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.