Harry's gift to Arthur

[Catlady (Rita Prince Winston)]

Tonks_op wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPFGU-OTChatter/message/38792>:

<< The real question is what is the deeper meaning of all of this.
What is the symbolic meaning??? What is Rowling trying to say? >>

Geoff replied in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPFGU-OTChatter/message/38796>:

<< Sometimes a screwdriver is just a screwdriver.
(With acknowledgments to Sigmund Freud) >>

To which, Annemehr replied in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPFGU-OTChatter/message/38797>:

<< I'd like one, but I'm out of vodka. >>

Like, a wizard is only a wizard, but a screwdriver is a drink? 

I can imagine that as the caption or word balloon to a cartoon of two
middle-aged witches commiserating at a bar.

But Freud's cigar was a phallic symbol only because of its shape,
while a screwdriver is not only longer than it is wide, but also has
'screw' in its name. Instead of going there, we can mention that
Arthur 'has a screw loose' when he considers eklektricity and aeroplanes.

And Tonks_op replied in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPFGU-OTChatter/message/38800>:

<< I was thinking about the wire and what it does. Why fuse wire?
Energy?? >>

Do people still speak of someone 'blowing a fuse'? I think that phrase
meant losing one's temper. If I have to seek coded symbolism, I could
say that Harry expects Arthur to lose his temper and is giving him the
junk to repair his brain afterwards? 

"Short circuit" is also a slang phrase, but I think it follows the
Humpty Dumpty principle (i.e. it means whatever the person saying it
wants it to mean). Sometimes it's even a good thing, when it means
circumventing the slow and laborious bureaucratic process. When it's a
good thing, Harry wouldn't want Arthur to 'fix' it.