
Your terminology is repellant, and I shan't even try to address the yawning maw of the question of its accuracy.
Of course Evan understands that. Do you understand that he isn't maneuvering in a vacuum? If even I am aware that all governments are made up of hundreds of self-directed and self-centeredly-motivated moving parts, I am aghast if you're not, and I know Others are. Sometimes it works in one's favor and sometimes against. You know plans never survive first contact with the target, or what are contingencies for?
Finding children's books is not hard, Lucius. You floo to Diagon Alley. You walk into Flourish & Blotts. You tell the poor harassed sod behind the desk, "My first child is two months old. I need drivel with soft bits that can be drooled on and chewed and if possible makes noises. Help me, O-Beloved Shopkeep, you're my only hope."
SS
Severus,
I showed the shopgirl that bit of your letter and then I had to pay for the crystal case behind her when she laughed so hard she broke it, thanks awfully.
Yours in some puzzlement,
Lucius
Luke,
I'm to believe you're a charmless numbskull who's incapable of a simple reparo, then? (Which is to say that I consider you to have made this delightful narrative up out of whole cloth in order to stiff me for a glass case you broke with your ridiculous poncy walking stick when you turned around too quickly out of fear someone you know would see you buying a book with a fuzzy bunny on the cover.)
SS
Severus,
If it will get me out of reading My Pretty Pegasus and Dippy The Dragon Is Hungry more than once a day once you're back, I beg you on both knees to believe that very thing.
Lucius
Luke,
It will not.
Sincerely,
Reality
Mam,
Would you please take some workable clay samples from the thicket by the Pendle—you know the one—and from that dip by the bluebell wood in the Bowden and owl them to Narcissa? At least half a pound from each, call it 12℥ to be on the safe side if possible. Alacrity would be deeply appreciated.
S
Naj, darling,
Why on earth am I receiving wet lumps of earth from your mother and a sweet-shop?
Cerberus
Very,
I was tempted to deliver the bricks to your princess in person, just to see her face. Itching your feet off, are you? I told you to take a tub of Verily In Soothe. Trust you to come up with something odd. Let me know if it works.
E. Snape
Narcissa,
Because you have stolen control of my shoe-making process. I'd like you to give them to your cobbler, please, and have him make me four sets of insoles—enchanted to be flexible and durable and all that, and if he knows how to infuse them with magic from the nearest ley line or node I'll make him a bottle of any garden wine, mead, or cider he likes. Feel free to up the number a bit if he badly needs persuading, though I do expect to be quite busy on my return. One set made of clay from each sample, and one an amalgam. If you won't send me the bill, send it to Evan and we'll pretend I haven't stolen it or got him a dreadful new eyesore of an easel or something. (The wood-workers here are quite remarkable. Many use traditional tools like knives and transfiguration, but some also do a sort of hive-mind will-controlling spell on termites. The detail this method permits is astonishing.)
Naj
Mam,
I took two tubs, and I've nearly gone through them already. They won't let me brew in the inn, and there are little fairy-like beings that work for their Ministry that converge and start scolding and wielding pins if you try to light a fire outside in the wizarding areas where, one might have assumed, one would only be looked at so oddly for using a cauldron. Evidently they're not over the war.
(If their last war was even what Binns has deigned to notify us about; I have the impression that if I were to properly explain that our language uses one word to express the political state of not-at-war and the emotion of tranquility, I should get quite bored waiting for the laughter to subside.)
No such firestorms at home, I trust?
S
Very,
Suppose you manage your young idiot and let me manage mine.
Mam
Mam,
Suppose you consider that I mean what I say on occasion. I think you're wise to stay off the Prophet's subscription list and eschew other hallmarks of wizarding citizenship, for what that's worth, but I'd like to ask Lily to start sending you a copy. Ignorance may be bliss, but it's not always protection.
(Not but what the venerable rag only helps so much. Their articles are more than half spin which is all garbage, but at least after reading it you know that things have happened.)
S
P.S.: Note that I am not asking you whether by 'your young idiot' you mean myself or your husband. I do not ask you to tell me, as I do not wish to know. Do not consider this hypocrisy: ignorance is no protection from curses or violence, but it can be a protection from horror-stricken insanity.
My dear boy,
I've just had the most delightful visit from one of my old Gryffindors. I believe you know Miss Prince as was, although I don't think she will have mentioned that she was coming to see me. What a pleasure it is to sit with my alumni and recall the sunny days of yore! Things were so different then, a freer, gentler era, and one's memory cannot help but be tinged with the golden glow of fading recollections. Why, before this afternoon I can't remember the last time anyone shattered my spectacles with a bag of Gobstones. Why the dear girl should imagine me responsible for Ministry security I can't imagine, can you?
Regardless, it was a great pleasure to see her again and have a chance to catch up. It's so reassuring to the feelings of a teacher or parent to hear about important things in our children's lives from them directly and in a timely manner, as no doubt you'll discover before long.
On which subject, my boy, which is to say, that of your imminent discovery of the joys of academia, I remain positively afire to hear the results of these interviews which are the purported purpose of your summer sabbatical, and shall send your newest suggestions for Gawain Robard's syllabus to join their brethren on the mountainous pile of commentary on the DADA position one always does receive over the summer.
In trust you both are taking some time from this extensive brainstorming to enjoy the delights of the Balkans,
I remain, yours affectionately,
Albus Dumbledore
Professor,
I suppose it is, in the dignified and storied halls of 'academia,' as la belle Flamelle would say, of all things the most dreadful to tell one's employer to blow it out his ear. I inquire as a mere matter of hypothetical interest.
S. Snape
My dear boy,
Would one, hypothetically, be offering his employer, perhaps, a box of that delightful lavender-laced snuff sold at the apothecary outside Sofia run by the charming zmey? As I recall, it was quite strong enough to feel as if one was, indeed, sneezing it out one's ears. I'm afraid I never cared for that sort of thing myself—it's quite inadvisable unless clean-shaven, you know—but no doubt Horace would enjoy a sample.
Warmest regards,
Albus Dumbledore
Professor,
Since as an educator and a former Gryffindor you may be presumed to value clarity and forthrightness in your communications, I shall rephrase:
To he who would say to me that it is within his purview to instruct me in how I speak with my mother I say: tie your beard in a knot and throw it over your shoulder. You're damned lucky she stopped at breaking your glasses, O Supreme Mugwump.
And you'll have my report on my interviews when I've finished them and compiled them into something coherent. Which is to say: most likely in person.
Very sincerely,
S. Snape.
My dear boy,
I have attempted the manner of wearing my beard you suggested and received several compliments! I must say, however, that it may have to be saved for formal occasions—I used a Celtic knot, of course, as a simpler one would not have gone well with my robes at all, and it was perhaps too time-consuming a style to adopt on an everyday basis. I do look forward to discussing the effect with your great friend, however, as I do other matters with your good self.
Affectionately yours,
Albus Dumbledore
attached:
Evan—
Why is everyone I know crazy?
Couldn't tell you for sure, Spike, but you might want to think about whether there's a common denominator involved. Have you finished talking cauldron bottoms yet? I have the apparition coordinates for Silistar Beach if you can come rescue me from this utter bore.
Ev
Mein Troglodyte,
STANDARDIZATION IN CAULDRON CONSTRUCTION MINIMIZES EXPLOSIONS.
Best-beloved foghorn,
Does it really? I don't suppose it's anything to do with heat distribution, is it? No, no, couldn't possibly be, I can't imagine what or who lied to me that heat distribution was why, over and over repeatedly twelve times a month or so for two years straight. You'd better come tell me all about it, I am agog for the truth of this obscure and not at all blindingly common-sensicle question which has always been so frightfully important to my work as a painter. Bring food or I'll buy starchy, starchy pies.
Ev
P.S.: if you plan to be enough of a porcupine to really talk cauldron bottoms at me and don't also bring a very nice bottle, I will bite you so much the bug-eater will ask you questions about it tomorrow, or at least look at you funny and try to kill me with his eyes again. On your face will I gorge, and then you will have no grouchy DF-leg to stand on when I 'call you ridiculous names,' because the adjective will have been proven by your cherished Etymology of whom I am wildly jealous. Feel free to test me if you think I can't distract you long enough!