Warning: This is yet another of the posts in which I demonstrate my incurable nerdiness. If this is too painful for you to read about, please be advised.

So, today over at The Leaky Cauldron, the hosts of Pottercast were doing a live call-in show. Since I have developed a serious infatuation with the Pottercast hosts since I began listening to the podcast several months ago, I thought, hey, why not call in and ask one of my many unanswered Harry Potter questions. So, for the first time since high school (probably since that time I won a trip to Nashville from KLOVE), I began the long, boring process of, dial, hear busy signal, hang up, dial again, ad infinitum.

So, I wrote down everything I intended to say. I will not be a babbling idiot, I resolved to myself. I will be calm. I will be witty. They will thing I'm the most brilliant caller ever. During the first session this morning I didn't get through. Then, tonight, they had another session, and after calling for a good hour and a half, after eating an egg-salad sandwich, reading Pippi Longstocking, and hearing the voicemail message about a million times, I stared at the ceiling, thought about my homework, and dialed *speeddial 9* yet again.

On the other end, there was a strange noise. What is this? my fried brain asked. What am I doing again? Who am I calling?

IT'S THE PODCAST PEOPLE! said that last thread of rationality in my brain. "Uh, uh, uh, hi guys" I said, and frantically tried to remember what I had intended to say. "How's it going?" Crap, crap. A bad start. Of course they've been asked "how's it going" a million times tonight.

"We're good," says John Noe, voice rather garbled by technical translation of cell phone to SKYPE and back again. Slightly recovering, I remember that I should introduce myself. "This is Devon from Oregon." Silence. ... I begin to panic. What's wrong with my name? Did I say something wrong? Now what do I do?

Do not wait for them to ask you for your question--it will waste time, says the Crisis Management part of my brain, who is taking emergency control of my motor functions. Oh yes, I think, I remember that from the call-in shows I've heard before. I plow ahead, "My question is, can a wizard be killed by non-magical means? Or can only something magic kill you? I mean, if you're a wizard, can something Muggle kill you, or do you have to be killed by something magical? Like with Lily and James, they couldn't have been killed in a car accident, right? Is that because it wasn't magic?" Breathe! Breathe or you will die, idiot! says Crisis Management. Also, you do know that was babbling, don't you?

John, Melissa, and Sue begin to answer my question calmly and rationally from the other end (although they are still garbled, which adds to the surreality of the experience--that and the spinning room). I get the sense that they are saying, yes, non-magical things can probably still kill you if you're a wizard, you just have more ways to protect yourself. "But, what about Neville?" I jump in, hoping I'm not interrupting anyone. "He learned he was a wizard when he fell out of a window and bounced."

"Well, maybe he bounced because he was chubby, not because of magic" says a person, whom I realize just at this moment must have been Chris Rankin, who plays Percy in the HP films. Woo, I talked to a movie star! Anyway, we all laugh at that, and the PC people talk about it some more while I sit there, not able to hear well enough to tell if there's a good moment to jump in. I try to make a comment that references an earlier Pottercast, so they'll know I've been listening and am a super-cool fan, but by this time I've degenerated into complete and total babbling, and it comes out something like this: "Yeah, and I was thinking, like, if Harry fell down the stairs and died, or, I mean, would he die, you know, because it wasn't magical?" I really don't know you, says Crisis Management.

The PC hosts do their best to make sense of that comment, while I think, time to move on. Really. Time to move on--where's my paper of "things to say"? Ah, here it is.... "By the way, John, thank you for inventing the word "Horcri." That really made my day." ... At last! Success! All the hosts erupt in laughter, and I join in. I said something funny. Crisis Management decides to admit me back into its acquaintance. The PC hosts chatter about how everyone's saying "horcri" and I, revelling in my moment of wittiness, jump in with "The best would be if it ended up in the books [crap! There's only one book left, silly!]--Um, I mean if it was in the last book." Yes, yes, everyone agrees. I consider bringing up the fact that one of the characters says "Rupert" instead of "Ron" in Book Six, surely a nod to Rupert Grint, but decide (probably wisely) to hold off on that one.

Pretty soon, it seems like things are winding down, (although the voices are still garbled enough that it's hard to tell). I don't want to be one of those people that you wish would shut up already and get off the air, so when it sounds like they're pretty much done talking to me, I say, "Alright, well, I love you guys, take care." And start to hang up. As I reach for the bottom of my flip phone, I hear laughter and someone say "Well, I guess she's done." *sigh* Decision: Speak up once more and try to regain my dignity or cut my losses and hang up? One guess... and it's not the first one.

So, anyway, that was my moment of glory. Curse my pathetic improv skills! I clam up like crazy when I'm put on the spot--forget nouns, forget where my mouth is, talk too loudly and too fast... (Unless, oddly, I have whatever I'm supposed to say memorized, in which case, I'm cool as a cucumber, thanks to lots of elementary school conditioning in speech meets. *sigh* If only there had been call-in shows in the first grade...)

Labels: HP

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Thursday, April 06, 2006

The Elephant of Approval