BSC #22: Jessi Ramsey, Pet-Sitter

Tagline: This was one sitting job Jessi couldn't resist!

The Mancusis don't have any kids.. but they sure have a lot of pets! So when they're desperate for a sitter, whom do they call? The Baby-sitters Club!

Kristy's insulted. The Baby-sitters don't pet-sit. But Jessi's always like animals, and she talks Kristy into letting her have the job.

With snakes on the loose and sick hamsters, Jessi's got plent of pet-sitting troubles. And the Baby-sitters aren't making life any easier for her when they get into a big fight.

Will Jessi be able to handle her pet-sitting job when things are going wrong with the baby-sitters, too?

The Braddocks are on vacation this week, and coincidentally the ballet school is also closed, which leaves Jessi free for a new baby-sitting adventure! Immediately the Club gets a phone call from the Mancusis, who are looking for a pet-sitter. After Kristy's infamous first job for the Club, she has sworn off all pet-sitting for everyone ever. Of course, this doesn't sit well for the girls, especially Jessi, who believe that as long as they know about it up front, why couldn't they take a pet-sitting job every now and then? Especially since this is an emergency, as the Mancusis had originally lined up a pet-sitter, only to have them cancel at the last minute. Without anyone, the Mancusis vacation will be ruined!

So it's Jessi to the rescue. Over the course of the book (which in contrast to the last one which takes place over two months, this one takes place over the course of a week), we're treated to descriptions of Jessi pet-sitting. Things go pretty well. There's a lot for Jessi to do, but there aren't too many disasters, which is a small miracle considering how many pets the Mancusis have: three dogs (Cheryl, Pooh Bear, Jacques), five cats (Powder, Rosie, Ling Ling, Crosby, Tom), four rabbits (Fluffer-nut, Toto, Robert, Cindy) several birds (Frank, plus several parakeets, cockatoos and macaws), two guinea pigs (Lucy and Ricky), a cage full of hamsters (they're not even introduced to us!), several turtles (again, no names), and a garter snake (Barney).

A couple of times, the other girls use Jessi as an excuse to distract their own baby-sitting charges: Claudia shows up with Jamie Newton and Nina Marshall, where they go for a walk and end up walking Chewy, the Perkins' dog. Mary Anne then brings the Perkins' girls over, where they almost lose Barney the snake because Mary Anne is dumb and forgot to close his cage. Luckily Myriah just happened to be learning about snakes in school, and used her brains to figure out where Barney might be hiding. Kristy sits for Jackie Rodowsky, who is upset because he thinks he's going to lose the class election to take care of the class pet. He does in fact lose, and Kristy later sets him up with one of the Mancusis' hamsters.

The only real problem Jessi has is that she notices that one of the hamsters is off by himself all the time. As the week progresses, Jessi notices him getting fatter and fatter and more alone and irritable. Finally, on Saturday, the day before the Mancusis are set to come home, Jessi decides she better take the hamster to the vet, just to say in case something really is horribly wrong. There, we learn that the hamster is a lady and that she's quite pregnant. So pregnant that she gives birth to 10 babies the next day! The Mancusis decide that when the time is right, they'll be free to whoever wants one. Jessi, Mallory and Jackie all end up with one.

As hinted in the synopsis, the subplot of this one is that Kristy is too bossy, and it causes the other three older girls to question her and their positions in the club. Eventually the club decides to hold elections, only to realize that each girl is holding the position best suited to them. Kristy realizes that she's gone overboard with being bossy, most likely as a result of feeling stressed from Charlie being stressed about college.

Random Thoughts:

• I like reading these earlier books with Jessi as the narrator. She's not so brainwashed yet into the Club, so her perspective on the girls is interesting.
• Jessi is still rocking her job with the Braddocks. They just happen to be on vacation this week.
• Again, I'm reminded that I want to know more about Charlie Thomas. It's funny, because all these girls come from good families, so it's probably expected that they'll go on to college and make something of their lives. But most of the girls are the eldest in their families, so obviously this isn't an impending issue to any of them. Janine is older than Claudia, and is already taking some college classes on the side, so again, that's not an issue for her. Sam is still a few years away from college, but then that leaves us Charlie. I'm betting that Charlie has spent so much of his time being "the man of the house" and taking care of his siblings that he has completely forgotten about college and hasn't thought about what to do about this next step in his life. He probably didn't even think it'd be possible for him to go until recently. Until his mother married Watson, Charlie probably didn't expect to go to college. They definitely didn't have extra money lying around, so Charlie probably figured he'd have to work for a few years to afford college for himself. Plus, he probably figured he'd also continue to help take care of his younger siblings. Even if Charlie doesn't feel right taking Watson's money (I'm sure Watson would have no problems giving Charlie ALL the money he needs for college), Charlie at least doesn't have to worry about what will happen to his mom and siblings. Suddenly he's faced with a decision and life-choices he didn't think he'd have to make. I really want to know more about him!
• I like how in these earlier books, Jessi and Mallory still don't assume that they'll automatically become a professional dancer and author respectively. These are hobbies for them, allowing them to be multidimensional characters. In later books, they're pretty much defined solely by those traits.
• Further defining Jessi's individuality and the fact that she will not bow blindly to Kristy is the fact that at the first meeting of the book, she takes the Mancusi job just to spite Kristy and prove that Kristy is not the boss of her! haha Mallory also takes a stand, snarking to Jessi about how Kristy thinks she's queen
• I love how mean and petty the girls can get when they're fighting. On page 20: "At that, I heard Dawn mutter something that sounded like... well, it didn't sound nice."
• Fun fact: on page 23, Jessi uses the word "cacophony" several times to describe the Mancusi house. I remember always loving that word as a child, being super happy whenever I came across it in reading. Of course, I had never heard anyone use it aloud, so I had to come up with my own pronunciation guide: "caca-PHONY". To this day, I still have to catch myself to say it right >_< haha
• When Jessi visits the vet, we learn about white cats, and how they're often deaf. In three years' time (publication-wise), we'll get Mystery #3 Mallory and the Ghost Cat, which will have a deaf white cat as a plot point, and we'll learn that fun fact again. (Here's hoping I'll get to that book before the end of this year haha I seem to be slow going)
• I cannot believe that the Mancusis would trust an 11 year old to take care of all those pets. A random 11 year old they haven't met. For an entire week! A week is enough time for Jessi to royally fuck up one of the animals if she misunderstood one of the care instructions.
• Fun fact: when I was 12 or 13, I pet-sat for my friend's family. They had taken the dog to the kennel, so I didn't have to walk her or anything. I just had to fill the food/water dishes as needed for one cat and one bird, as well as water the plants and bring in the mail. I went over every day to make sure everything was as it should be. They said that if I could, it'd be nice to spend some time with the cat and bird so that they wouldn't get too lonely, so every other day or so, I'd bring a book and sit with them on the couch for an hour or two, just reading aloud and petting the cat, letting the bird sit on my shoulders/fly around.

BSC #21: Mallory and the Trouble with Twins

Tagline: The Arnold twins aren't just bad - they're double trouble!

Mallory knows she's a good baby-sitter. She's been looking after her seven younger brothers and sisters for years. So when Kristy offers her a steady job baby-sitting for the Arnold twins, Mal thinks it'll be easy money.

The twins sure are cute in their little matching outfits. But once Mrs. Arnold leaves, Marilyn and Carolyn turn into twin terrors! They run around the house like spoiled brats, and Mallory can't even tell them apart.

Taking care of Marilyn and Carolyn is a baby-sitting nightmare. But Mallory's a responsible member of the Baby-sitters Club - and she's not giving up!

This book starts off with a trip to the Washington Mall, the infamous mall that's an hour drive from Stoneybrook. The Pikes are on a mission to buy everyone new shoes. Mallory wants crazy fun pink ones with green trim, but when you have to shoe a large family, everyone gets what they need, not what they want, so Mallory ends up with loafers. We're reminded yet again of how babyish Mallory thinks she looks and how much better her life would be with pierced ears.

Mallory finds herself with a steady sitting job, sitting for the Arnold twins. The twins aren't new clients to the Club per se, but the other girls have only sat for them once or twice. Anyways, Mrs Arnold is on some temporary committee, and needs a regular sitter every Tuesday and Thursday for 8 weeks. Mallory is excited, thinking of all the money she'll get to make and all the things she wishes she could buy, but isn't allowed.

At first things go well for Mallory, but as soon as she remarks how cute the girls look with their identical matching outfits, all hell breaks loose. They take off their name bracelets and start talking gibberish to each other and playing tricks on Mallory. Mallory doesn't understand what's going on. She's grown up with triplet brothers, and they have never been this bad!

It takes the entire book for everyone to realize that the problem is that the twins want to be individuals, much like anyone else would. Mallory's never had problems with her brothers because they have never been forced to dress identical every single day. In the meantime, Claudia has a particularly bad time when she has to watch the twins one day over the weekend. Marilyn is supposed to go to an important piano recital rehearsal, but Claudia accidentally sends Carolyn instead!

Eventually the girls figure out that while little girls like to pretend to have twins, and like to occasionally dress alike, it can't be much fun to do it every single day, especially when no one can even attempt to tell you apart. This comes to a head when the twins have a birthday party, with some of the Club members helping, and Mallory notices that each girl gets the exact same identical generic 8 year old girl gift from her classmates.

Mallory helps the twins to talk to their mom, who feels awful because she always assumed that the girls liked dressing identically. It's then decided that the girls would be allowed to dress individually and would have more of a say in their outfits and individual expression. Everyone is happy!

The subplot in this one is Mallory's ongoing quest to stop "looking like a baby". Finally she decides to just straight-up ask her parents if she can get her ears pierced and a haircut and start buying some of her own clothes. The Pikes, being super cool, of course agree.

Random Thoughts:

• Jessi is still rocking the steady job with the Braddocks
• "Pretty much money" comes back, only this time, it's "pretty much birthday money". Is this a New England thing? Or weird slang that AMM is trying to make catch on??
• I find it interesting that the Arnold twins aren't new clients. The other girls mention having baby-sat for them occasionally in the past. Yet the twins never gave the girls many problems before. And now they become regulars.
• For some reason, this one has some of Mallory's sitting chapters start with Notebook entries. They normally don't do that for the narrator. I was pretty confused, thinking "Maybe I don't know the girls' handwriting well enough? Maybe someone had different writing in the beginning of the series??" But nope, it was Mallory.
• The Pikes actually aren't that strict. The only reason why Mallory still "dresses like a baby" is because the Pikes have to be practical. They know that everything they buy Mallory has to last, preferably long enough to get passed down to Vanessa and/or Margo. Because of that, they go for simple, classic wardrobe staple pieces. They obviously cannot afford a whole new wardrobe for Mallory and while I do know some children who wear contacts (if they're super hardcore athletic), most people I know don't get contacts til they're at least 13. The Pikes never said Mallory couldn't get her ears pierced. They probably just couldn't be bothered to waste the money on something so frivolous. So as soon as Mallory said that she wanted to spend her baby-sitting money on clothes and ear piercings, they were like, "Sure, why not?" The trouble is that Mallory had never asked before.
• There really wasn't much to this story. Basically the twins are tired of being considered one person and being completely matching. It takes the entire book for everyone to figure this out.
• If I had been Claudia, when I found out it was Marilyn I had with me, I would have made her spend the whole afternoon practicing. Yes, it's the not the same as being at rehearsal with your instructor, getting one on one feedback, but it's better than the entire afternoon going to waste.
• Mrs Arnold seems like a child. She uses her daughters as dolls essentially, dressing them up in identical matching cute outfits. All of the outfits described are pretty much "picture day" outfits: dresses with tights and matching accessories. A single bracelet. A necklace. Matching hair ribbons. All tastefully done. But highly impractical for children. How are the girls supposed to play?? Then the descriptions of Mrs Arnold herself sounds like an accessory store exploded on her, because she's described as wearing a million bracelets and necklaces and having bows on everything. It's like a little kid's version of "being fancy".
• This is the one where Claudia gets an extra hole pierced into one of her ears, resulting in her having three holes: one in one ear and two in the other. Fun fact: this is partly what inspired me to get a third hole pierced into one of my ears. I remember as a child thinking that Claudia's extra asymmetrical hole was the epitome of cool. It took me awhile to get over my fear of needles to convince myself to get my ears pierced the first time around. That was such an ordeal that I decided to leave it at that for now. But I never forgot Claudia's extra hole. When I got older, I decided to get a second hole punched into both of my ears. Again, I thought of Claudia, but I wasn't bold enough to go asymmetrical. I figured two holes would be hardcore enough. Finally, in my early 20s, I decided to get a cartilage piercing done. It was 2-for-1 piercing day at the tattoo parlor, and I wasn't sure I wanted TWO cartilage piercings. So instead I took a page out of Claudia's book: I got a third hole put into only one ear. Ta-da!

BSC #20: Kristy and the Walking Disaster

Tagline: Guess which one's the walking disaster!

They're lean, mean, they're the pride of Stoneybrook. Who are they? They're Kristy's Krushers!

When Kristy sees how much her little brothers and sister want to play on a softball team, she starts a rag-tag team of her own. Maybe Kristy's Krushers aren't world champions (how could they be, with Jackie Rodowsky, walking disaster, playing for them?), but nobody beats them when it comes to team spirit.

Now Bart's Bashers have challenged the Krushers to a real live game. It's bad enough that the Bashers truly are lean and mean - but what's worse is that Kristy has a crush on the Bashers' coach. A crush with a capital C!

Kristy is watching her younger siblings and their friends, when they all lament that they can't play softball. Some of them are too young for Little League, and all of them are too bad and/or embarrassed to play. Amanda Delaney mentions that Bart Taylor, who lives in the neighbourhood, has a team of his own, and suggests that people could join. So Kristy heads on over to check this guy out.

And check him out she does! Because Bart Taylor is very cute! Kristy is immediately smitten. Through her conversation with Bart, she discovers that Bart doesn't have anymore room on his team for more than a kid or two, which leads to Kristy deciding that she would just start her own team. Kristy decides that she'll take anyone she can, regardless of how old they are or how skilled (or unskilled) they are. She'll even ask Watson for help organizing it all.

Kristy tells the girls about her team, and immediately they start asking around and keeping an eye open for any charges who seem like they might be interested. Soon Kristy has about twenty kids, including (but not limited to) Claire, Margo and Nicky Pike, Matt Braddock, Nina Marshall, Myriah and Gabbie Perkins, Jamie Newton, her own siblings, and of course, Jackie Rodowsky. Overall, she discovers that the average age of her team is 5.8 years old. Feeling overwhelmed, Kristy turns to Watson, who helps her figure out what she's doing. Together they find a place and time to meet, and what the purpose of the team would be and how to structure the practices. The other girls from the Club agree to help Kristy run the practices.

Kristy's first practice is a relative success. Dawn and Mallory help her to keep all the kids corralled and accounted for, and quite a few parents stick around to chill, so Kristy is not left on her own with 20 kids. She holds just a friendly game so she can evaluate what skills everyone has, since she hadn't seen most of them play at that point. The team also decides on a name and a uniform: plain white t-shirts with iron-on letters that spell out "Krushers".

Kristy holds a couple of more practices with her team, and sees that although they really suck, they have a lot of heart. She also starts to see improvement and can pick out which of her players might actually be on to something. Practice gets cut early because Jackie takes off his catcher's mask and finds himself getting beaned in the face with a ball, which knocks one of his teeth loose.

Bolstered by her success, Kristy decides to stop by Bart's again to talk to him. There we learn that Bart's team is mostly older kids (7-9) who just aren't ready for Little League yet. They get to chatting, and Kristy wanting to prove that her team wasn't full of babies, challenges Bart's Bashers to a game in two and a half weeks.

The news of the big game bolsters everyone's enthusiasm, and Kristy starts assigning permanent positions to certain people to get them practicing on certain skills. Haley, Vanessa and Charlotte decide to be cheerleaders (well, Charlotte doesn't want to cheer, she just wants to spend time with her friends). The team also decides to sell refreshments at the game, and to use the proceeds to get them all matching hats. Again, the Krushers are full of spirit, and never give up. The practice is yet again cut short because of Jackie, on this time it's because he hit a homerun and broke the principal's window (they're practicing at Stoneybrook Elementary's field). Kristy is excited for her team.

At the next practice, Bart and some of the Bashers show up. The Bashers essentially act like hoodlums, hassling and heckling the Krushers, all the while having two of them run interference with Bart so that he's too distracted to notice how mean they're being. They essentially make all the kids cry, but it's Jackie being upset that finally leads to Kristy calling short the practice. Kristy, despite her crush on Bart, is angry that he can't control his team and that he couldn't see what they were doing.

The day before the big game, Kristy has one last practice with the team. Here, they play out a full game, trying to get a feel of what tomorrow would be like. Everyone plays great, and Kristy is super proud. Charlotte even considers cheerleading, and Kristy realizes just how much the team means to everyone and how much everyone's confidence has been boosted by it. Bart shows up for the last little bit, and walks Kristy home. Kristy is excited, but also confused, because he's technically her rival coach. She decides to keep things civil and baseball-related, leaving them to have an awkward good-bye.

Finally, it's the big game. Things get off to a rough start. Nicky Pike, their best pitcher, is sick. Then when the Bashers arrive, we find out that they have not only more players than the Krushers and are older, but they're also all boys with matching hats and t-shirts. Plus they have four cheerleaders. They pretty much show-up the Krushers in all aspects. The Krushers started off at bat, and got a bajillion outs (okay, only two, cuz duh), before achieving three homeruns. Kristy is worried that the team will only see the outs and the Bashers jeering, but they instead take strength in their three runs.

The Bashers get 6 runs on their turn, and then it's time for the Krushers again. Jackie, being a disaster, somehow manages to throw a bat into the refreshment stands, killing a cake and half the lemonade. He then strikes out, but not before accidentally launching his bat again. Of course, everyone laughs at him. The next thing Kristy knows, Jackie is pretending to trip and hurt his ankle, telling her that he better now play anymore. Kristy talks him through it though, and convinces him to come back into the game.

Long story short: the Krushers never give up. Even when the Bashers are mean. In the end, they give the Bashers a run for their money and end the game 16-11 for the Bashers. Most importantly, Charlotte starts cheering and everyone's confidence is boosted. When the game is over, Kristy is super proud of them, saying that even though they technically lost, it was a huge win for them, as they surprised the Bashers with how good they could be.

The book ends with Bart walking Kristy home and apologizing for how mean the Bashers have been. He admits that he was worried about the Krushers and that they are a far better team than he gave them credit for. They arrange to have another game in two weeks' time, but in the meantime, he was hoping that Kristy would want to be his friend and maybe go out to ballgame sometime or something. Kristy, of course, says yes.

There was no real subplot in this one. Mostly just about how Jackie is a walking disaster, but almost never gives up, no matter what he does or what happens to him.

Random Thoughts:

• Jessi is mentioned as having a steady job! Yay continuity!
• Bart Taylor is very, very, very cute apparently. He has a "crooked smile", "deep, deep brown eyes", an "even, straight, perfect nose", and "hair that looked like it might have been styled at one of those hair places for guys" haha
• I really really don't like Jackie. He's annoying as fuck. I don't understand how he can break so many things and be allowed to get away with it all with a smile. Even his 4 year old brother Archie is allowed to take lessons and classes! I guess the Rodowskys are putting all of the money from what would be Jackie's classes into repairing and replacing everything he destroys.
• Kristy allows Mary Anne to bring Tigger to a meeting. Kristy of the later books would never allow that. But this is when Kristy was still allowed to be a person, and not a dictator, hence her mild interest in boys and relaxed rules.
• We get a small glimpse of Janine when Tigger gets loose during the Club meeting. This just further reminds me of how much I wish we had the series from Janine's perspective. I should totes do a fanfiction of that. Or find one. I'm sure one exists haha
• What the fuck is the point of Bart's team? Most of them are Little League age, and they don't seem to be horrible at the game. Who have they been playing this whole time? Or have they just been like the Krushers, and played practice games against themselves?
• I actually really like the breakdown of how Kristy runs the Krushers: they meet twice a week, where Kristy will coach and hold a workshop for them for half of the time, then they take a break, then since there's so many of them (and really no one else besides the Bashers to play against), they divide up in half and play practice games against themselves. It actually sounds like a fun and productive way to get kids more interested in baseball. If the kids ever aged, I could see many of them going on to join Little League and being better than their other teammates because of their experience on the Krushers.
• I love Kristy's assessment of guys her age: 50% of them are normal, and 50% of them are jerks. Furthermore, in her neighbourhood, 50% are plain, and then 50% are snobs. So that gives her a 25% chance of getting a plain jerk, a 25% chance of getting a snobby jerk, a 25% chance of getting a normal snob and a 25% chance of getting someone who was normal and plain.
• I think it's really sweet that Kristy immediately thinks of Watson when planning her team. She admits that Watson's not very athletic at all (which goes with all the descriptions/impressions we've seen of him thus far: he's older, balding, a slight paunch, and eventually **SPOILER ALERT** we'll discover that he has a bad heart), but she knows he's a huge baseball fan like she is, and that he's great at organizing things and managing things. 
• I love the Perkins girls, even though they're not realistic at all. They make such a big deal out of Gabbie being two and a half years old. Those extra 6 months must be like a lifetime, because they often include her with the older kids (albeit pointing out that she's the youngest), instead of roping her in with the babies. For instance, in this book they specifically mention Marnie Barrett, who is 2 years old, and Kristy mentions that "When you go places with a two-year-old, you have to bring along an awful lot of equipment - toys, munchies, baby wipes, extra clothes, you name it."
• Again, I can't stand Karen. As if she mispells the name of her team, just because it's not grammatically correct. I mean, I'm all for proper spelling, but in this case, she's the one making the mistake. I bet you she's the kind of person who'd tell a person with an unusual spelling of their own name that their name is spelled wrong.
• I love the continuity of bringing up Charlotte and the pageant again.
• Again, I wish we had had a series about Haley, Charlotte, Vanessa and Becca instead of one about Karen (if we had to have a series aimed at younger girls at all).
• We meet the Kuhns in this one. It's interesting, because I can't think of a time when we've met a family of kids when they weren't being baby-sat by the Club. Here, we meet the Kuhns because they're friends with the Barretts. We learn that Jake is apparently a bit overweight =/
• Ugh, they mentioned brownies in the book, and now I want brownies >_< haha I fail at making brownies. Best case scenario, they're more like cake squares. Worst case scenario, they're dry as fuck. I can never make moist fudgy brownies like I want haha
• Considering the Bashers are 1) older and 2) have been a team far longer, the fact that the Krushers only lost by 5 runs is a pretty big deal.