Quote:

Originally Posted by Waddles

Juniper's jaw dropped. Lord Stoddard Withers. She had heard of him. "Ohhh! I know him!" Juniper said, rather more loudly than she had intended. "Er. I know of him." Of course she did not know him personally. The man had died over two hundred years before she was born. Before her grandmother was born, even. She beamed at Willow, glad that the other girl had an interesting person. After all, who could be more interesting than a dead magizoologist?

"In a duel? Lord Withers would win, most definitely," Juniper said matter-of-factly. "He's got all those winged horses on his side." The girl smirked a little. Obviously anyone who had the brains to breed winged horses and think to play Quidditch on horses would also have the ingenuity necessary to beat Daisy Dodderidge, who was famous for running a pub, in a duel. "All Daisy Dodderidge had was a brand-new pub. Personally, I think it requires a lot more brains and skill to breed winged horses than it does to run a pub, even if that pub is the Leaky Cauldron."

Seeing Kovac taking notes, it occurred to Juniper that she probably ought to do the same. Dipping her quill in Willow's ink - surely the girl would not mind if she borrowed a little bit of ink - Juniper scribbled down what she had just said about the duel, and the names of both of their cards. That would be enough to stimulate her memory when she reviewed her notes later.

It was very obvious, by Nature - Freak's expression, that the girl was very excited to know that she had Withers as a card. Her reaction --and loud voice-- should have been expected seeing that Juniper LOVED animals and everything that involved. However, Willow had not thought of that. And. . . What was that? Juniper was actually offering her a genuine beam! How weird. Willow could not keep the surprise out of her face. "Well, I hadn't," she said as only reply. It wasn't like she read much, nor did she like animals so it was obvious that she would not know who the man was.

Slightly surprised that she agreed with something Juniper Goodwin said, Willow nodded thoughtfully. "I suppose you are right. But I doubt he would be allowed to use horses on a duel. I'm sure he wouldn't need them, anyway--he was obviously a clever man." And also a very crazy one. Willow could just imagine in how much trouble he had gotten for breeding a new creature.

"If it were a debate or some kind of cooking contest, I'm sure Daisy would have won, you know? She probably much more skilled than Withers when it came to talking to people, and well, if she was the Leaky Cauldron's owner, she probably knew how to cook, as well," Willow mused lowly, not even noticing that Juniper had used some of her ink.

Juniper nodded eagerly in agreement. "Yes. It takes lots of brains to breed flying horses. Especially if you're the first to do so." Just think how much work it must have been for Withers to breed a new species of magical creature. Examples like his made Juniper want to be a magizoologist. But the present-day limitations on magical creature-breeding would make being a magizoologist today much less exciting than being a magizoologist in Lord Withers's time.

"Yeaah. Ms. Dodderidge would probably win if they were to do a mathematical contest, too. You have to be good at that accounting and such in order to start a business and have it end up as successful as the Leaky Cauldron," Juniper said quietly, doodling a winged horse on the edge of her parchment.

A sudden thought occurred to her. "I bet Daisy liked Muggles more than Withers did, though. I mean, she started the Leaky Cauldron to be a gateway between Muggle London and Diagon Alley, didn't she?" If Juniper remembered correctly, that had been the woman's goal. "I bet she knew more about Muggles than Lord Withers did, then."

And for the first time ever, Willow realized that Juniper Goodwin was smart. Of course she knew very deep inside that the girl had to be, but she'd never actually thought about it. To be honest, the only thing she thought about Juniper was that she had a ridiculous love for plants and animals. And Ghosts, too, apparently.

Scribbling down all the things that Goodwin had pointed out, Willow looked from under her lashes to see what she was doing: she was drawing something that looked like a winger horse. Go figures. Her forest green eyes rolled.

"I actually thought about that," Willow allowed, looking finally up. "I mean, not about Daisy, but about this Withers person, you see. To me it was very obvious that he either did not like Muggles or he was just indifferent towards them. I think that because of the game he created; I mean, Muggles obviously can't play it, not to mention that maybe he thought of himself above the non-magical population because he was smart enough to create the game and therefore, play it?" Hmm. Or maybe she was just completely wrong. Really, for all she knew, Withers could have been one of those people that found Muggles fascinating.

Juniper added some final textures to her doodle before looking up just in time to see anti-nature girl roll her eyes. Huh. She had always known that Kovac had problems with hating nature, but apparently the girl had an attitude problem, too. Well, it was Juniper's problem. She truly did not care if Willow did not like plants, as long as she did not kill anything.

Juniper bit her lip. "Well. Muggles have normal horses. Not winged ones, I mean. So Withers might have taken some advice from Muggle horse-breeders. Or even horse-trainers. I mean, of course he was smart." Juniper blinked. She was talking in circles, wasn't she? "But Muggles are actually pretty smart about animals. They've figured out what horses and dogs and cats and such like to eat, and they can train them to behave perfectly fine. So Withers may have taken a leaf out of their book when he trained his winged horses to play that sport he created." Had she come to a point? Juniper thought she must have made at least a little bit of sense. She had come to her original conclusion, after all. Right?

Tapping the end of her quill on her parchment, Juniper rested her chin on her hand. "I bet Withers was good at dancing. He has the title of Lord, right? Isn't that some sort of title for Muggle aristocracy or something?" She grinned. "Plus, he was an athlete. So he must have had the endurance required to dance, at least."

he looked towards the shelves as he didnt really see either one of them. he thought about going in and seein if mari was alright, but decided against it. he was working on his muggles homework when lyra decided to say something.he turned his attention to her as he had ignored her look from earlier. He hoped he wasnt suppose to be shaking in his shoes because she didnt scare him."A Dance off?" he asked her seriously as who thought of that." Well if it was her vs me on a dance off i would clearly win. Seeing as im still alive. Is that quick enough?" he teased her as he chuckled. he started to get serious as he then added," pick another wizard lyra and then we can get this done."

Robert looked over his shoulder expecting Mariska to be following him but didn't see her. Running a hand through his hair nervously he sat down without a word and set the large stack of books on the table. He didn't look at anyone and tried to keep from looking back toward the shelves. Now he was really confused.... What did that mean? Where did that put them. Running his hand through his hair he rested it against his head and pulled his notebook over to him from Lyra with a murmured, "Thanks." Where did that put him and Lyra.... He was so lost in his mind. His thoughts running amuck in his head, so much so that he had to force himself to focus. What were we doing...? Right, History of Magic... Taking a book off the top stack he flipped it open, "Who are we doing first?"

Quote:

Originally Posted by Waddles

Juniper added some final textures to her doodle before looking up just in time to see anti-nature girl roll her eyes. Huh. She had always known that Kovac had problems with hating nature, but apparently the girl had an attitude problem, too. Well, it was Juniper's problem. She truly did not care if Willow did not like plants, as long as she did not kill anything.

Juniper bit her lip. "Well. Muggles have normal horses. Not winged ones, I mean. So Withers might have taken some advice from Muggle horse-breeders. Or even horse-trainers. I mean, of course he was smart." Juniper blinked. She was talking in circles, wasn't she? "But Muggles are actually pretty smart about animals. They've figured out what horses and dogs and cats and such like to eat, and they can train them to behave perfectly fine. So Withers may have taken a leaf out of their book when he trained his winged horses to play that sport he created." Had she come to a point? Juniper thought she must have made at least a little bit of sense. She had come to her original conclusion, after all. Right?

Tapping the end of her quill on her parchment, Juniper rested her chin on her hand. "I bet Withers was good at dancing. He has the title of Lord, right? Isn't that some sort of title for Muggle aristocracy or something?" She grinned. "Plus, he was an athlete. So he must have had the endurance required to dance, at least."

Willow had always thought of Juniper as a Nature-Freak that happen to be too shy for her own good. But now, well, the girl was positively ranting about normal horses, winged horses, muggles, wizards. . . and cats and dogs? She blinked a couple of times, trying to make sense of it all.

"Oh, I never said that Muggles aren't smart," Willow began, "They pretty much have to be in order to live without magic." A life without magic was very hard to imgine for her. How did Muggles manage it, she would never know, and nor did she want to, really; Muggle things deeply confused her. "I think he probably did take some, er, tips from the muggles, but then he added, er, new things?" Naturally. Normal horses didn't have wings, and his did--do. Still do. Ah, this was so not her fortee. Talking about animals was not her thing.

When had History of Magic become Care of Magical Creatures?

As soon as the word dancing reached her ears, Willow quickly busied herself with taking notes again. "Not nessesarily. I'm an athlete and I don't like to dance." That wasn't true. She just didn't know how to dance.

Camira just shook her head a bit at the memory. "Yes, he's always been a bit strange after that. But he's also very overprotective of me now. It's weird. And he talks back. I think the fact that I cuddled him for 2 years undermines my new found authority", she said with a shrug. She didn't really mind. He was still her favorite elf.

"Oooh, well, I just finished Catcher in the Rye, and before that I read One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. They were both brilliant. I'm thinking of reading Fahrenheit 451 next", she said quietly, still a bit embarrassed that she was so enthused by muggle fiction. "Do you like muggle fiction?"

Barefoot. She liked it too. But only if her feet were properly manicured. "I could never sleep with socks on. I get hot at night and toss off the covers, even though it's pretty cool in the dungeons." Okaaaay. Like he really needed to know that. She looked back down at her Herbology and thought about how to explain the mechanics of the puffapod's flowering process. "Do you think it would be too much if I went through the chemical process a plant goes through to use oxygen for nutrient absorption", she asked randomly. She didn't want the professor to hate her for rambling on when what she really wanted was a few sentence answer.

Juniper nodded and scribbled down some notes on the Muggle subject. They had discussed it enough, right? Right. This was not Muggle Studies, and both of them had just agreed that Muggles were smart. Case closed.

"That doesn't mean you're a bad dancer," Juniper pointed out. "Withers could have absolutely despised dancing, and yet still been good at it. I mean, I don't particularly like washing dishes over the summer. But my mum still says I'm the best dishwasher in the house." Best not to mention that she was the only one who ever washed dishes by hand. That would completely eradicate the only evidence she had to support her idea.

"So, even though you, and probably Withers, don't like to dance and are athletes... I'm sure you're both excellent dancers." Juniper grinned, satisfied that she had an unarguable idea.

Lyra looked up as Cayden began to speak. Did he think he was funny? She needed to ask another question as she didn't understand properly what the last question was about. "Are we supposed to discuss each and EVERY person on this timeline?" She was getting frustrated at herself and seemed to be showing it to the rest of the people at the moment.

Balanced numbers was not in her favor. "I'm sorry for sounding so mean at the moment but I am frustrated completely. This homework is way too much and it is the first one." It would be different if they didn't have to work together and wait for everyone to find books and different information and whatnot. And then Robert came from the bookshelves...finally. "If I can figure out exactly what this question means," she shrugged as she looked back to the timeline, grabbing a book off the stack that he brought with him.

Mari came back to the table just as Lyra was saying something in a frustrated voice about not understanding the question at hand. Mariska didn't reveal any of the awkward emotions she was now feeling, even though there were plenty of them. She shook her hair back a bit and took a breath as she sat down. " Well, let's put Stroulger and...Wenlock in the versus debate." She said, looking at her notes. Mari was going to dive headfirst into this homework to forget her other issues at the moment. " I think Wenlock would win in a duel, simply because she was a Arithmancer and would know what days to choose to fight, and when not to. As far as a cook off...well. I've got no idea about that." She said with a little laugh and a glance at Elizabeth that said she needed to talk to her soon.

"I see," Zeke said with a nod. "Catcher in the Rye is my favorite book, tied with To Kill A Mockingbird. Have you read that?" he asked, nodding vigorously. Reading and books - especially Muggle books - were his favorite topics of conversation. (For someone so silly, he really was smart ) "And Fahrenheit 451 is good, too," he said. "I haven't read it for a long time, though. I get cold really easily. I steal blankets when I can," he said with a laugh. "And I think she'll probably give you extra points, actually," he said to Camira's Herbology question. "She seems to like that kind of thing."

Robert lifted his head up just as Mariska came back to the table and tried his hardest to take his eyes off of her but only seemed to manage to refrain from looking at her every so often. Hearing Lyra speak he turned toward her grateful for the distraction, "Umm...I think it means that we just do the cards that each of us has. I can't honestly see him wanting to read every single person and we can be more thorough that way. I'm pretty sure we just do the cards we have."

As Mariska spoke again he cleared his throat and started taking notes forcing himself not to look at her lest he turn red himself. Running a hand through his hair he started doodling on the side of his paper. At the mention of the duel he shook his head, "Yea...but Stroulger invented the sneakoscope so he was already paranoid. I wouldn't put it past the bloke to have practiced every day as well. I think I'd put my money on Stroulger to win if I had to. The cook off...I don't know. I have this image of Stroulger in my head as one of those muggle cops or even some aurors...sitting home alone eating beans or noodles out of a can or something. So....Maybe Wenlock?"

Lyra's green eyes looked up to see that Mari joined the group once again. "You both must have read the books while you were in the stacks," she snickered as she was beginning to lighten up a bit. "See, you add so much and that's why I thought it would be good to work with you." The answer that Mari gave was great! She liked her way of thinking, none the less and then turned to Robert as he spoke as well. "Now that is interesting too but if you think about it, he had to invent something magical because he didn't trust the people around him where as Wenlock just simply stated what was actually obvious, the magical number seven. Therefore, Stroulger thought outside of the box and went above and beyond what he was supposed too. I'd go with Stroulger. Ptolemy doesn't stand a chance with anything except maybe a good dance off just for trying.

"But the cook off, well, think about it," she said as she looked towards the card that Elizabeth had. "I would go with Wenlock on this one because she would have had to add seven ingredients just to make it magical." That really didn't make any sense but she understood it.

A cook off. Where they serious. His dance idea was more plausible. Who would have a cook off? Really lyra had no sense of humor. Seemed to be the theme of the day anyway. he sat there as he watched everyone else talk about how adding seven ingredients would make it magical. he would of asked for an explanation for it, but he could foresee it being shot down. That he didnt even need an seven of anything to see. he chuckled a little as everyone commented something of their own.

He was writing some things down as a silver falcon flew through the air and landed on his chair. He moved to take the the letter from the falcon as it then flew off in search of the window it had come in from. "Im just curious here. Why would a wizard have a cook off? I mean a good portion of wizards have house elves. Even if they did, its not like cooking is a high thing in the wizarding world. Let alone everyone has magic." didnt make much sense to him. he looked down at his letter as he moved to open it as he was prepared for any incoming traffic that his question was going to start. He quickly read his letter as he then stuffed it into his book. He turned to mari as he explained in a low voice as he didnt want anyone to hear." im sorry. Im going to leave. i need to take care of something." he told her as he then gathered his things."sorry, but you'll have to excuse me." he said to everyone as he gave htem all a smile. he pushed in his chair as he made his way to the exit.

Elizabeth had been flipping through the one library book she had while they had waited for Robert and Mari to rejoin them, quickly getting lost in her head. But then, voices broke through and she realized they had come back, and the conversation about the HoM work had restarted. "Stroulger may have been paranoid, but Wenlock could have simply read his numbers. And then, if she had wanted, she could have made the duel happen on a day where she knew she could win. And isn't half of cooking measurements?," she asked. At least, the few times she had perused cookbooks idly, it seemed there were a lot of numbers involved.

She had seen the bird fly in from her peripheral vision, and nodded distractedly as Cayden excused himself. Lyra had said she wanted to get the discussion over with, and he hadn't seemed fully into it anyway. She glanced back at the rest of the group, nodding subtly at Mari as her friend looked at her, indicating she understood. Then she spoke up again. "Maybe we could come up with some other ideas, other than the ones we were prompted with in the assignment. Get some extra points for creativity or something. I mean, cookoffs, duels, dance-offs . . . interesting, but there are so many other ideas where people could face off." She grinned. "What if two of them were on a game show or something? Like, one of those where people are required to know random things?"

Camira tilted her head at him curiously. "No, i Haven't, actually. What's it about? A bird?" Why would anyone spend the time to write a novel about a bird? Mockingbirds were amazing, but still. She turned her attention back to what he was saying. Apparently he was an evil blanket thief. "Tsk. Tsk. Stealing blankets. You should be ashamed. I knew you had a secret bad boy streak in you", she goaded, good naturedly of course. "Oooh, I hope I get extra points. Though just getting full points would be pleasing enough. Just, sometimes I can get carried away, which is not always a good thing. Professor Forrester, for example, hates it when people aberrate from what he asks. I think he's actually taken away points, now that I think about it." She gave a little shrug. From what she'd seen, Professor Kazimeriz was like that too. "So, what do you want to do? When we go to Hogsmeade?" Perhaps it was a bit early to be planning, but spontaneity was not always your friend. Besides, she had a few other people to meet there so she needed to get her timeline straight.

Oh goodie! Sho was willing to help her. And he was from muggle stock. Even better. “I do,” she said matter-of-factly, unperturbed by admitting it to Sho. He seemed like the sort that wouldn’t make fun because she didn’t know bubble gum from a balloon. Tobi on the other hand…well, he got frustrated with her quite easily sometimes.
But Tobi was there. Oh bother, what was she going to do with him? “Well, I think,” she said pulling out the handouts and handing them over to Sho. “That their dressy clothing, and even some of their everyday clothing is gaudy and way to ostentatious.”

Nathaniel had just visited with the creature he was taking care of for CoMC.He needed to find as much information as he could about the Augurey.He didn't see anyone he knew so he had gathered a few books and plopped down at a table.

Kira skipped her way into the library and found herself sitting across a griffy boy when she took out her book to read. It seemed like he liked to read as well or was the study type. She chuckled and went up to him. "Hi there, whats your name?, Im Kira, its my second year here.." She smiles.

Nathaniel looked up from his book on the Aurgurey "Hello.I'm Nathaniel. Nice to meet you." he said with a smile.

"Pleased to meet you" Kira was delighted. She looked down at his pile of books. "You come here much? I do most of my reading here by myself, i read all sorts of books on magical creatures and significant wizards but what most interests me is muggles, they are fascinating...." She looks at him for a moment. I wonder if he speaks spanish, she thought and chuckled some more.

"This is like only my second time here. I don't like being inside. I'm only in here reading up on the magical creature I was assigned to take care of for CoMC class.he said moving his hair of if his eyes. He pushed up his thick black framed glasses and continued "I live in the muggle world."

She looked at him. "Hmmmm, tell me more about this magical creature, I've heard of it.." She laughed quietly to herself. "Dont we all live in the muggle word, its all just a matter of connecting to them or not" She bent down to see what he was reading. Kira reached out and took his glasses. She smiled.
"Do you wear them to read or just to look good?" She couldnt help herself and laughed.

"Well, from what I've read the Augurey is also known as the Irish Phoenix. It's got greenish black plumage. I visited to baby one that I was assigned earlier. Right now he's just fluffy." . "Well some people live in a wizarding community. I don't. I live in a muggle community in Falmouth. Plus I'm half and ha..he didn't finish his sentence because the girl took his glasses."I need them to see everything. I have muggle contacts but I like my glasses."