Yahoo News 7 Harry Potter facts that are really pretty weird when you think about them
Every Harry Potter fan has probably imagined what it would be like to attend Hogwarts at some point or another. The spells you'd like to use, the robes you'd be able to wear, which House you'd be sorted into, the list of magical hijinks goes on and on.
The problem is that not everything in the wizarding world is rosy, and we're not just talking about Voldemort. Actually, there are plenty of weird occurrences in that universe that, frankly, make us feel better that our letter to Hogwarts never arrived.
1. Witches and wizards used to just vanish their... business
Ew. Before witches and wizards eventually accepted that Muggles had actually invented something useful and installed plumbing, according to a feature on Pottermore by JK Rowling, magical folk "relieved themselves wherever they stood and vanished the evidence".
Can you imagine being halfway through a conversation with someone on the way to Transfiguration class, see them losing focus and just know what was happening? Blergh.
Not to mention that 11-year-old Hogwarts students barely know how to float a feather, never mind use a Vanishing spell, which are only taught in fourth year.
2. Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans: the dark side
"They mean every flavour" – Ron Weasley, who warned us all.
Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans are introduced as fun, magical and highly marketable sweets that can taste of anything from delicious toffee to "alas – earwax", and as much as we don't want to spoil the fun, here we go.
Dumbledore had a vomit-flavoured bean back in the day, as well as an earwax one, so who's to stay there aren't other bodily function beans available on the market (see point one for ideas). And where does it end? How macabre did Bertie go with his vision? We'll stick with Starburst, thanks.
3. Ron shared his bed with Peter Pettigrew
In the wizarding world, you might think that you are snuggling up to your nice rat, but that animal may turn out to be a middle-aged Death Eater in disguise.
True, we don't know how often Scabbers slept in Ron's bed, but it's definitely canon that he roamed the sheets and pillows, and frankly, that's gross enough.
It's not just pets either, since how could you ever really know you weren't being overheard when Animagus exist? Rita Skeeter used her skills as a bug to listen in on conversations and McGonagall spied on the Dursleys all day as a cat. You'd just be suspicious of all animals.
4. Dumbledore may be gone, but his night-soil remains
Dumbledore once revealed, while telling an anecdote about how confusing Hogwarts can be, that he once got lost on the way to the bathroom and ended up stumbling upon a room of chamber pots, AKA the Room of Requirement.
It stands to reason that Dumbledore relieved himself in the bathroom (not vanishing it on the spot like back in the day), then tootled off to bed. That means that there is a version of the Room of Requirement that is filled with chamberpots... including one containing Dumbledore's ancient effluvia.
What lucky student will one day stumble on this prize?
5. What the hell was Aberforth doing with that goat?
Albus' brother, Aberforth, was once in the papers after being prosecuted for "practising inappropriate charms on a goat".
Let's unpack this for a second.
At Hogwarts, they are always practising charms on animals. They vanish kittens in their fourth year, for crying out loud! They turn rats into goblets. They turned mice into snuff boxes.
So since whatever Aberforth was doing was big enough to hit the papers, we have to concede that he wasn't just turning them into a useful bit of furniture.
JK Rowling has touched on this subject once, but checked how old the questioner was before answering. She said: "I think that he was trying to make a goat that was easy to keep clean, curly horns. That's a joke that works on a couple of levels."
Sure, JK. Sure.
6. If you're magic, chances are you're related
Harry, stop fighting your 16th cousin six times removed!
Yes, many pure-blood wizarding families were descended from the three Peverell brothers, Ignotus, Antioch and Cadmus. Of course, this meant that Harry and his biggest enemy, Voldemort, were very, very distantly related to one another.
Chances are, if you live in the wizarding world, it's probably best not to try one of the DNA Ancestry kits.
7. They're all spiking each other's drinks
Mad-Eye had it right: drink from your own hip flask at all times. If you lived in the wizarding world, a single drink of something could change your life forever.
In the books, it is revealed that Voldemort's father, Tom Riddle sr, was regularly given a love potion to stay with his mother, Merope. Ron accidentally ate chocolates laced with love potion (and then was poisoned by drinking mead).
Umbridge tried to get Harry to drink veritaserum (truth-telling potion) without his permission or knowledge.
For goodness sake! Just stick with water, from the tap. Thank goodness, again, for plumbing.
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