Fees for Harry / Running Water /... Bath, Stove, and More

[Steve]

No: HPFGUIDX 179346

---  "zanooda2" <zanooda2 at ...> wrote:
>
> ---  "Catlady (Rita Prince Winston)" 
> <catlady@> wrote:
>  
> > If that tent had running water when they used that same 
> > tent at the> Quidditch World Cup, why did our three take 
> > the tea kettle to fill it at an outdoor tap
> 
> 
> Maybe it's only because Arthur was determined to do everything
> as if they were Muggles camping. He insisted on putting the 
> tent up by hand, and on making fire even though there was an
> oven in the tent. Besides, it was mentioned in GoF that the 
> tent had a bathroom, and what's the point of having a 
> bathroom without running water :-)?
> 
> 
> zanooda
>

bboyminn:

That was going to be my answer; Arthur want to do everything
'Muggle Style'. 

But on the issue of the Bathroom, or more correctly the 'toilet',
do you suppose the 'disposal' (he said euphemistically) aspect 
of the room actually used water? If it did use water that
water aspect was probably more of an illusion since there would
be no plumbing underneath. Likely it used some kind of
vanishing spell. But was it a permanent device oriented 
vanishing spell similar to a vanishing cabinet, or did it 
require the 'wave of a wand' to make it work? 

Now Tap-water would be a different matter, there is really
nothing to dispose of, just water-in/water-out.

And as long as we are on the subject of utilitarian appliances,
I wonder about cook stoves and refrigerators. Are these 
magical object with cooking and heating spells on them. Do
they use fuel of some type (gas, electricity, etc...)? 

Or, for a refrigerator and freezer, did Molly simply place
cooling and freeze charms on parts of her existing kitchen
cabinets. Or, maybe she simply placed the various cooling 
charms on the food items themselves and placed them in the 
normal cupboard. Or, maybe she has a refrigerator-looking
object that needed or had cooling spells on it. 

We do know Molly and the tent had a cook stove, or object that
look like cook stoves, but is it one of those illusions like
the Hogwarts Express or the Wizards Wireless that merely 
mimics real world objects, or are are they wizardly real?

By that I mean, does Molly merely have a cook stove-looking
object in and upon which she casts her own flame charms, or
are the flame charms actually built into the stove; turn a
knob and magical flames appear? 

And as long as we are on the subject of cooking, which ties
to the subject of food, where do wizards get their food? I
don't recall hearing about or seeing or even the implication
of a wizards grocer in any of the books. Yet, they do manage
to get food. Think of all the food related items needed to 
keep Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlor in business, or the many
coffee shops, Inns, Pubs, and cafes we see. 

At Grimmauld Place, once Kreacher became 'nice', he seemed 
to have magically discovered an endless supply of food. It 
all had to come from somewhere.

Once we have a source of the food (and other items) then 
comes the complication of paying for them. In my own private
Potter fantasy world, I imagine, many years in the future,
Harry and Ron being quite rich, and not wanting to bother
with such mundane things as money. So they made an 
arrangement with Gringotts to accept their signatures as
authorization for payment. When ever Harry or Ron buy
anything in the wizard world, they merely sign their name
to the back of the sales receipt, and the merchant sends
that to the bank. The bank then takes the signed receipt
as the equivalent of a check, and pays to the merchants
account the amount indicated. Nice, clean, and easy.

Now a variation of that, that might have allows Sirius to
purchase Harry's broom, is that instead of the signature of
the account holder, the bank vault is named. Sirius's note
said to remove the money to pay for the broom from bank
vault #711. Perhaps, like a Swiss Numbered Account, that
was enough to authorize payment, especially when the
payment is going to a reputable business. 

Just a few rambling thoughts.

Steve/bboymiin