An All Nighter

I remember now why I don't stay out and party anymore, it's not necessarily the booze that gets you, it's the staying up all night.

I had gone to the release party for book 5 a few years ago and wasn't planning on going Friday night for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

At the last minute I decided to attend the Harry Potter festivities around town. Bryon kept Grace and I stayed in town after work.

I went to the 5th movie (Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix) which was GREAT! I just barely made it to the early show that night and got a perfect seat amongst a crowed house. The movie was better than the book for me. The 5th book was my least favorite. It could have been at least a hundred pages shorter if she had just cut out some of the bitching about homework etc. We got it, he's a surly teenager...give it a rest.

After the movie I went downtown and met up with the White Family (Tina, Kevin and the boys) and we checked out the supposed Harry Potter festivities. Not much really going on. I all sounded better on paper than it actually was. The kids had some Butter Beer at the Moxie (which turns out is cream soda and butterscotch flavoring) and we all headed over to Borders.

The parking lot was PACKED! There were HUNDREDS of people there! It was about 8:30 by the time I made it to Borders and I saw my friend Dawn there too and we hung out a while. I finally found some books and magazines and settled onto a cozy piece of floor to wait it out until midnight. By this time I was committed. I wasn't going home without a book! I had stopped by on my lunch hour to get a wrist band just in case, so I could line up when the time came. My band was silver, second on the color tier from the top. Only later would I learn there were 150 bands given out per color.

At midnight it was pretty much chaos. No one would move from their spot. They had all 5 or 6 checkouts going but I realized pretty quickly it was going to be at least another couple of hours before I could get my book PLUS another hour home.

I gave my wrist band away to a lady who was low on the book totem pole and high tailed it over to Wal-Mart where I got it $3 dollars cheaper in about 5 minutes! I didn't end up getting home until 1:30, and not to bed until 2 am. Bryon was settled in and snoring like a freight train so finally I made up the futon and slept in the spare room. I got 5 hours of sleep that night.

Good thing this is the last book! I'm too old for this stuff :)