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Despite continued planning with Professor Trishna regarding their joint lesson, Myrni was still a bit nervous about working so closely with another colleague on a project. She was well aware of her own idiosyncracies (both in her life and in her teaching style) and she wasn't sure how they would match up with those that others had. She could tell that Professor Trishna was an interesting person (one reason why she liked the idea of working with him) but they were still getting to know one another and that had the potential for making the lesson a disaster, even in light of their efforts to plan.

Myrni quietly greeted the students from her own class and she relished the thought of working with the new crop of seventh years from Tapendra's class. Once they all were settled into seats and Tapendra himself was also present, Myrni decided that it was probably a good time to jump right into the class.

"Good morning everyone. I apologize to those of you who do not normally take Arithmancy and would never, in a million years, consider waking this early for class," she joked with a smile, noting the yawns and attempts to brush the sleep from their eyes. "Hopefully the lesson that Professor Trishna and I have put together for you will be of interest enough where you won't feel compelled to fall back to sleep."

Myrni took a moment to walk down one of the aisles in the classroom, passing by a few students and she paused when she reached a row with a student on either side. She touched the desktops in front of them with her fingertips and continued, "So, the board might give you an idea of what we have in store for you. With Valentine's Day being close upon us, we'd like to talk to you about what it means to be compatible with others." Myrni tilted her head slightly to one side as if to be really considering something. "Let's get the discussion going with me posing this to you all. What are reasons we want to know if we are compatible with someone else? And then what are the methods we use to come to a conclusion about it?"

Dion stifled a yawn - he'd have normally gotten up at this time, but Dax had been very...Dax-ish the night before and he'd had a hard time getting to sleep. He looked up at Professor Lebvartian blearily and raised his hand after a moment.

"If you don't mind, Professor," he said. "People want to know if they're compatible so they can...feel better about an existing or tenuous relationship, usually romantic in nature - or sometimes to back up a failing relationship, as an excuse to..." Up until the last part, it was as if he'd read it out of a textbook - but he faltered and shrugged sheepishly. "As an excuse to claim the relationship is doomed early on and end it," he finished. His reply wasn't as verbose as he would otherwise have liked it to be. "Most people resort to guesswork - or quizzes and the like. The magical ways to test it are many... but I assume you'be be looking for Numerology?"

Matty was actually happy that this morning Arithmancy was a joint class with the Astronomy students. It wasn't because he had never taken astronomy and was intrigued by what he could learn from the new Professor but because he could spend the next hour with his girlfriend. Addie didn't take Arithmancy and Matty didn't take Astronomy but because of this rare joint class they could actually spend a little time together where they normally wouldn't have been able to.

Matty sat comfortably next to Addie and was a little surprised at the question Professor Levartian posed. Compatibility? That could be used for so many things and meant so many things to so many people and not always the same thing. In a relationship it usually meant how well someone got along or how 'meant for each other' they were. It was the same in a friendship, the more things one had in common with a friend usually meant the more compatible they were.

"People usually look for common interests when building a relationship. A base compatibility that can be attributed to shared traits. Like personalities often draw to each other. If someone was brash and selfish you wouldn't think them to be compatible with someone that was withdrawn and selfless."

Grace liked the thought of  combining Arithmancy and Astrology, but she was somewhat wary of having a class with Professor Levartian given what had happened before break. It was still hard to look at her Head of House without thinking about seeing her figure sprawled on the ground and covered by Bombay.

The topic for the class caused Grace to smirk. Valentine's Day had always been an interesting time of year for her to watch others be bitten by the love bug. She wasn't sure if she was lucky or cursed in never really having a serious, romantic relationship to worry about. She saw the havoc it was wreaking on some of her classmates and decided to count her lucky stars - so to speak.

She listened to Dax and Matty's responses to Professor Levartian's question and decided to weigh in herself. "I think some methods of determining compatibility tend to be very superficial or more black and white. I think it's hard to stuff relationships into a neat little box because are talking about the human element. So any method that's used may have a certain amount of validity but it's not perfect either. And some people take the different methods more seriously than others." Grace splayed her hands out in front of her on her desk. "For instance, a lot of people talk about opposites attracting....how that tends to bolster two people being compatible with one another. Some people think that if two people are too much alike, that takes the fun and excitement out of a relationship. But then again, if two people are two different, then that might make it hard to sustain a relationship long term. I think it depends on the two people involved though. Not everyone wants to work that hard to be compatible with someone."