Hi, Everyone!

[Catlady (Rita Prince Winston)]

THE OLD CROWD -- INTRO
 
***Name:
Rita Prince Winston
 
***Nicknames/IDs:
catlady_de_los_angeles (Yahoo)
Catlady (Fiction Alley)
catlady at ... (e-mail) 
 
***Age, Birthday, Place of Birth:
45
November 7, 1957
Los Angeles California 

***Home
Venice, California -- I live in a two-bedroom apartment half-a-mile 
from the beach. It's in a beautiful low-rise complex with a big lawn 
with a couple of old trees. Currently there are some wild ducks and 
ducklings from the canals eating the grass from the lawn. My landlady 
is an angel-darling.
 
***Family:
I don't have any children, intentionally.
Both my parents are dead, which is something along the lines of "good 
riddance"
I have one brother, two years younger, who works at Stanford 
University in Palo Alto, but in the last ten years, the only contact 
we bother to have is to e-mail Happy Birthday to each other.
My domestic partner is named Tim Merrigan (I call him Timcat). I 
pretend to support us and he pretends to keep house.
There are currently four cats in the household: Cinnamon, Elway, 
Taliesin, and Pixy. I reminisce of the late Nan, Obi, Sasha, and 
Fancy from my adult life, Cindy and Pippin from my youth, and Foggy, 
Wally, Winthrop, Linda, Smokey, and T'Challa from my childhood. 
My best friends are Lee and Barry Gold, who live nearby (two miles 
inland, in a *single-family detached house*). 

***Education/Job
I dropped out of Bryn Mawr College -- if I had stayed, I would have 
flunked out.
Then I got an Associate (two year) degree in Data Processing from 
Santa Monica College.
Then I got a job as a COBOL programmer.
Which I still am, currently at LACMTA 
(Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority).

***Other things we might want to know about you:
I lived in New York City May 1980 to October 1984.
I met Tim at LASFS (Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society) and used to 
go to cons and write in apas. 
Would it come as a great surprise that I dote on cats?
And am a Wiccan? altho' not very observant.
And heterosexual?
You-uns have probably already noticed that I'm an unreconstructed 
liberal. (The rules against discussing politics on HPfGU are wise.)
But maybe not that I'm INXJ, and really *very* shy in person.
And *very* fat. 

***Current/recent reading:
Current events (which is VERY depressing).
Magazines about archaeology and science.
HPfGU main list and OT
no time for anything else
altho' I used to read fanfic by Lori, Cassie Claire, Ebony, Heidi, and 
Barb -- all wonderful.  

***First contact with Harry Potter:
1999. Lee lent me the first three books (of which I had previously 
heard on NPR, but not paid attention). I instantly was addicted, 
staying up all night to read them all. I talked about the Potterverse 
until all my friends were bored out of their minds (they think the 
Potter books are very nice, but not as excellent as many others). I 
had just been invited to an e-group for a totally other interest, so 
I got the very original idea of checking whether there was an e-group 
to discuss HP ... and here I am!

***Extent of Potter obsession:
Less than Extreme: I don't collect multiple copies of the books or buy 
a lot of the merchandise and I didn't make (nor even buy) a movie 
Hogwarts uniform ... but I *do* write a Snape/Draco/Pansy fanfic ...

***Favourite Potter things:
I'm a Ravenclaw.

PoA is my favorite book.

Remus/Sirius is my favorite ship, which doesn't keep me from enjoying 
Remus/OC and Sirius/Lily fics. I am unable to get emotional about 
shipping the Trio, but do insist that McGonagall/Hooch is obviously 
canon truth.

Remus is my favorite beloved, Sirius second, fanon-Draco third, 
Severus fourth...

I have the big blue mug with the Hogwarts shield on it, probably my 
favorite merchandise (why did they stop making it?). I also have the 
(US) set of four House Mugs ... I like the House shields with whole 
animals on patterned backgrounds MUCH better than the House shields 
with torn-off pieces of animals on the original calendar ... but I 
like the "boats to Hogwarts" picture on the original calendar (all 
those lights on the dark lake, and the fancy castle on the cliff, 
look so magical that I can ignore how ugly they made Ron) so much 
that I got that mug, too.

I have the Christmas stocking that says "Harry Potter" on it with an 
idealized picture of the Sorting Hat and some stars and glitter. It 
was a present, but I love it. I hung it on the wall of my cubicle 
along with my Christmas stocking with a cat on it. That Christmas, 
other friends gave me a Dept 57 box, a figurine, a look-into-tube, and 
a box of HP-themed butter cookies. Except for the butter cookies and 
the pretty box they came in, I put those things in the linen closet. 

Oh, I also have a denim tote bag with the Hogwarts shield on it, 
currently hanging on a doorknob holding yarn to crochet an afghan.

I bought the DVD of the first movie right away and haven't watched it 
yet, so I didn't bother to buy the DVD of the second movie.