OMG! I know you've probably already seen this in LJ Spotlight, but I am fucking LOVING
dear_stupid. Good GOD, that comm is addictive!
Onto the book! I think this book should have been called Claudia Is A Hateful Little Toad. Cause wow, does she act like a little brat in this chapter.
John and Ree-OH-kow (oy, how that name bugs me. It's not an impossible name to have, I guess, but a far more common name would be Ryoko (or Ryouko, if we're being nitpicky.) And every time I read or think of that name, I think of someone pronouncing Ryoko as "Ree-OH-kow" (which makes me cringe, because you're supposed to pronounce the Y like a consonant, not a vowel) and ANM going "Ree-OH-kow, you say? Thanks!" and writing it down as "Rioko".) Anyway, John and Ree-OH-kow Kishi go out for dinner and leave Claudia and Janine at home with Mimi.
We get the contrast between nice, social Claudia making dinner with Mimi (and fucking spelled-out accents, sdjgfsdajkfghfdg!!!) and mean, antisocial Janine holed up in her room studying. Nobody bothers to ask Janine if she wants to help, or even what she wants to have, then Claudia's all, "That Janine! Why doesn't she ever help make dinner? Apart from the fact that we never ask her, I mean."
Claudia describes Mimi's cooking as "Somehow she always knew when to lift the lid for a perfect golden-brown waffle", which totes sounds like something out of an infomercial.
Then at dinner, Janine asks Claudia what she's doing the next day. She tells her and Mimi about cult camp and how they're not going to have an attendance list or make people come to every session, or even make people join in the flute google-blaster masturbation session if it's a bit out there for them; they're just going to keep things, um...
"Flexible?" suggests Janine. Which is actually a really good way of summing it up. But Claudia doesn't know what "flexible" means, and takes it as a personal insult, and when Janine's talking about her day, the following conversation takes place:
Mimi: You are enjoying your computer studies? (heeeee, this part totally makes me think of one of the English teachers I work with. She'd say "Are you", not "You are", but the rest I am totally hearing in her voice.)
Janine: Oh, immensely. Programming is so logical. And once you master the basics, it can be...um...
Claudia: Boring?
Claudia? Two things. Shut. Up.
Then the conversation turns to how tired Mimi is, and I should point out that Janine is just as concerned as Claudia. See? She does care!
Janine asks if they'd like to play a trivia board game, creatively titled The Trivia Game. Claudia assumes that Janine asked them to play because Claudia sucks at it. For reals, she actually says "I'm no good at it and Janine knows it, which may be why she asked us to play." Anyone else hearing that song from Disturbing Behaviour that goes "Paranoia, paranoia, everybody's coming to get me!"?
So Claudia plays the Creatively Named Trivia Game (hey, I'm a poet and I didn't even know it! Tell Vanessa Pike!) and sucks at it. She channels her frustration over this into accusing Janine of cheating and calling her a nerd. Real mature, Claud. Mimi calls her on her bullshit and Claudia strops that Mimi just likes Janine better cause she's smarter (riiiiight, and that's why she says "My Claudia" and not "My Janine". Shut up, Claudia.) Mimi's too tired for Claudia's tantrums and goes to bed.
Claudia feels terrible. Not because her sister tried to do something with the family for once and she threw it back in her face, though, but because Mimi is apparently "hardly ever cross with me."
Janine comes down and tells Claudia she won't rat her out to her parents. When Claudia was packing a sad about not being able to answer a question, she accidentally let slip that she had a Nancy Drew book in her room. Janine, thinking Claudia might be worried, assures her that she won't rat her out, albeit in the "omg I just swallowed an encyclopaedia" vocabulary that ANM likes to give her. Because apparently nerds don't talk like human beings.
Then we have this lovely little conversation:
Janine: Goodness...
Claudia: What?
Janine: I - sometimes I wish I were as close to Mimi as you are.
Claudia: Well, maybe if you'd leave your computer alone for 15 minutes you'd be closer to all of us. You act like you're married to that thing. Does it make a nice husband?
ASDGFADJKGAJFDLHGJKALDFGHJKFDALGHDAJF!!!! OH MY GOD CLAUDIA, SHUT THE MOTHER FUCK UP!!!! First of all, Janine just said she wouldn't rat you out about your secret stash. Second, when someone is confiding in you about an insecurity of theirs, "Well, it's your own fault for being so antisocial omg!!!!!11!!one!" is a really shitty reply. How would you feel if you went to Janine and said "I wish Mum and Dad were as proud of me as they are of you" and she said "Well, why don't you get off your fat ass and study then, you fucking tard?" Third, she JUST DID try to spend time with you, you little shit slice! Maybe it wasn't an activity that you personally enjoy, but she was still volunteering to do something with you, you stupid little twat! And fourth, I can tell you from experience that saying "Oh my GAWD you are SO ANTISOCIAL!!! Stop spending so much time in your room!!!" DOES NOT WORK. Seriously, Janine, if she's anything like me, would just be like, "OK, so I go hang out with the family. Then what? What do I say? What do we talk about? What if I get it wrong, or get nervous and talk funny, and Claudia chucks a spaz again? Who died and made her God, anyway? Fuck her and her self-righteous bullshit, I'll go chill on Young Scientists Worldwide instead. ernestrutherfordrocks has that hilarious Nancy Drew snark thread going in the Random Discussion forum, and I wanted to hear about the latest developments in cleared_the_neighbourhood's and lets_get_astrophysical's fascinating research and tell everyone the latest dirt on that creepy anime fetishist at SU who has the hots for me."
As Claudia and Janine are fighting, they hear a loud noise from Mimi's room. They go in there and find her unconscious. Claudia and Janine work together to call the paramedics and keep her warm until they come. Janine rides with her to the hospital and tells Claudia to get hold of John and Ree-OH-kow.
John and Ree-OH-kow are having dinner at a French restaurant, probably so that ANM can have some more fun with the retarded fake accents she seems to love. Seriously, check this out:
Claudia: H-Hello? My name is Claudia Kishi and my parents are having dinner there - I mean, at your restaurant. There's an emergency and I have to talk to them."
Restaurant dude: "I am tres sorry, but they have just left."
The fuck? OK, I am an immigrant (sort of) in a country that speaks a different language than I grew up speaking, as are a lot of people I know. And not one of us goes around saying shit like "Very moushiwake gozaimasen ga, mou dete irasshaimashita." If you know the rest of it, you know how to say "very". Stupid ANM.
Also, how the fuck does he know her parents have just left without even checking with a waiter or their records or something? Unless this restaurant is so shit that the Kishis were the only customers there. Or! Maybe the Kishis are millionaires from running a drug cartel or something (and they can't tell the kids they're loaded, cause Janine would ask too many questions) and they drop so much dough at Chez Maurice that everyone knows them by name.
Plus, he ends the conversation with "Bon nuit". Isn't that supposed to be "Bonne nuit"?
John and Ree-OH-kow arrive, Claudia tells them what happened and they hurry to the hospital and wait worriedly for the docs to tell them what's up. This part seems kind of realistic to me, though I've never really been in a situation like that, so I can't be sure.
Coming up next: Cult camp gets underway but Janine RUINS IT OMG!!!!!!!111