How much do I love Harry Potter?

I got into Harry Potter when the third book was already out. I would read the books during class. I was so adamant and unabashed about reading the books in class my math teacher would ask me how I was liking them (presumably to embarrass me and get me to focus on her lesson) and I would answer truthfully that they were awesome!

When the fourth book came out I was at a summer camp with a bunch of girls I liked. I ignored them and finished reading the fourth book. Seriously, I ignored girls for Harry Potter!

When the fifth book came out a really close childhood friend of mine who I hadn't seen in two years was visiting me. I read the book in front of him the whole first day he was visiting and then finished up on the second day when he was leaving. I haven't seen him since.

When the sixth book came out I had just started college and had tons of homework. Instead of doing my homework I picked up the book and read it nonstop until I was finished without even eating the whole day. To top it off my dad and little brother who lived more than one thousand miles away were visiting me at college and I ignored them along with my homework. I almost failed two classes because the projects that were due were supposed to be built upon as the quarter progressed.

When the seventh book came out I couldn't wait for my copy to arrive so I read the poorly photographed pages online before Amazon even shipped out my book. I had really bad eyestrain afterwards!

Without Harry Potter I'd have never gotten into fantasy. While I waited for each book to come out I would read loads of other magnificent fantasy books and I have Jo Rowling and her boy wizard to thank for that! I tried reading Lord of the Rings and Narnia when I was younger but didn't like them. After reading Harry Potter I grew to appreciate and even love them.

When I wasn't reading I was working on my Harry Potter websites. I would skip lunch at school to go to the library and use the computers to work on US Harry Potter (now the Harry Potter Friendship Network) and Hogwarts Live. I even skipped tons of parties and ignored many invitations from friends (some were rather attractive) just to work on improving these websites. I spent all four days of my fall break one time fixing all the textual errors on HL. And who even knows how much time I spent promoting HL on forums, chatrooms, search engines, directories, blogs, topsites, social networks, etc.

For the first whole year I ran HL I paid for all costs of operation until in the fall of 2005 after trying a myriad of advertisers and adding loads of stuff to the Prefect's Lounge I was finally able to cover monthly upkeep. Which, is a really good thing cause I had just moved out on my own to start college. This meant a bunch of new and very major living expenses and at the time HL's $80 a month hosting was a lot to someone who only worked part-time. So, thanks to your love of Harry Potter and many generous donations over the years HL will still have many magical times ahead of it.