Hogsmeade

We got to go to Hogsmeade this weekend, and have to write about one of the places we went, its history, etc.

Well, whoopie twang, but can I ask you, WHY have so few wizards from wizarding families been to Hogsmeade before they come to school??

I mean, I understand that people who come from Muggle families wouldn't even know about it. Granted. And I understand that parents are busy and all that, but seriously, it is a nice place, why don't more people go there with their kids for daytrips?

Floo network, folks! Floo network! If you don't want to Apparate with the kids, fine, but Floo powder is not THAT expensive that you can't have a day trip every, I dunno, YEAR.

I mean, I have had the run of the place since I was a little kid, but mom has her shop there. She even brings the Vestucci Grandparents when they are over here - they are really much better at acting like a witch and a wizard than most magical people are at acting like Muggles. They know how to have fun. They put on anything Mom lays out for them, and as to amazing spells in front of them, well, as Grandma Marie puts it, "We'll just act like we're in Manhatten, honey. Nobody notices anything there either. We got lots of practice ignoring." But they DO notice everything and they talk about it at dinner, and they laugh a lot.

But back to the topic - my favorite place this weekend was Boswaithes Bags, Boxes and Bidets, Mokeskins to Mugglesacks since 1662.. As usual, the magical Bidet department was not exactly the happening place, except for a few Japanese wizards putting in orders for back home. Madame Boswaithe based them on the whole "flushing yourself into the ministry" thing they had going back before, you know, and I don't think too many people enjoyed that form of wizard transport, or want it in their home, but she maintains it is a very CLEAN way to travel and will eventually replace Floo, which can be so dusty. Which is why she is using bidets, instead of toilets. But anyway, there were three Japanese wizards in there, one with his wife, who was complaining loudly about something in Japanese the whole time, and I just nodded to Madame B and went back to the bag department to watch a few second years trying to buy pencil cases and backpacks and things like that.

I always love watching. This weekend it went something like this...

A second year muggleborn student approached the counter in the back of the store. Bugsy was sitting on a stool, leaning on it, looking asleep, but as soon as the student got within five feet of the counter, he perked all up and said, in this really rusty voice he has, "and what will Sire be wanting???'

Bugsy sounds almost like a house elf, and he does have rather large ears, but he is pretty tall to be an elf - about 4 foot six, I'd say, and he is Madame's Very Special Friend. He used to run Bugsy's Boxes, Boites and Bee Skeps but there was some incident with a bunch of Argentinian leather containers that I have never heard the whole story about and, having very little business sense, he came out on the dirty end of that stick and needed to find work, which Madame was perfectly happy to give him, so he sells burses, baglets and Mugglesacks in the back of the store.

"I'm not a boy!" The pretty little witch with gold curls and a pink cap was saying.

"Didn't say you was, Sire. Now, what is Sire wanting?"

"But I am not a SIRE, I can't be a SIRE, I am a Girl, a WITCH." she said, with a little emphasis, and the pink pom pom on her hat jiggled as she moved her chin.

"Of course you is a Witch, Sire. Now, what is you wanting? Burses? Purses? baglets?"

The young lady, who was by herself and wearing a little snake pin on her lapel, tried again. "I'm not a sire. I can't be a sire. A sire has to be a boy, and I am a GIRL. That is why I am a Witch, not a Wizard." She was being what she thought was very patient now. Anemone. That's her name - I've heard the other girls call her that in the common room. But Bugsy was not the least discomposed.

"Well, what is Sire wanting?"

She looked at him with her eyes bugging out, and then probably recalled that she was not supposed to stare. She cast a furtive glance around. "I need a Muggle pencil case." she said in a low, muffled voice.

"We isn't having any Muggle Pencil Cases, Sire! How's about a nice Mokeskin traveling satchel." He didn't lower his voice one iota to make her feel comfortable - if anything, he'd raised it.

"No Muggle Pencil Cases?" she asked, in a puzzled voice.

"No Cases whatsowhizit, Sire. Cases is Cassandra's Cases, Caskets and Crumb Trays, purveyors to Wizards since 1792, over on the next street but one."

She seemed to regroup. "Well, but I am here now, and I have to meet the other girls in a few minutes at the Leaky Cauldron, and,"

"Your Sureptitions, Sire, is not Bugsy's problem. We is not having Cases. We has Bags. We has Boxes. We has Mugglesacks. We is not having Cases."

"Well, then, a Muggle bag of some sort," she replied, fingering something in her pocket - probably her allowance. Pencil cases are one pricepoint, large sacks another, she might have been thinking, although it was clear she really had no idea of how a small bag with a special spell could cost much, much more than a large, unenchanted seabag. I thought I ought to take pity on her and finitee'd my disillusionment spell.

It always shocks people when I do that. I'm, really good at it. Dad has us practice every morning when we're home, and at random moments when we aren't. Constant Vigilance, you know. After she squeaked, and jumped a little, she looked flustered.

"Oh, B-B-Belladonna. Well, I just wanted a M-M-Muggle pencil case. For my little brother. Because he is just getting to be old enough for pencils...."

It was clear that this was a lie, carefully practiced for the event, and I could not imagine how she could get to even second year in the dungeons and still be such a bad liar.

"I see. Well, nothing wrong with buying a gift for a Muggle friend, either, if that was what you were doing."

I smiled at her. The whole house - the whole Wizarding World, probably, knows that my mother is a MuggleorSomething, evein if they are not sure what, exactly, that means. She could hardly contradict me.

"And there's no point in going over to Cassandra's, because it closed in 1874 when Cassandra's lover died of the Dragon Pox and she emigrated to Australia, where she took up Kangaroo charming. Never caught on like Snakes, you know, but she did give it a go. Anyway, what you've got to ask Bugsy for is a Boogie Bag, uncharmed."

She turned around and eyed Bugsy. Then she looked back at me, head tilted slightly to one side, and finally turned around and spoke to Bugsy in a very definate sort of voice.

"I should like one Boogie Bag, uncharmed, blue, if you have it. With a Zipper."

Bugsy threw me a disgusted look over her head. Then he reached under the counter and pulled out a little Muslin drawsting bag. He tapped it once, while mumbling, and it turned into a reasonable approximation of a pencil case. He muttered again, drawing his wand down the side of the case, and a zipper appeared in its wake. Finally, he screamed out "Azzuro!" in a shrill voice that brought the eye of everyone in the shop, and it turned a dark blue."

Poor Anemone was trembling. "But, sir..."

"That's two Knuts and a sickle" I said, having purchased a similar one the week before. "And don't worry - it's uncharmed. That was Transfiguration - you should know the difference from class. Even if it wasn't, you wouldn't be responsible - He would, and Madame, of course."

I eyed him, but he seemed perfectly comfortable.I patted her on the back, and sent her out the door to meet her friends before I turned back to Bugsy.

"Why did you give her such a hard time?" I asked, "when you are always so nice to me?"

"Geoffrey didn't like her," he said simply. Geoffrey is his invisible kneazle.

"Geoffrey my father's spinning eye, Bugsy," I said cheerfully. "And don't worry, I can check that thing out this evening back up at the dormitories. Dad's taught me a trick or two."

This seemed to offend him. "Geoffrey doesn't like her," he said, "but Bosthwaite's has an unblemished reputatoe for reliable receptacles."

I smiled. "That's right. Bosthwaite's, founded in 1662 by Bednigo Bosthwaite, seller of Boxes and Bedframes. Over the years, our wares have changed but little, and our standards not at all. All boxes and bags, for wizards and hags, from small to quite large, to encompass a barge, charms extra." I was reciting from their little snippet in the Hogsmeade tourist brochure.

He looked at me.

"Don't worry. I've no intention of telling her that Bosthwaite used a calender of his own invention and the store was really started in 1972, or that his drug habit made him a lousy businessman and he was running it into the ground until his sister took over." I smiled sweetly once again and went on my way.

Really, they ought to be warned about Hogsmeade...