PotterCast 95: Tucson, Arizona Transcript
Part 1 (0:00 - 14:59)
Melissa Anelli (MA): Welcome! Thank you, guys, for coming to Tucson for our first...
John Noe (JN): Yay! (audience cheers)
MA: This is the first- well, you probably live here in Tucson. (to an audience member) You don't? Where are you from?
Audience member: I am from the Vegala.
JN: An hour away.
MA: Rock on! Awesome.
JN: Hour and a half. Awesome. Geez!
MA: Two hours; who can beat two hours?
Sue Upton (SU): What?
MA: What?
Audience member: Well, I came to visit my friend.
JN: Oh we're your friends too.
MA: We traveled six to get here, but we are on tour. Well, this is the first show on our tour where we are at a (http://www.bordersstores.com/)Borders, which is so exciting because we like to be in book stores.
JN: Yay, Borders!
SU: Yay!
JN: Have we hit the record button this time?
MA: Yes, we have. (audience laughs)
JN: Oh, we did the show last time and we got a minute into it and we remembered, "oh, the record button would be nice, wouldn't it."
MA: Well, that was Harry and the Potter's fault.
JN: Yes. Oh, well.
MA: I don't know if you guys have seen, but Borders has now put out an hour long Harry Potter discussion, it's pretty awesome. It's with PotterCast (JN: Yes!) and a bunch of our friends at the Phoenix Rising conference in New Orleans. Pretty much anywhere you go on Leaky it will have a Borders thing on it, just click it and you will get there. A lot of fun if you want another one of these podcasts at home.
JN: We are traveling how many more cities thanks to Borders? At least twenty, right?
MA: At least twenty total.
JN: Yeah.
MA: This is like our third city or something. Seriously, I literally said "hey, Borders, help!" They said okay.
JN: We want to come to Tucson, Borders, make it happen.
MA: So, make your reservations today to get your Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows here because they rule. We also want to say "hi!" We have a very, very special- how many of you like to read the interviews that J.K. Rowling does, look for clues, etc.? What website to use to do that?
Audience: Leaky!
MA: I wasn't asking for a plug. I wasn't asking for a plug. That was very nice kiss up, though. (audience laughs)
MA: What website do you use?
Audience member: Accio Quote.
MA: Lisa, who runs Accio Quote, is right there! That is Lisa Bunker.
JN: Woo!
SU: Yay! (audience applauds)
MA: She's awesome. She's responsible, I mean, we wouldn't know half of the things we know to obsess about without her. She says one thing; we have a year of speculation. It's true right? Okay.
JN: One hundred percent.
MA: So, in each city that we go to we're trying to determine which city knows the Harry Potter the best. Which one after Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows comes out will- I do this alot, will have had the best answers to our five question prediction exam.
JN: The smartest Potter city in the country that we are visiting.
MA: Who thinks it's Tucson? (audience applauds) (JN laughs)
MA: I don't know. Albuquerque has some pretty interesting ideas.
SU: Yeah. (JN laughs)
MA: They thought Voldemort was going to kill Harry with a gun. (audience laughs)
SU: Muggle, very Muggle.
JN: Then the Muggles are going to kill all the wizards and unite. (security alarm sounds)
JN: Uh-oh.
MA: Don't steal books! (audience laughs)
JN: Sadness.
SU: Madame Pince will get you.
JN: You ruin it for the rest of us.
MA: No, but seriously, they thought all the Muggles were going to come and defeat the wizards.
JN: No, nonsense.
MA: I'm not going to file logic to the argument, anyway.
SU: There is none.
MA: So, who is ready for exam? Are you guys ready? (Audience: Yes!) Okay.
JN: A quicky little quiz, not like our 500 question (MA laughs) quiz on Leaky Cauldron, which will answer which is the smartest Harry Potter fan.
MA: Who has taken that? Whoa.
JN: We just put up like a hundred more questions.
MA: Yeah. There are 400 questions online, now. We're trying to determine which fan on all of the internets has... (JN: The whole world of the internets.) A whole world of Harry Potter fans had the best ideas, and you need at least 500 questions you know, so 400 of them are out now, go check it out.
JN: I think there are about fourteen questions about Crookshanks, actually. Just so we get it all straightened out. (audience laughter)
MA: And thirty on Grubbly-Plank, if you listen to John this tour.
JN: Grubbly-Plank is a very complex character indeed. (MA laughs)
MA: Grubbly-Plank is the new Dawlish. (audience laughter)
SU: The new Dawlish!
JN: I love me some Grubbly-Plank. (all laugh)
MA: Welcome to our life on tour.
SU: Is it the monocle? Is that it? The pipe?
JN: The monocle is appealing. The plank, the plank! The name, (MA: The plank?) the name Plank does it for me alone.
MA: Okay, okay, who's got the first question for these guys?
JN: We have one of five questions, here. The first one, of course, is the biggest, all-important question. Everybody make some noise if you think Harry will survive The Deathly Hallows. (audience cheering and clapping)
MA: That was like a Southern one. (JN laughs) That was nice. (laughs) Now, we're in the Southwest.
SU: There it is. Woo!
JN: Sounded like a rooster. If there are any of you left, make noise. If Harry will die, make noise now. (a few cheers)
SU: Boo!
MA: You clapped for both. (all laugh)
SU: No, you can't have them both.
MA: Okay, I thought you did. You're wrong, though. (all laugh)
SU: Maybe, maybe.
MA: No, she's wrong. Harry's going to live.
JN: Okay. Tucson so far thinks Harry will survive. Okay. Sounds about right. We also have- our other huge question out there is if you think Snape is a very bad man, (MA laughs) let's make some noise about here. (audience cheers)
MA: Very bad man as in evil. Not just a real jerk.
JN: Yes, you think he's a butt-head. You think we can trust Snape, how about some clapping here. (audience cheers)
MA: We have a sticker. The Borders lady is dutifully presenting the "Trust Snape" sticker. I didn't get one, and I think I really want one. Is that okay?
JN: We didn't order a book first. Yes. Oh, yes.
MA: We're also just- check them out. They're mine! No, here.
JN: Can these go on your car?
SU: See? We all trust Snape.
MA: I need one here and the other one there. Here and there.
JN: I wonder if these are safe for cars. I don't know if anybody saw our car outside.
MA: Who saw the car outside?
SU: The Potter-mobile. PotterCast-mobile.
JN: We have markers for Tucson to color in their space on our car for the PotterCast-mobile.
MA: Because Tucson does the best drawings apparently. (all laugh)
SU: Well, we'll see. All right, we're on to number three.
MA: Number three.
SU: This is a big one. Okay, who thinks that Harry Potter is a Horcrux? (audience cheers) Who thinks he's not...?
JN: Who thinks that's ridiculous?
SU: Yeah. (audience cheers)
JN: Woo!
MA: I like Tucson. (laughs and audience cheers) You are smart people with good earrings. Okay, number four.
JN: Number four, I think, is from the beginning of Deathly Hallows; if Harry will be returning to Hogwarts for his seventh year of school. If he will, make some noise.
MA: If he will? (silence)
JN: Wow! (MA: Whoa!) Apparently, he's going on a Horcrux hunt.
MA: In Tucson.
JN: In Tucson. (everyone laughs)
MA: They're like "no, he's coming here and that's the end of it." (audience laughs) Okay, so do we need to even...? Well, let's hear the cheers, anyway. Harry will not go back to school. (audience cheers)
JN: There it is.
MA: We like the cheers.
JN: This isn't one of the questions, but what about Hermione? Will she go back and take her N.E.W.T.s? Because this seems kind of crazy of her to not take her N.E.W.T.s.
SU: She will find a way. (MA laughs)
MA: She's going to do an at home test. (laughs)
JN: Is she going to take her N.E.W.T.s? She's going to take an online class for N.E.W.T.s.
MA: No, no, no. She'll take the On-Horcrux-Hunt test.
JN: Yes.
SU: She'll write it up, grade it.
MA: Trying to save the world? Take this test instead. (audience laughs)
JN: Oh, gosh.
MA: On the back of the hippogriff, you know?
SU: Yeah.
MA: Dragon.
Audience member: She'll take the predictions test.
MA: She'll take the predictions test for the Leaky Cauldron and she'll probably win. (audience laughs) Because she's going to live. (Audience member: Yes!) Number five. And this is it. Your last chance to be the best Harry Potter city ever.
JN: (drumroll) I hope one of you remembers it.
MA: Of course I remember it, John.
JN: (laughs) I don't remember it.
MA: (laughs) I know you don't. That's why I fix it up. (laughs) Do you think we're going to go behind the veil? (audience cheers) All right, if you do, hold on. Wait, I'm doing this thing that Eddie Izzard does. It doesn't work. Eddie Izzard does it and it works! (JN: All right.) It didn't work. Okay. I'll try it later. (laughs) If we will go behind the veil. (audience cheers) If we won't go behind the veil. (audience cheers)
JN: I don't think we're going behind the darn veil.
SU: Yeah, we are.
MA: Why not?
JN: Because you go behind the veil, you die.
SU: No! We're going to hear from Sirius. (JN laughs)
JN: But, no. Maybe (MA: We're going to go in with a cane.) you could go in with a diary or the Pensieve or something but.
MA: We're going to go in with a cane and grab Sirius and drag him back out.
SU: Yay!
MA: Oh, Sirius. You can just summon Sirius, like do an accio at the veil. (audience laughs) Sirius is like, "Whoa. I was having lunch." (all laugh)
JN: You jerk!
SU: Everybody, wait just a minute.
MA: We can only hope.
JN: Who dares disturb his slumber.
MA: Sue can only hope, I think. (laughs)
JN: Aw.
MA: (laughing) I'm sorry. Yeah, I think you do have to die when you go behind the veil.
Audience member: We don't know if...
MA: We don't know.
SU: You're right.
MA: And, that's what great inventors are made of.
JN: Jo said Sirius is gone.
SU: Well, but he has that handy-dandy mirror. I'm just saying.
MA: It's the veil mirror.
JN: You can't fix a broken mirror once it's been broken. There's no spells to fix things.
SU: Oh, that strangely reparo.
JN: Oh, no kidding.
SU: Oh, who'd have thunk.
MA: Okay, over lunch we decided to have a "Quiz John Noe" segment. (audience laughs)
JN: Oh, I love this game.
MA: I really just- you just sunk yourself. I want to try this, now. Who's got a canon stump for John? Who's got a question for him?
JN: Lisa can't play.
MA: Lisa can't play. She's on the Lexicon, that's just not fair. Okay, camera lady.
Audience member: Okay, how many money did the twins bet on the World Cup?
MA: Oh! That's one of the questions on the exam.
SU: Yeah.
MA: Which means he should know it but he doesn't.
JN: Hm. Oh, my.
SU: Wizard money.
JN: I almost wanted to say, I have forty galleons and twenty-three galleons in my head. But I think those are both wrong.
SU: Close, but no cigar.
MA: Sue knows.
JN: Sue knows?
SU: No.
MA: No, I don't know either. (audience laughs) She knows. You should know.
Audience member: It's thirty-seven galleons, fifteen sickle, and three knuts.
MA: That's some impressive knowledge.
JN: Those knuts or they would not have...
SU: Knuts.
JN: Knuts.
MA: Knuts, knuts, knuts, knuts.
AM1: According to Scholastic, they pronounce it k-nuts.
SU: Is that how they say it on the little...?
MA: Don't they also say "Voldemort" and she says "Voldemor."
JN: That's like accio. I hate accio.
SU: 'Cause I feel...
JN: How many think it's "asio"? I would prefer it to be "asio."
MA: I wanted it to be "achio" because I'm Italian. (audience laughs) That's how you say it. Hey, achio. That's what it is.
SU: Well, maybe they say that at the little Hogwarts of Italy. You never know.
MA: Yeah. The Hogwarts of Italy is called Achio.
SU: Well, maybe so.
MA: Achio magic. Magica. Something, anyway. Okay, if you guys are regular listeners of PotterCast, you know that we also do Canon Conundrums. John asked me this week what a conundrum was.
JN: I did not! That was somebody else.
MA: You so did.
JN: Somebody else asked you what a conundrum meant, and then you defined it as an enigma, or something. I was like "what are you defining big words with bigger words." (MA and audience laugh) I don't know who you're talking to here.
MA: A letter limit on the words. (JN: Yeah.) We've been soliciting your ideas about what we should talk about on this tour; the big remaining questions. This is not really that big of a remaining question, but we wanted to talk today about what you guys might think a Death Eater, why Death Eater? What does that come from? Why is it a Death Eater?
JN: It's an odd name to pick for a evil bunch of folk.
MA: There's a Slytherin over here that's got an idea.
SU: She's already to go.
MA: A demonstrative what? Poster? Wait, I got to get my glasses. I'm old.
SU: No, she has to come up here. I've got to see this. I like it. People bring...
MA: Oh, my God. Is it about Death Eaters?
SU: Show and tell, love it.
Audience member: It's a whole theme.
MA: There's a whole theory here. (SU: Wow.) Help us, here. Hold on, we'll hold this.
JN: Make sure our cameras can see it over here.
Audience member: Okay, I guess I'm holding it.
MA: What are your names? What are your names?
Brittany Vaughn: I'm Brittany Vaughn. This is Rose Williamson.
Rose Williamson: Hi. Brittany's the Slytherin, I'm the Ravenclaw. So, she wants me to explain. (audience members and JN laugh)
JN: (laughs) Very nice. Wowee. I think the Hufflepuffs flew back home.
MA: Well done. Well done.
RW: We were very curious about the deluxe cover. And the Antipodean Opal Eye. So, we looked up antipodes like everyone else and found the normal stuff: opposing sides of the world, summer equals winter, midnight equals noon. And we realized J.K. has kind of an obsession with opposites. So, for example, July 31st is Harry's birthday, and Tom Riddle's birthday is December 31st. We thought that was pretty interesting, so we were looking at other dates. And somewhere on a forum I had seen Walpurgis Night, which is the opposite of Halloween. And it's the exact opposite. It's April 30th, which is six months after October 31st. Well, J.K. Rowling also said that she was going to name the Death Eaters originally, the Knights of Walpurgis. So, that was really interesting, too, considering Sirius Black's mothers' name is also Walburga. So, there's a lot that has to go with this April 30th date. So, we're thinking something really important is going to happen on April 30th.