“I’m not sure I would write ‘I love you’ on a postcard where the mailman and your mother could see it.” BSC Super Special #3: Babysitters’ Winter Vacation (1989)

Before I begin, I need to point out that this has always been my least favorite super special. I owned 1-4 and 6-11. I reread my favorites a dozen times or more. I think I read this one twice, maybe three times. I think part of it had to do with the fact that, in my head, it’s even more ridiculous than the SS where they get stranded on an island (my absolute faaaaavorite). The other part had a lot to do with the fact that Mary Anne drove me absolutely nuts all throughout this book.

So Stoneybrook Middle School apparently is a very lucky school, because they get a (low-cost) vacation to Vermont every year courtesy of the Leicester Lodge. They have a Winter Carnival full of outdoor sports. And because the BSC is stupid, they agree to play babysitters to a group of elementary school students whose teachers are injured. Here are everyone’s stories, in the order they first get a chapter:

Mary Anne: Logan is in Aruba so she spends the whole book mooning, worrying about a ghost (did she turn into Dawn?) and worrying because she hates a gym teacher who is their chaperone.

Stacey: Meets a guy and falls in (ready?) luv.

Dawn: Is a giant klutz, falling down left and right. And she fights with Mary Anne, who’s being all self-centered.

Kristy: Is in charge of the whole carnival and gets too far into it (there’s a shocker.) She guilts some people into taking part, including a guy who breaks his leg.

Claudia: Thinks her ski instructor has a crush on her, but eventually finds out he’s married.

Jessi: Worries because she’s in charge of the talent show. Also thinks one of the elementary school girls, Pinky, is racist. Doesn’t want to do anything wintery because she might get frostbite and not be able to dance anymore.

And last and least interesting:

Mallory: Does her stupid #$^*ing Harriet the Spy schtick again. Lame-o! And she’s afraid of a dance.

Interesting Tidbits

I am soooo dorky. I was trying to remember which sitter was the frame for each book—the reason that the sitters all sat down and wrote about their exploits. I know Kristy is the cause for #7 and #8 and Jessi is behind #9 and #13. Stacey is behind #2 and Dawn, I think, behind #4, #5 and #12. I’d have to pick up the others to remember exactly, although #1 and #15 were kind of a joint effort and I think #6 was a Claudia story. This is the only Mary Anne.

Mary Anne says you get to meet new people at Leicester Lodge, which is fun. But if she’s really shy, wouldn’t she prefer not to meet new people?

Kristy = funny? If you say so, Mary Anne. Not the first word I think of when I think of Kristy.

Richard reminds Mary Anne to brush her teeth; she stifles the urge to remind him she’s not a baby. She then turns around a few minutes later and reminds him to feed Tigger while she’s gone.

Leicester Lodge Lounge Lizard. Sounds like a really bad cabaret act.

Even writing on a shaking bus, Stacey still has to dot her Is with little hearts.

There are 382 kids at SMS, but this is early on the series. Tons more kids move to town before it ends.

Dawn mentions “The Shining.” I hadn’t watched that movie when I was reading these books. And since I got nightmares from “The Stand,” I have no intention of ever watching it.

Mallory and Jessi are afraid of getting lost. Why? It’s a hotel! You can’t tell me they’ve never been to a hotel before. We know Mallory has.

Heh. To calm Mal and Jessi, the older girls show them around. They ride the elevator to the top floor of the dorms to show that all the dorm floors are the same. Claudia points out the candy machine on every floor. Jessi asks if they have to ride up and look at all the candy machines every time they head downstairs.

In the first Kristy chapter, she addresses her letter to everyone in her family individually. Luckily, she left the pets off.

Claudia spelling: minut (twice), loge (twice), straving, waht, whith, hospitle. She also uses four for for and there for their. Stacey helped her spell figure (by telling her there’s no Y in it…)

Dawn snores. And I don’t know why, but I take great pleasure in that.

Mary Anne worries about Logan cheating on her with…ahem…”a girl who wasn’t shy and who was good in gym.” Yeah…

Real book: Jessi gives Pinky Matilda by Roald Dahl to read. One of my childhood favorites!

MA wants everyone to contribute so she can make a book for Logan, showing him what he missed. So why does Stacey think that Logan would want to hear about her latest crush?

Even though Mal’s Harriet crap is boring, she did make me laugh a couple times. First, she copies Mary Anne’s notes and shows that at one point, MA wrote Mary Anne Bruno and then Logan Spier. Then Mal comments on the ghost that supposedly haunts the lodge: “But maybe that explains the white thing I saw in the corner of our dorm last night. Then again, it might just have been Stacey’s bathrobe, hanging on a hook.”

One of the lodge employees has worked there since 1930. Which was a long time even back then, and this book was published 25 years ago. (My surviving grandparents weren’t even born in 1930.)

Claudia owns a Polaroid.

Both Claudia and Dawn are mad at Kristy, which is only fair. She’s acting like a bitch. She’s mad at Dawn for being a klutz on ice skates. Claudia judges the ice sculpture contest (see my comment below) and chooses a winner from the other team, so Kristy’s being super-nasty to her on the ski slopes.

Here’s what I don’t get. If Kristy is organizing the events, why is she also a team captain? That makes no sense. Even worse is the fact that Claudia is allowed to judge the ice sculpture contest. If she’s on a team, then she shouldn’t be allowed to judge. There are enough teachers that they should have been able to make it work without student input.

Claudia spelling time again! Juge (twice), juging, totle, sclupture (twice), whanted, Cheshur (Cheshire), realictic, Ahsley. She also uses planed for planned bite for bit and no for know.

Mal says something and Jessi says she sounds just like her mother. I can totally see that. Mal spends a lot of time playing second mom anyway. You know that someday, she’s either going to end up with a whole house full of kids herself, or she’s going to boycott that and remain single and childless her whole life.

In her entry for Logan’s book, Dawn writes the following: “Mary Anne, are you really going to put all this stuff in your book for Logan? Try to tone it down a little, okay? It’s embarrassing.” Okay, first, if it’s embarrassing, why even write it in the first place? Second, I really wonder how much of this book would actually make it into a book for Logan. Would she really tell him about all the time she spent mooning over him and his imaginary girlfriend? (At the end she says she realized she needed to cut that out of his book, as well as the bit about all the letters she wrote him.)

Claudia steps on Stacey’s hand when she gets out of bed. Of course. Can’t let that joke die!

Spacey Stacey. Heh.

I LOOOOOOVE when Mary Anne and Dawn fight. They’re total bitches to each other.

This fight isn’t as good as the one in #31, but it’s still pretty awesome. Because the Conway Cove kids are with them, they fake being civil to each other and go completely overboard. “Thank you.” “Oh, you are so completely welcome.”

You guys know Dawn isn’t exactly my favorite babysitter most of the time, but I actually feel for her in this book. Mary Anne was being totally self-centered. Kristy was being an ass to her. And I like the character development (even if she forgets it by the next book): she realizes she actually does care what others think about her to some extent; she’s not as much of an individual as she thinks she is. I feel like that same point is brought up in a lot of Dawn books, and then forgotten again.

List of things Dawn says she’s survived: the divorce, moving to Connecticut, Jeff moving back to California…and the Trip-Man.

Despite actually not hating Dawn in this book, I take amazing pleasure in the fact that she sets a world record for Fastest Bankruptcy in Monopoly.

Jessi has dimples. Has that ever been mentioned before?

Mary Anne keeps trying to write Logan letters, which is stupid because she says she’s not going to mail them. Plus, they’re awesome. One is about how she yearns and pines for him; another, in her own words, sounds like something you’d write to “an eighty-five year old great-aunt who has blue hair and stuffs Kleenex up her sleeves.” The third begins, “Dear Logan, light of my life.”

Logan actually calls Mary Anne from Aruba. Those two are way too attached.

I just love how all the ‘ghost stories’ the teachers tell around the fire are old urban legends: the Choking Doberman; the dead boyfriend above the car…

Mal’s excited about the snowstorm because they might have to be evacuated and then they won’t have a dance! Dumbass.

Claudia strikes again: Goerge (George), snowstrom, wright (right), excatly, inchis, complaning, prefect (perfect), compertitons, afternon, monring, waht, shinning, frist, broght, gogles, improtent, speel, impresed. She also uses wine for win, and Stacey helps her spell Guy (her ski instructor…since he’s French, he pronounces it Gee, which is what she wrote first.) If Stacey’s helping her, shouldn’t she spell check everything? Claudia says Stacey helped her speel, after all.

Jessi, to Mal: “Relax. You look like you’re being carried off to jail. This is just a dance.” (She ends up dancing half the night with the same guy.)

The title quote is what Mary Anne writes in response to Stacey’s guy, Pierre, writing I love you on the postcard he sends her. I have more of an issue with the fact that he’s about thirteen and he thinks he loves a girl after spending a week with her…

Mary Anne and her dad actually pick Logan’s family up at the airport.

I just realized that, other than making fun of her spelling, I kinda neglected Claudia and her ski instructor. This is partly because that plot line didn’t start until the book was more than halfway over and partly because it’s just so Claudia to assume that any guy who pays attention to her must like her. I could also say I neglected Stacey and her boy Pierre, but they get even less attention in the book than Claudia. Here’s a Daria quote to sum up how I felt about Claudia’s storyline: Ms. Barch: Why don’t you apply for a federal grant, dear? Send an inquiry to the U.S. Department of Deluded Adolescents.

New Characters:

Kids from Conway Cove elementary school: Ginnie, Bryce, Priscilla “Pinky” Winkler, Amber, Joey, Renee, Corey, Kara, Valerie, Ian, Ryan, Kathie

Outfits:

Teensy (a lodge employee): jean overalls, plaid shirt, painty baseball cap

Mallory: red and white sweater with jeans

Coming next: #30 Mary Anne and the Great Romance

“You two sound cuckoo.” BSC #27: Jessi and the Superbrat (1989)

This is a short one, not because the book is awful, but because I’m reading while battling a respiratory infection and going on thirty-six hours with no sleep.

Before I start, two things. 1) Does anyone know if Stoneybrook High School has an established mascot? I seem to remember one but can’t recall what it was.

2) I nearly wrote Superbra instead of Superbrat a few times while writing this. Jessi and the Superbra might have been more interesting.

Jessi’s star-struck when she discovers that one of the stars of Becca’s favorite television show, Derek Masters, lives in Stoneybrook when he’s not working in L.A. (or as Becca calls it, L.P.) Coincidentally—or not so much, for a BSC book—the Masterses come back to Stoneybrook shortly thereafter. Jessi’s hired for a bunch of jobs with Derek and his little brother and discovers that Derek’s having a hard time fitting back in. The girls are all star-struck and the boys make fun of him. He mentions one particular boy, whom Jessi calls the Superbrat, who does a bunch of nasty things to him. Claudia helps him make friends and, just before he moves back to L.A., Derek admits that the Superbrat never existed—all the things he said the brat did, Derek actually did to other boys in the class.

Meanwhile, Derek tells Jessi she could be a model and actress, so she actually looks into getting an agent while in the midst of auditioning for Swan Lake. But when she gets a part, she realizes that ballet is her real love.  

Interesting Tidbits

The cover of this book cracks me up. All four of the boys (presumably Derek and the Pike triplets) are seriously disturbing in appearance, and Jessi’s proportioned like a flat-chested Barbie: her head is too tiny for her body, while her legs are super long. And let’s not even talk about the awesome outfit. (She’s trendy Kristy—in jeans, turtleneck and sweater/sweatshirt.) Also, why does everyone have their own birdie? That’s not how badminton is usually played…

 

 

Weird! When I went looking for this cover online, I found one where they had redone Jessi’s face so that she looks like does in the much later covers. But they didn’t change anything else. She looks closer to 11 than thirty that way though.

 

I think that of all the characters in the books, I was the most like Becca when I was growing up. I was all quiet and shy around strangers, and a loud nutcase at home. Oh, and I had giant crushes on television stars…only mine were on Steve Burton and Shemar Moore. Yummy.

Jessi keeps confusing Derek with his brainiac character, Waldo, to the point that she thinks that he might be able to help her with her sixth grade science homework.

Mallory suggests a television show: Babysitter for the Stars. A) That sounds like something Kristy would come up with…and then actually try to pitch to a network and B) Didn’t that air on some cable network sometime in the last ten years?

At one point, Jordan is spelled as Jordon.

Ugh, Karen. Say no more.

Okay, say more. Jessi says Karen chews on life the way a puppy chews on a slipper. That’s…both accurate and hilarious. She leaves behind a hot mess when she’s done.

Why the &$^! would Kristy tell Karen that there’s a celebrity in Stoneybrook? Even at six, she’s the type who would stalk someone. Plus, she thinks she’s going to be the next star. We all know the only thing Karen could star on would be an obnoxious reality show. Oooh, I’m thinking of a fanfic where Karen is one of the contestants on The Bachelor. (I will not actually be writing it…the most Karen is allowed to show up in my stories is as a mention, and even then, just about everyone has to be disdainful of her.)

I always wonder why Kristy agrees to let Hannie and Amanda come over at the same time when she knows the two of them just argue all the time.

Then again, I always wonder why ANYONE wants to spend time with Karen. She’s bossy, rude, bratty and self-centered. And those are her better points.

Jessi: I can’t get all my hair to stay in the elastic, Daddy. Mr. Ramsey: Did you try gluing it? (And then he offers to shave her head to solve the problem. Can he be my dad?)

Claudia spelling: meen (and that’s her third try!), realy, nise, Derich, reelly, whent, Derick, frends, fingirs. And of course, she writes the entry because she’s…babbysitting!

Ooh, Mary Anne forgot to write down a job! Shocking!

Mrs. Masters is NOT good at keeping a secret. The BSC hosts a surprise party for Derek before he leaves, and Mrs. Masters keeps not-so-subtly asking Jessi if they need more items for the party. It reminded me of when I taught school and my students and I threw a surprise party for our paraprofessional. The kids kept saying things like, “Miss, what kind of cake do you like to eat at parties?” (The title quote is Derek’s response to the conversation.)

You got to wonder why the Masterses even bother coming and going from Stoneybrook. Wouldn’t it be easier on Derek and Todd (and their parents as well) if they just moved to L.A. until Derek was done? If he plans to be a working child actor, it seems to be pointless.

Remember when cereal boxes had prizes in them?

Eight year old Derek has better spelling than Claudia.

Outfits:

Claudia: pink t-shirt, red skirt, black footless tights

New characters:

Derek and Todd Masters (8 and 4)—33 and 29

Next week: Yay, it’s super special time!

“We passed a Howard Johnson’s and Mr. Kishi said we could go in there to eat because he knew the manager personally, and I thought he meant he knew Howard Johnson.” BSC #26: Claudia and the Sad Goodbye (1989)

Claudia’s grandmother Mimi collapses and is taken to the hospital. She gets some blood transfusions and then goes back home. Claudia gets testy because Mimi isn’t feeling well and is testy herself. Mimi goes back to the hospital, where she passes away in the middle of the night. Claudia gets mad and then feels guilty (I think she goes through just about all the stages of grief in 147 pages.) Eventually, she realizes that Mimi helped make her a better person and honors her memory with a collage.

Meanwhile, Claudia and Mary Anne are hosting an art class for various sitting charges, including Corrie Addison, whose parents enroll her in every activity imaginable in order to avoid spending time with her. Corrie is obviously unhappy with this arrangement, so Claudia eventually points that out to Mrs. Addison. She makes an effort to spend time with her…temporarily.

Interesting Tidbits

Claudia’s dad is a partner in an investment firm. Notice how all of the BSC parents are professionals? No one’s a truck driver or an electrician or something like that.

Claudia says that Janine’s IQ is “like, nine million.” I’ve always wondered about her IQ because they make such a point of her being a genius. I know a girl with an astronomical IQ. She just turned fourteen and is a sophomore in high school, although she takes most of her classes at the community college for dual high school and college credit. Her parents didn’t want to hold her back but they didn’t want her to be too far ahead of her peers either.

Claudia describes what she’s wearing that day, and it’s exactly what she’s wearing on the cover! Wow! Even the Christmas light earrings:

 

Mallory freaks out because Mimi scolds her for something she never did. Then Claudia gets annoyed/scared because Mimi gave Mal a bird from her collection. That’s something she hadn’t been doing…yet.

Claudia has a box labeled ‘art suplys’. That’s kind of vague. Shouldn’t it say ‘charcoles’ or ‘pant brushes’ or ‘pastells’ or something?

Claudia explains how to prevent getting salmonella from meat. Great. We’re getting cooking lessons from someone who probably would spell chicken as chiken. (Plus, I just hate thinking about raw chicken anyway.)

Janine’s college class (according to Claudia): Advances and Trends in Computerized Biopsychiatry.

I don’t know why this disturbs me so much: when Mimi needs to be rushed to the hospital, Claudia immediately sets down the hot tureen she was serving soup out of directly onto the table. She mentions that the mark has never come off the table. I guess it’s just kind of a horrible reminder of what the family went through that day. I’m more disturbed by the mark on the table than I am with Mimi being carried out by the paramedics.

During the first art lesson, Gabbie spends all her time mixing paint colors in the water and announcing what colors she makes. Later, Jamie decides to give her a lesson on colors and shapes, and tells her she gets a ‘J-plus.’

For some reason, Mary Anne’s handwriting looks shaky and off in her notebook entry. They always make a point of what good handwriting she has, but I’ve always thought Kristy’s handwriting was easier to read.

Mimi starts to feel better the second time she goes to the hospital. She actually makes a joke that she’s a vampire, because the doctors have to keep giving her blood.

Claudia makes a point of closing Mimi’s door in the hospital. She notes that Mimi had to get changed with the door open and wants to respect her privacy and dignity. At this point, it’s about the sweetest and most meaningful thing she could do for her.

Mimi, in turn, says something very sweet to Claudia, who doesn’t even know what it means: “My Claudia, never believe what other people say. About you. Never unless you believe it too. I love you.”

Everyone’s all awkward during the BSC meetings after Mimi’s death. Janine sits in on the first one because she doesn’t want to be alone (which seems sweet and totally in character for what little we actually know about her). At the second one, people are still being quiet because they don’t know what to say, so Kristy tries to distract them by talking about bras and food fights. One question: was this during the same conversation, or two separate ones?

Jessi’s apparently the only one who doesn’t want anchovies this time. I know it’s been mentioned before that Kristy likes anchovies. I wonder if she’d be up for my favorite pizza: pineapple and anchovy?

Everyone gathers at Mary Anne’s after the BSC meeting, and that’s where they eat the pizza. They also tell Mimi stories, and Mary Anne says the title quote as part of a story about the first time Mimi had pizza.

Stacey really keeps a sitting notebook for her jobs in NYC? The hell?

Claudia actually wonders who’s babysitting for all the kids of the friends who came to Mimi’s funeral, since all the BSC members are in attendance.

Claudia’s been extra tired (because she’s been working hard at not thinking about Mimi), so she worries that she’s coming down with leprosy, of all things.

I’d expected to cry at some point in this book, and I did…but not when I expected. The kids made papier-mâché puppets in Claudia’s art class. Corrie goes on and on about how her mom will be so happy when Corrie presents her Nancy Drew puppet as a gift. But when her mom is almost three hours late picking her up, she shoves the puppet at Claudia and says she doesn’t want her mom to have her after all. It totally broke my heart.

This is when I thought I’d cry, because I’ve remembered this part ever since I was ten: Mimi wrote her own obituary and even listed the correct year for her death. Janine uses it to point out to Claudia (who feels guilty, like her occasional frustration with Mimi led Mimi to ‘give up’) that Mimi just knew her time was up.

The image of Claudia’s parents hooking pinkies and saying ‘jinx’ made me laugh.

Outfits:

Claudia: lavender plaid cuffed pants, green shirt, suspenders, beret, fleece lined high tops, Christmas light earrings

New Characters:

Sean and Corrie Addison (10 and 9)—35 and 34

Next: #27 Jessi and the Superbrat

“But if you spit anything across the table at me—I’ll make you sit in the high chair.” BSC #25 Mary Anne and the Search for Tigger (1989)

In case you couldn’t tell by the informative title, Mary Anne’s kitten has disappeared. The BSC has emergency meetings, put up flyers and search all over the neighborhood. They get a ransom demand from a little kid who has no idea where Tigger really is.

Meanwhile, Logan’s been distant and crabby. When Mary Anne discovers that his sister Kerry, lonely because she hasn’t made friends yet, was hiding Tigger in her closet, she accuses him of knowing about it. But it turns out he’s just a crappy ball player and that’s why he’s been such an ass recently. He and Mary Anne make up and Tigger is safe, so happy ending.

Interesting Tidbits

I’ve always wondered about why MA’s cat is named Tigger. Did AMM have a cat named that as a girl? And more importantly, did they have problems with Disney for using the name?

The cover. First, Logan’s never looked more like Zack Morris than in this shot. Also, check out his awesomely 80’s high tops. Speaking of awesome, Mary Anne’s outfit is the best. Grossly oversized sweatshirt, spandex pants with tubular 80’s design down the side tucked into her socks. Makes me almost glad this is sorta coming back into fashion. (If you haven’t figured it out by now, I am being as sarcastic as I know how with this statement.) This is also the first cover where Mary Anne has two pigtails, something that becomes her trademark for a while.

 

Also, the boy on the cover looks totally bored. He’s like, “Forget this. I’m gonna go play some Nintendo.”

Ha! Mary Anne describes Claudia’s room as a ‘rat hole.’ Accurate, but not as nice as MA usually is.

I love that Mary Anne knows she could take Logan inside her house, even though it’s against her father’s rules, because he’d never know, but she won’t. She can’t bring herself to break the rules. We all know someone like that…some of us (ahem) are that person.

Aww, MA also wonders what Logan possibly sees in her that makes him like her. Get that girl some self-esteem.

Real book: Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeleine L’Engle. I guess she finished reading A Wrinkle in Time.

Bruno family description time: Logan and Hunter have the same curly, dark-blonde hair, but Hunter looks like Mr. Bruno, while Logan and Kerry look like Mrs. Bruno. Kerry’s hair is straight, thick and lighter blonde.

Kerry calls Hunter Huntie, which just makes me laugh.

Hunter’s list of allergies is pretty long, and his room is bare of toys and anything else that could collect dust. I remember my cousin’s bedroom used to look like that when we were kids. He outgrew all his allergies, and we were joking some time back that I grew into mine. (Mine are nearly as extensive as Hunter’s.)

Of course, when you have a missing kitten, there’s only one thing to do: call an emergency BSC meeting!

Ooh, a thirty dollar reward for the return of your cat. If someone stole him, that’s bound to make them return him! (Here goes the sarcasm again.)

Why is Jessi giving Squirt whole grapes? You’re supposed to cut them at least in half so they’re less likely to make him choke. Bad babysitter! (The title quote is what Jessi says to Becca after Squirt spits a grape right at her.)

Wait…what? We’re given the red herring that maybe Charlotte took Tigger because she loves him. (She was playing with him earlier in the story.) Becca says Charlotte wishes Tigger were hers, and Jessi says that Charlotte doesn’t have any pets. But in the very first sitting job with Charlotte, Stacey freaks out because the lights go out and she keeps hearing noises, but it’s just Carrot, the schnauzer. And I know Carrot is around later, so he’s not like the Pike family cat who is never seen or heard from again.

Aww, Squirt needs to stop being cute. First he fake sneezes, and then he poses like a muscle man.

More real books: Baby Island, which Jessi reads with Becca, and Sounder, which Jessi reads by herself.

Mallory is running down the street throwing Tigger’s missing flyer into mailboxes and MA asks if she’s in training for the “poster Olympics.”

Mary Anne is supervising Jamie, Myriah and Gabbie as they search for Tigger. She’s concerned that one of them will find him…dead. But she’s worried because she doesn’t want him to be dead, not because of the trauma to a 2, 4 or 5 year old at being the one to find a dead cat.

Ha! I’d forgotten about the ransom attempt! Some kid who MA talked to when putting up the Tigger flyers sends a ransom demand for $100. She takes it seriously despite the fact that the handwriting looks like a kid’s. She briefly considers telling her dad, but then changes her mind because she thinks he won’t let her pay the ransom. Honey, even the FBI suggests you don’t pay ransoms without proof of life.

A disturbing but surprisingly accurate sentence: “Kristy loves emergencies.”

Heh: Logan: “Mary Anne, you’re acting like such a girl.” Mary Anne: “I am a girl.”

Logan’s the first one to suggest a kid wrote the ransom note; he’s also the one to come up with the ‘plan’ of stuffing an envelope with Monopoly money and putting it out for the alleged catnapper so they can catch him (or, as Dawn points out, her) in the act. (Of course, this actually works, but the kid doesn’t actually have Tigger or know where he is.)

They actually reschedule Shannon to cover a sitting job so they can all be there to bust the ransom artist.

This book is just full of stupidly quotable moments. From Dawn’s notebook entry in which she muses about the gossip chain in small-town life: “The California town I lived in is bigger than Stoneybrook, so it’s not like the entire neighborhood knows each time you take a bath.”

Sharon-ism: She’s apt to put socks in the bread drawer.

I don’t know why this is so funny to me. While Dawn is babysitting Buddy and Suzi, they lock Pow away in a box so he can’t get ‘basset-napped.’ Buddy starts describing a pet-napping ring…which actually happens in one of my favorite mysteries, #7 (Dawn and the Disappearing Dogs, or it is known among my circle, The Mallory Book.) Dawn keeps insisting that the Barretts don’t need to worry about dog-nappers (or basset-nappers, or Pow-nappers.)

Dawn reads Millions of Cats to Suzi. Very apropos.

Mmmm, fish eyes and glue…aka, tapioca pudding. Anyone hungry?

Logan threatens to make a citizen’s arrest on the boy who sent the ransom note, telling him he committed a felony.

Claudia spelling time: She’s babbysitting again (this time, for Maria and Gabie/Gabby Perkin and Jami). Other spelling: dective (detective), invinted (invited), thoght. She uses their for they’re and there for their, threw for through. The funniest part is that when the kids are playing detective games, Gabbie keeps calling detectives defectives. Claud makes sure to spell that very carefully so that the others can understand—and she gets it right all three times she uses it!

It’s a good thing this was before Abby’s time: for years, Claudia thought Elvis was Elbow Presley.

Myriah and Gabbie Perkins: Pet Detectives. Coming soon to (no) theater near you!

What has Myriah been watching that she thinks a lot of ‘private eyes’ live in Hawaii? Even in 1989, I don’t think five year olds were interested in reruns of Magnum.

MA is sitting for Hunter because he’s too allergy-riffic to go to the dentist. (Mrs. Bruno says he’d probably sneeze and bite the dentist.) His sneezing is worse, and he reveals that he knows that Kerry is hiding Tigger in her closet.

“Kerry is a champion sneak. She could hide a whale in the house and we’d never notice him.” “Not until you smelled him.”

Claudia suggests MA is overprotecting Tigger like her dad used to treat her. MA jokingly replies that Tigger may not date until he’s 16 and isn’t allowed to get his ears pierced.

Final thought for the book: I just love when the books I get at the thrift stores are the original ones from when the stories were first published. Even though the cover on this one looks like crap and the book is almost moldy, there’s some appeal by having the original sweepstakes and stuff in it. Apparently, there was a ‘Who’s your favorite babysitter contest,’ which Stacey overwhelmingly won. Claudia came in second, followed by Dawn, Mary Anne and Kristy (who only had 1/4^th of the votes Stacey did!)

Outfits:

Claudia: blouse with a coat of arms, short black skirt, scarf as a belt, short black boots, dinosaur earrings (which go soooo well with the rest of that outfit) and a seashell hair clip (ditto)

New characters:

Kerry and Hunter Bruno (9 and 5)—34 and 30

Next week: We mourn the loss of Mimi in Claudia and the Sad Goodbye.

“I’m eating slowly, okay?” BSC#24 Kristy and the Mother’s Day Surprise (1989)

Guess which holiday this one covers? Several things are going on. For starters, the BSC puts together an outing for their clients the day before Mother’s Day so that the moms can have a day off. Stacey (who has no life, I guess?) comes to hang out in Stoneybrook just so she can help with the event. They take twenty-one kids to a carnival.

Meanwhile, two other Mom-related things are going on. Mary Anne’s all kindsa sad briefly on-and-off through the book because she has no mom. And Elizabeth keeps talking about babies and being mushy and weird. She and Watson adopt a Vietnamese toddler and name her Emily Michelle. And suddenly--because we all know that having a kid solves all your family problems--the Brewer-Thomases feel like a family and all is well.

Interesting Tidbits

Before I even start this one, this is something I was thinking about at work today. (You now have a vague idea of how boring my job is—I think about the BSC during work.) Kristy takes the bus to school because she lives out of the boundaries for SMS. I’m fairly certain that the school she’s supposed to be going to is called Kelsey. But who actually goes there? All of Kristy neighbors appear to send their kids to either Stoneybrook Academy (Karen, Hannie, Linny) or Stoneybrook Day School (Shannon, Tiffany, Maria, Max, Amanda, Bill, Melody, Bart). And of course, Abby and Anna go to SMS. This turns out to actually be relevant, because Kristy mentions everyone in her neighborhood going to private school.

The cover: I’ve looked at this cover probably 100 times before for various reasons. And not until today did I ever notice that the boy on the right in the green striped shirt is playing with the girl in the skirt’s hair. What an odd choice, Hodges Soileau.

 

Oh no, I have to stop wearing layers. I’m dressing like Dawn!

I’ve always wondered about Kristy wearing a visor at meetings. She says she likes to look like she’s in charge. But the only people who ever see her at meetings are club members and maybe Claudia’s family. And they all know she’s president, so why? (That’s totally rhetorical, because it’s just a power trip on Kristy’s part.)

Claudia spelling: Jessi finds M&M’s in a box labeled ‘pastils and charcaols.’ (Interestingly enough, M&M’s are written as M and M’s in one spot, and then M & M’s two paragraphs later.)

Kristy’s so thoughtful. Everyone’s discussing at to get for Mother’s Day, and MA says she doesn’t have to worry about it. It gets all awkward and Kristy’s like…we don’t know what to say. “Sorry we have moms and you don’t?” Could have been worse. She could have actually said that to MA, not just thought it.

This book is hella full of ham-fisted foreshadowing. Karen and Andrew and DM are acting like brats at the dinner table. Even Sam is being bratty—he tells Karen her epidermis is showing, for cryin’ out loud—and Elizabeth and Watson are sitting there talking about how beautiful their family is and how lucky they are to have all these great kids. (Humorously, when Elizabeth asks how everyone would feel about another brother and sister, the older three are all for the idea of her getting preggo. I don’t know many high school kids who would welcome a baby into their family with open arms…if only because it’s proof that their parents are having sex.)

Best ending to a family dinner ever: Boo-boo comes in with a still-living mole he’d caught. My cats can’t even catch bugs for the most part. (Dobby thinks that if he meows at them enough, they’ll fall into his mouth. Or something.)

Aww, sad foreshadowing. Kristy notes that Mimi seems slower and older these days. Ultra mega sad face.

OMG…it’s the I’m Awesome necklace! It’s one of the moments in BSC fashion that I just never forget. Because we all know that if you have to tell people how awesome you are, you’re really not awesome at all. Sorry, Dawn. (BTW, I love the fact that Kristy wonders where she got it and then says, “Probably California.” Because apparently, that’s where the narcissists all live. The cool ones, anyway.)

 

BTW, found this. Dawn would probably like it:

 

Claudia spelling: Babbysat (yay, that one’s my favorite!) waht (twice), wher, discovred , printending (pretending ???, twice), circos, thight, glas, anser, probelms. She also uses there for their, bake for back and clone for clown. The last one is pretty funny; she says that Jamie was printending (still ???) to be a clone.

What’s with AMM and little kids messing up the lyrics to songs? I remember distinctly one book where I think it is Max Delaney who keeps singing my hysle cat instead of my high silk hat. In this one, DM keeps singing about iceboards instead of icebergs. That kind of makes sense. But Jamie is singing Home on the Range and gets most of the lyrics wrong. I can understand a kid not understanding a word or two in a song because I’ve done that myself. But Jamie’s silly lyrics make absolutely no sense.

Kristy’s mom cries when she gets her ‘surprise’ invitation. Kristy says it’s like she was watching Love Story or Brian’s Song on television. Seems needlessly specific. How many ten year olds in 1989 had seen either of those movies?

Jessi’s really super excited to meet Stacey…because she sleeps in her old bedroom. To me, that would be more freaky than anything else.

Ooh, more foreshadowing: Stacey’s excited to come to Stoneybrook because her parents have been arguing.

The meeting with Stacey in it is actually all awkward. Mal and Jessi don’t know how to act around Stacey; Stacey’s all wistful for living in Stoneybrook; Mimi comes wandering in, looking for a cow. (I did not make that last part up.) Finally, as a distraction, Kristy says, “I wonder what my mom will look like when she’s pregnant.” And Dawn replies, “Like she’s going to tip over.”

And we’re back to talking about how Claudia and Stacey met by running into eachother again. I like that version of events better than the one in last week’sbook. Although, at my middle school, it would have been more like, “Bitch, don’t be trying to copy me!” and then a cat fight because they were wearing the same outfit. Kristy even suggests they were mad at each other because each was trying to be the coolest.

Funny moment (to me): When they get to the carnival, Karen of course wants to go in the haunted house. It’s decided that Andrew, Archie, Suzi and Gabbie are too young to go in. Jenny opts out also, because the house is dirty. Last time I checked, she’s the same age as Andrew and Archie and Suzi’s actually older than she is. I guess Kristy (who didn’t want to invite Jenny and keeps saying EW in regards to her) just wanted to point out how prissy she is?

Mallory refuses to let Margo ride any of the rides because of her motion sickness. She finally relents and lets her on the merry-go-round. Margo repays her by barfing all over her shoes. (When they eat lunch, Kristy tells her to eat slowly. She says the title line about half an hour after everyone else is done eating.)

Poor Shea. Karen has a crush on him. Run, Shea, run!

Interesting. Mal knows a lot of songs that she uses to keep the kids focused on something. Many of them were ones we sang at Girl Scout camp, but quite a few didn’t seem like songs little kids would know. I always knew tons of kiddie songs growing up, and songs like “The Ants Go Marching” (which Mal starts with) always work best because you don’t have to know all the words, just the general gist. We used to use that one, “Herman the Worm” and “Found a Peanut” for that purpose. But “Hey-ho, Nobody Home”…I used to sing that whole series in a round with a bunch of seventh graders at camp, but I wouldn’t expect seven year olds to know it.

Claire’s Mother’s Day card says Happy Moths Day.

Mary Anne’s thirteen and she just thought of giving her dad a Mother’s Day present? You’d think some adult might have suggested that by now.

David Michael, after finding out about Emily Michelle: “But I guess a little sister will be okay. I mean, I’ve already got one, and she hasn’t killed me yet.”

Okay, here it comes. My rant.

I have two adopted cousins. One of them was adopted in much the same way EM would have been, in the same time frame. She was two years old and adopted from Korea in 1987. And my aunt and uncle paid thousands of dollars, were on a waiting list for things to clear up—legal issues, etc—for several years before they were able to adopt. And then they had to fly to Korea to claim her and spent several weeks there before even more legal red tape was sorted out.

Watson and Elizabeth have been married for less than a year. They never left the country—someone brought Emily to them. And while there are countries where you don’t have to go to pick the child up, you’d think they’d want to if they could. And even though they claim they’ve been trying to adopt for a while, they find out about Emily one day and get her the next. My aunt and uncle found out about my cousin and went to get her several months later.

Now Dawn’s in on the act of misheard song lyrics. She sings Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds’ “the girl with kaleidoscope eyes” as “the girl with colitis goes by.” And while, according to a book I own, that is actually a commonly misheard lyric, how has Dawn ever heard of colitis?

Outfits:

Mallory: SMS sweatshirt, jeans with zippers on the legs (remember when those were cool?), gold hoop earrings

Jessi: jeans, leotard, gold hoop earrings that match Mal’s

Mary Anne: black and white checked skirt, matching hair bow, (no shirt I guess? Way to go Mary Anne!), necklace with her name spelled on it (and probably her number…after all, she’s shirtless!)

Dawn: dress, plaid high-top sneakers, I’m awesome necklace, four different sized hoop earrings

Claudia: dress, red tie, socks that were red, blue and purple, spider earrings; blue shirt, blue and black leopard print pants tied at the ankles, purple high-tops, mega accessories

Kristy: jeans, sneakers, turtleneck, sweater; jeans, collie hat, t-shirt with a picture of Beaver Cleaver on it (REALLY?), SHS sweatshirt

Stacey: pink jumpsuit, white t-shirt, jellies (for chasing kids around in? Bitch, please. Those things would chafe your feet raw. There’s a reason no one wears them anymore!)

New characters:

Emily Michelle Thomas Brewer (2)—27

Next week: #25 Mary Anne and the Search for Tigger, where we get to delve into the problems of a family we don’t get to see too much—Logan’s.

“What do you know about bulking up?” BSC #20: Kristy and the Walking Disaster (1989)

They should rename this book “Let’s make fun of Jackie Rodowsky again!”

The little editor’s note at the end of the book makes it clear that Ann M. Martin wrote this book because she “had fun” writing about Jackie. He’s written like a cartoon character, but he’s so nice and sweet that the BSC can’t help forgiving him for the disasters that happen around him. The title of the book is kind of mean, because Jackie’s actually a decent player. He’s just klutzy and messy. (I am going to keep track of every accident he has though.) Kristy has another one of her “brilliant ideas.” (Cue Blair Warner from The Facts of Life.) Because there is a whole bunch of BSC clients who want to play softball but are too young or scared to try out for Little League, she starts Kristy’s Krushers to fill the void. As she mentions about 5 million times through the book, the average age of the players is 5.8. Kristy meets Bart Taylor who also has a similar team (although his players are older) and the Krushers play the Bashers. They don’t win, but they prove they’ve got team spirit and guts. It’s like watching reading Rudy. And Kristy develops a krush on Bart.

Interesting Tidbits

Cover love! Other than Kristy and Jackie, I have no idea who these kids are supposed to be. They’re all kinda adorable though. (But a rather large proportion are blond…)

 

Mary Anne brings Tigger to the meeting, and he keeps distracting everyone by being adorable: playing with ribbon, sitting in a shoe. Then he completely disappears…only Mary Anne doesn’t notice for a while. He turns up on Janine’s computer.

How does Amanda Delaney know so much about Bart? Does she know his brother or something?

Kristy does math: She figures half of boys are normal and half are jerks, while in her neighborhood, half of both groups are snobs. So Bart has a twenty-five percent chance of him being a decent human being. (I’m surprised she thinks half of the boys her age are normal.)

I’m trying to figure out why exactly most of these kids can’t join t-ball or other softball teams. Not Little League necessarily, where you’re expected to have at least a little talent, but a lot of communities have less-competitive softball teams for kids. It’s not like Kristy and Bart were the first people to come across the idea that kids who aren’t particularly talented might still like to play.

Jackie “oopses”: Makes a giant mess trying to make pink lemonade; threw a baseball into the neighbor’s gutter; knocked over some stuff in the garage; tripped on a shoelace.

Kristy decides that twenty kids is enough. I can’t imagine any thirteen year old wanting to take on twenty kids by herself voluntarily, especially when one of them is a toddler. (My niece is two and a half and she’s tenuously potty trained and is a handful all by herself. Good thing Gabbie Perkins is so angelic, right?)

Also, shouldn’t she need permission slips and legal documents? Watson and Elizabeth could be sued up the yin yang if one of these kids breaks a bone or gets a concussion while playing, which is always a possibility.

In this story, Hannie is seven while Linny is still eight, and Buddy is still seven and Suzi is still four.

Kristy makes a list of questions that need to be answered such as “Where can we practice?” and “How often should we meet?” The final question is about whether Bart likes her. She presumably shows the list to Watson, as he helps her find answers to all the other questions. I’m really hoping she erased the last question.

Ugh. This is embarrassing to write, but when I was a kid, I would have been with Karen. I would have hated that the team was Kristy’s Krushers because it’s not proper spelling. You all have to know how much it’s killing me to agree with Karen on anything.

Claudia spelling! First off, I announce with much glee, that she and Mal are babbysitting. Mal is presumably sitting right next to her as she is writing, as it’s a joint entry, and yet she spells her name as Mallery. How did Mal not correct her? Especially since later, when she says that Claire is compertive, Mal corrects that to competitive. (She also uses expect for except.)

Nofe-air! Nofe-air! I’ll buy that Claire throws tantrums when she strikes out or when her team loses or something, but Mallory says she throws them when she watches ball games on television, too. What the #*$@? That makes zero sense.

Kristy should have thought about how she was going to sign for Matt before she had him join the team. There must be books out there specifically on how to sign for sports. Heck, there’s a book on how to sign every curse word imaginable. I almost bought it myself. They keep signing stuff like “monkey” and “oven” instead of baseball terms.

More Jackie “oopses”: gets his gum stuck in a catcher’s mask; knocks loose a tooth, which Claudia then has to pull out; breaks a window in the school.

I think it’s funny that Kristy is grossed out by loose teeth. I happened to love losing teeth. I was still losing molars when I was Kristy’s age—I remember one just fell out of my mouth in eighth grade grammar class—and I didn’t get my adult canines until I was nearly twenty.

Unintentionally humorous. Jessi is sitting in the stands with Marnie Barrett, who is two. She’s feeding her Cheerios like she’s a nine month old. Marnie doesn’t really talk and is essentially a baby. Kristy mentions how much stuff you need with a two year old. Yet Gabbie, who is only slightly older, is like a mini-five year old, with a vocabulary, who would never sit in a stroller eating Cheerios.

I’ve always wondered why Haley, Vanessa and Charlotte never asked Becca to come cheer with them. I know she’s supposed to be shy, but so is Charlotte, and she’s into it.

I love Haley. The Bashers show up at a Krushers’ practice to check out the competition. One of them distracts Bart so they can all be rude about the Krushers players. They call Jackie Pig-pen and Gabbie a baby. They call Jake fatso and then, when Matt makes a loud animal-type sound, they call him a dummy loud enough for everyone to hear. Haley gets in the boy’s face and says, “That ‘dummy’ is my brother and if you call him a dummy one more time, I’ll personally rearrange your face.” Not only is she Matt’s protector, she’s only too ready to punch boys in their faces. She’s the girl I wanted to be at that age.

I love that whenever Watson sounds like a sentimental sitcom dad, Kristy says he sounds jerky. What kind of jerky? Beef or venison? If he were really being jerky, instead of saying stuff like, “It doesn’t matter if you lose tomorrow as long as you try your hardest,” he’d say, “Kristy, you jackass…[insert something rude and unpleasant here.]”

The title quote comes from the scene where Charlie jokingly tells his brothers and sister to bulk up before the game, so they start carbo-loading or something.

Sam and Charlie must be so popular with their classmates. “What did you do this weekend?” “I ran the refreshment table at my sister’s little kid softball team’s game….Why are you laughing?”

More Jackie: he is ‘testing’ a bat when it flies out of his hands and knocks over the refreshment table. A cake flies off the table and ends up covered in lemonade. (Sam, Charlie, Jessi and Dawn save the rest of the baked goods. I’m surprised Dawn was willing to save something with processed sugar in it); nearly hits the pitcher with the bat while batting.

A very true sentence: “Karen just cannot be subtle.”

One last Jackie moment: he knocks over a lamp while talking to Kristy on the phone.

New characters:

Jake, Laurel and Patsy Kuhn (8, 6 and 5)—33, 31 and 30

Bart Taylor (13)--38

Outfits:

Kristy’s coaching outfit: jeans, Krushers’ tee and sneakers and collie cap (jeans do not seem very sporty and even cover Kristy agrees.)

Next week: Because the next book is another Kristy (#24), I’ll be popping back/forward in time a bit to do The Summer Before. #24 will be next after that, followed by #25 to take us out of the month of February.