Arrrrrrrr! Today is Miss Hermione Granger’s 23rd birthday (using the timeline from the CoS DVD). We at TLC wish her a very yo-h-ho and a bottle of rum-day, as she shares her birthday with International Talk Like a Pirate day! Coincidence? Ah, who knows…

Yorkshire Today reports that the Hogwarts Express “returns to Scarborough on Saturday, for its first public engagement since the official Harry Potter train was attacked by vandals in the resort.”

Thanks go out to Jen, who brought this Texas Quidditch site to our attention!

Christian Coulson (Tom Riddle) is the latest special guest to be confirmed for Collectormania, which will be held October 3rd through the 6th at Middleton Hall in Buckinghamshire. Also appearing are Toby Jones (Dobby), James and Oliver Phelps (the Weasley twins) and Matthew Lewis (Neville). Thank you, Sarah and Iris!

Chinese fans will get a nice surprise – in an attempt to circumvent further illegal translations of Order of the Phoenix, China will release the book on Sunday, more than ten days ahead of the scheduled release date.

Could the latest Harry Potter novel carry the faltering children’s book industry through to the end of the year?

The writer who translated the first Harry Potter novel into Welsh discusses the difficulty in doing so, as well as her hope that she’ll be picked to translate others in the series. Thanks to Narcissa for the link!

Thanks to editor Megan Morrison and all of Team TLC, we have a brand new FAQ (Frequently Answered Questions) sheet. Have a question about TLC? It’s more than likely in there. Check it out!

JKR was parodied on last night’s season premiere of Crank Yankers (a Comedy Central program in which crank calls are re-enacted by puppets). In the episode, a humorous crank call was placed to a librarian by “Lady JK’s assistant”, who wanted to book an appearance for JKR. The “assistant” butchered the pronunciation of Rowling and …read more!

JK Rowling is included in Fortune’s list of the youngest, richest, and most powerful people in the world.