Mrs Norris: A Character Study

[Brooks R]

No: HPFGUIDX 1077

--- In HPforGrownups at egroups.com, "Sister Mary Lunatic" <klaatu at p...> 
wrote:
> >>>She is probably able to "notice" Harry when he's under the 
invisibility
> cloak.<<<<
> 
> This is something that makes me wonder.  Harry always thinks that 
Mrs.
> Norris is looking right at him when he's invisible, and yet the cat 
never
> goes up to him and performs any action that would reveal his 
presence.  She
> just stares at the space where he is.  Since she seems to aid Filch 
in
> catching delinquent students, why is she not attempting to bring 
Filch's
> attention to the invisible Harry?


One possible answer - with all the ghosts around, she thinks that 
something in an invisibility cloak is just another one of those,
which might be interesting to watch, but are clearly *not* in the
supervised students category.  

Almost everyone with experience with a cat, and many people with 
experience with a dog, have noticed that sometimes the critter seems 
to be intently watching something moving that the human cannot see. 
I call those "Cobblies" (Cobbly, singular) after one of the stories
that make up Clifford D. Simak's _City_ . (Wherein men leave the
Earth and a civilization of talking dogs they created, and left 
behind, takes over. The 'Cobbly worlds' in the story are alternate 
dimensions very near to our own, which animals can sometimes see into 
when we can't, so that is what they are watching.  In the story, 
something unpleasant from one of the Cobbly worlds breaks the 
interdimensional barrier and arrives in this one.  But anyway, i
think Mrs. Norris assumes that the something she sees is an unusual 
ghost, or else one of whatever cats really are seeing when we can't 
see what they are watching.

-Brooks