Relations with Ron himself were strained, but, thanks to that utter cow Rita Skeeter, I had trouble with quite a few people. Skeeter had been sniffing around since the beginning of the Tournament, and her first story about Harry had alerted me to the fact that she played fast and loose with the truth. When she sneaked after Hagrid and heard the big oaf rabbiting on to Madame Maxime about how his mother was a giant, she ran with that story, and Hagrid went into a tailspin. Honestly, doesn't anybody but me have eyes? It had been pretty obvious from the second I met him that Hagrid wasn't human, if only because I know very well that no human's that big. Still and all, Hagrid's dead useful because anything that's in his brain spills out his mouth, and I need him, if only for his knowledge about magical creatures.