I've been told, now that I'm conscious and can get my voice to work, that I should update this thing. So now I am. Mr. Malfoy and Miss Bulstrode have visited me today, and Pomfrey tells me that more Slytherins have requested to come. Certainly they may, though I do not know why they would wish to.

So. I am alive. One of my students is dead, and one of my friends, and other people whom I have had reason, at one point or another, to care for. And I am alive. I did not know what was going to happen. Moreover, I freely admit that I am still not sure what did happen; like Xiomara, I seem to be suffering intermittent memory loss. Also I cannot walk yet and my left hand is crippled. They say it is permanent nerve damage.

I have never been one for inspiring speeches, and I am certainly not going to start parroting them now. I will only remind all of the students of what my Slytherins should already know: when catastrophe has struck, there is only one thing left that we can do. We survive.

My, my, you certainly all are a busy lot these days. Hooch is being followed around by a strange little ape-man whom I am given to understand is somehow genetically connected to her, a revelation I find somewhat disturbing. Ronald Weasley is still an idiot, and Finnigan's girlish charm continues to endear him to all he meets. And while innocently perusing the journals, as I have been so gently reminded by our august headmaster to do, I ran across a thread in which Harry Potter discusses sex that made me want to remove my brain from my skull and scrub it clean with copper wool. A cleansing charm would not be enough, one suspects. I am not paid enough for this. Minerva, do try to keep your students' hormones from actually sloshing out of their ears, won't you? It would be a kindness.

I have a few hours before I must deal with some unpleasant business, and perhaps it would not be a complete waste of time to pass them in rumination, however idle. I have Lilitou and a single glass of rather good sherry that I am not obliged to share with any of my usual freeloading companions.

Malfoy and Bulstrode are out of the hospital wing, now. I trust they have gotten the requisite amount of sleep, for they are going to need it in the face of the detention I am about to dole out, which I expect to last several hours. One does not interfere in a wizards' duel, but one may certainly administer the appropriate consequences when it is done. Even such a childish exercise as this. Our seventh-year students -- all of them -- should have come to the understanding that it is past time to put away these infantile games that waste energy and can even cause physical harm. The health of my Slytherins, especially those about to leave my care, is not a laughing matter to me; a serious world awaits them beyond these walls, and there is no one to administer gentle warnings there. There is no guarantee, in fact, that there will be any kind of warning at all.

Still and all, one does one's best. There is a certain peace that comes in accepting one's life for what it is, one's accomplishments for what they are. I am not sure what brings me to remark on these subjects now, and less sure what prompts me to share them with an audience, but I don't suppose it matters very much one way or the other. The students of Hogwarts will do well to make what they can of their time; that is all.

It took the better part of last night and this morning, but I have finally succeeded in getting this literally accursed machine up and running again. You will no doubt be shocked, yes, shocked and appalled to learn that it was Black who cursed it in the first place. At first I was incensed. Then I realised that Black's little prank would relieve me from updating this ridiculous journal for the foreseeable future and decided that discretion was the better part of valour. They say every cloud has a silver lining, but frankly, this is the first time I've noticed any such phenomenon.

Needless to say, the headmaster eventually noticed, and so my holiday from technology has come to an end. I have less than no interest in reading the backlogs of the so-called "friends" page to see what sorts of boring exploits you have all been up to -- don't we get enough of that anyway? Really now -- but I will freely admit that the sight of many of you running around like headless chickens preparing for your inevitable doom come N.E.W.Ts-time is quite refreshing. Fear is indeed a wonderful whetsone for the mind; a concept I have always known, and naturally have employed it in my pedagogical philosophies.

At any rate, I am back. And I am watching you, as always. Unless, of course, you are insipid or dull, in which case I shall continue to ignore you.

BLACK YOU SAID YOU HAD REMOVED THE CURSE ON THIS THING GET DOWN HE

ucking sodding thing had better

Very well, that was a false alarm but I believe that now

It's been over a bloody month but I think this bloody thing is finally worki

I hate parties.