#44 Dawn and the Big Sleepover (Chapters 10-12)
Chapters 1-3
Chapters 4-6
Chapters 7-9
Whoops...sorry about the delay on the next part of this one, guys. I promise I'll get it done soon! If I start a snark, I finish it!
Ok, when we last left off, the BSC swooped into Stoneybrook Elementary School to organize a food/clothing drive for the kids' Zuni pen pals in New Mexico (because, you know, the school wasn't planning on doing anything). Forget that none of the BSC really has any connection to the pen pals - if someone needs help, the BSC will always be there to save the day!
So the kids went to work to raise money - the Pikes held a carnival (for once, not one run by the BSC), which was almost ruined by the Perfect Perkinses' dog Chewy. And the Rodowskys organized a garage sale, which was almost ruined by all the kids stealing stuff from their parents without permission to donate to the sale. That got sorted out, but not before we were left with some foreshadowing about some of the kids getting a little too overeager with wanting to win a prize at the big sleepover.
Chapter 10:
"That's a big box!" And with that, Dawn starts this snark off with a great, big...
Or, would that be "That's what HE said?" Anyway...
Dawn's remarking on the big box of donations from Buddy Barrett. As soon as he sets it down, Dawn asks if he's expecting a receipt, and sure enough, Dawn has to scribble one down for him. Damn, these kids are taking this seriously! I wonder if Dawn regrets ignoring Mary Anne's concerns that the kids would get too competitive. She glances at the thick legal pad she's holding, which is filled with inventory of all the stuff that had been donated. She said at one point, there was a line of kids waiting to drop stuff off at the barn. See how influential the BSC is? More like, see how powerful Kristy's Mind Control Ray is.
Dawn takes down what Buddy brought over - various clothes and food items. Included in there is a silk nightgown, which I'm guessing is something like this, since Mrs. Barrett is Stoneybrook's resident MILF and all. Dawn asks Buddy if his mother was cool with donating an entire case of powdered baby formula and he says yes, since Marnie grew out of it ages ago (and has moved onto eating Kleenex. Gabbie Perkins laughs at her). Before Dawn can ask anything else, Buddy asks again for a receipt, so Dawn gives it to him and he leaves. Three more kids show up right after Buddy, and one of them is the little smartass from the BSC's assembly, Rob Hines, and Dawn remarks he's been to the barn three times that week. Wow, more foreshadowing!
When she finally closes shop for the day, Dawn looks around at everything in the barn, which is now crammed full with donations. Some of the stuff is the usual things you'd see getting donated to a clothing drive, including old and worn shoes and ancient fashions like a leisure suit. *gasp* Tommy Pickles, you donated your dad's old disco suit again?
However, Dawn also comes across a gorgeous, silky nightgown with what looked like a hand-painted flower pattern, brand new running shoes, and some designer dresses. Ok, if there's all these nice clothes at Dawn's barn, brought in over the past week, why haven't angry parents been storming in, with kids in tow, to claim their clothes that their dumb kids took without asking? Are the parents in Stoneybrook that stupid? Dawn is too busy wondering why some of the donations are so nice. Wouldn't she have some suspicions after reading Claudia's entry in the BSC notebook about the garage sale? Then again, maybe she couldn't make it through, since that was a particularly painful Claudia entry.
She looks next at the food donations, and surprises us by not bitching about the cans of beef stew and tuna ("Why are these MONSTERS donating cans of DEAD ANIMAL CARCASS?!? Ick! Yuck!"). Instead, she finds it very odd that among the nutritious, inexpensive, and long-lasting donations, there's gum and candy bars and tins of cookies and imported chocolates and caviar and a canister of hot cocoa. Well, the gum and caviar's kind of weird (and wouldn't that be perishable too?), and chocolate would melt if it was shipped, depending on when this book takes place. But I don't see anything wrong with cookies. My Girl Scout troop used to volunteer every year at the town food drive, which was held at a local church, and our job was to sort everything by type (corn, peas, beans, cranberry sauce, etc), then split it among the boxes that were going to each family. And we used to get unique donations too - cake mix, frosting, cookies, I vividly remember finding a bag of tortilla chips in one of the collection boxes. It may not be a staple, like a can of corn, but non-perishable is non-perishable. Right? Dawn also thinks donating hot cocoa is stupid because why would anyone send hot cocoa to people who lived in the desert? People living in warmer climates never drink hot cocoa, Dawn?
Ok, I spoke too soon about Dawn not realizing that kids are cheating with the relief drive. Her eyes travel over to another area of the barn, and she observes suddenly, the nice stuff didn't seem so...nice. Over there is a brand new suit with a receipt from the tailor's in the pocket, with the name HINES on it. So apparently Mr. Hines bought a suit last week, had it tailored, then decided to give it away. Something was very wrong. And after what had happened at the yard sale, I had a feeling I knew exactly what.
Bravo, Dawn. The last horse finally crosses the finish line.
The next morning, Dawn tells Mary Anne her suspicions, and Mary Anne said she was thinking the same thing too. Dawn wants to know why Mary Anne didn't say anything (and I do too - why do these girls never say anything and keep stuff to themselves?), and Mary Anne said she didn't want to assume. Besides, I imagined how happy the pen pals would be when they saw such nice things. Because she's sweet, innocent Mary Anne who could never pass judgement on anyone. Wishful thinking, and it would be nice to see someone donate fancy, expensive things to a relief effort, so I see what she's saying, but at the same time, it isn't the norm, so it would raise a red flag to me if I was Mary Anne, especially after what the kids pulled at the garage sale.
Dawn doesn't know what to do about it. Mary Anne says they should talk to the kids, and while Dawn complains that they can't show up at everyone's houses, Mary Anne says they won't have to, since the ones who keep showing up with unauthorized donations will be back, since they're trying to rack up receipts to count towards a prize. Ok, fair enough. I'm still wondering why they haven't been getting phone calls from parents, asking if they can come pick up their things. If I noticed I had a designer dress or new sneakers missing, and knew my kid was donating stuff for a clothing drive, I'd put two and two together and ask them what was going on.
Conveniently, the Hines family shows up later that morning. They can't be looking for their stuff, because they don't mention anything about it. Mary Anne and Dawn instead take the opportunity to thank the family for their generous donations and point out how nice it was to donate a brand new suit. Immediately the parents remember "Hey! We were looking for our stuff, what's it doing here?" and Mr. Hines asks Rob about it. Rob says he took the suit by mistake. I don't care how young this kid is - even I knew at seven years old that if I wanted something that belonged to my parents, I asked. Mr. Hines also finds a pair of his shoes that he had been looking for, and Rob says he took them because his dad never wears them. Geez, we got someone competing for Claudia in the "Has the Least Amount of Logic" department.
Mr. and Mrs. Hines apologize for the mix-up, take their things back, and leave some bags of donations in return. And sure enough, like the entire town had been listening in on Mary Anne and Dawn's conversation that morning, a few more families show up to get their things back. Finally! Mary and Dawn think up an idea to remedy this situation, so they won't have to deal with any sticky-fingered kids anymore - the children now have to bring a permission slip, which includes a list of what they're donating, signed by a parent when they bring stuff to the barn. Problem solved. And I'm kind of glad Kristy wasn't here for this part, or else she would have flipped a shit and started panicking that the Hines family would ring every doorbell in Stoneybrook, warning families that the BSC encourages kids to steal.
Chapter 11:
I am so tempted to skip this chapter, but I'll see if I can find something, anything to snark in it. So we have a BSC notebook entry from Mary Anne, writing about her babysitting job for Matt and Haley Braddock, and she said she was hoping to take a break from the pen pal project. *GASP* You heartless bitch! When a BSC member is involved in a project, they go in wholeheartedly, no questions asked! Wait until Kristy finds out *cues lightning and thunder clap*
We start out with Haley begging Mary Anne to let her play Madame Leveaux so she can raise money for her pen pal. And no, Haley isn't planning on performing an exotic cabaret on her front lawn. She wants to tell fortunes, which is actually pretty creative. And Leveaux...the old people? No, that would be Lesvieux. Ok, now the french speaker in me is curious. Let me get out my french dictionary that I haven't opened in about four and a half years.
Veaux is apparently the plural of veau. Which means...veal. Haley is Madame Veal? She should thank her lucky stars that Dawn isn't babysitting her.
Anyway, Haley is excited when Mary Anne agrees to help out, and she happily signs her plans to Matt. And while I ponder how Jessi was able to pick up ASL quick enough to communicate coherently with Matt (because Dawn just gave us the explanation of who Matt is), Haley gets to work setting up. She emerges from her bedroom in a costume that Dawn describes as something from I Dream of Jeannie (old tv show! Everyone take a shot!). Haley tries doing an exotic dance that involves "wiggling awkwardly" (ew?) and talks to Mary Anne in an over-pronounced, Eastern European accent. And since this is a BSC book, Lerangis spells it out phonetically. It looks like Mme Noelle's french, but more nasal. If something can look more nasal. Thees eez zuh vay vee speek een Trannnsylvania! I can think of a few Transylvanians who are offended by this stereotype:
They only have an hour until the Braddocks get home, so the kids and Mary Anne get to work, setting up a card table on the front lawn and Mary Anne makes a sign advertising Madame Leveaux's services. Whoa, mind meet gutter. And she actually writes in PRINT on the sign, instead of her usual loopy cursive, so this is the only time I can call Mary Anne's handwriting 100% legible. Haley sits down with a deck of cards which she arranges as a substitution for tarot cards I guess, and Matt decides he wants to practice catching while Haley works her magic. Good lord, this chapter is boring.
So her first customers are Suzi and Marnie Barrett, along with Mrs. MILF. Why is she Mrs. MILF? Well, as soon as she saw Haley, Dawn said she flashed a dazzling smile. A smile from Mrs. Barrett alone could raise enough money to rebuild the school on the Zuni reservation. Mrs. Barrett pays for Suzi to have her fortune told, and Matt pulls the chair out so Suzi can sit down. Haley touches Suzi's forehead while shuffling the cards around and her fortune for Suzi is she sees Buddy at the elementary school's gym, having fun at the sleepover. Um, you'd think for Suzi's fortune, she'd make up something for Suzi and not tell her something about Buddy?
Suzi complains, not because she didn't get her own personal fortune, but because Haley already knew about it and demands her money back. LOL I love the Barretts...but only the Barretts, the DeWitts sucked. Mrs. Barrett quiets her down and lets Marnie get her fortune told as well. Only Marnie isn't too interested, screams "NO!" and starts crying. And there we have one of like three times I can think of Marnie talking in the entire BSC series. Gabbie Perkins would sit down and say "Why I am positively delighted to have my fortune told by you, Haley! What is written in the stars about my future?" Ok, know who Gabbie reminds me of? Dakota Fanning, from the Dakota Fanning Show sketch on SNL. Marnie's her band leader who tries talking about comic books and Gabbie doesn't understand because comic books aren't intelligent enough for her. But I digress.
The Barretts leave, and Haley says she thinks her veil scared Marnie. Mary Anne tells her not to worry about it, and reminds her that it's ok to make up fortunes, she doesn't have to be accurate. Somewhere, Mallory is screaming about how Mary Anne is a LIAR! The next customers are a group of 8th grade boys who just so happen to be walking through the Braddocks' neighborhood. Alan Gray, Pete Black, and Justin Forbes. Let me just say, forget Logan and his hiring a horse-drawn carriage and wanting to buy a ring for his beloved. Alan Gray is the most accurate teenage boy in the BSC series. I have no clue who Justin Forbes is, but from the way Dawn describes him, it sounds like he was a one-note character in another book, and Peter Lerangis needed another immature 8th grade boy for this scene. He prank-called Stacey and said he was from the Atlanta Pig Farm? It sounds familiar, but I don't know what book that was.
Alan sits down wants his fortune told, and calls Haley "Madame Levy-oox" and "Madamee Lee-voke-see-odor." Haley ignores his looniness and pulls a fast one on him, by giving him part of a fortune and telling him to continue, he has to pay more, and ends up collecting two bucks from all three of them. Clever. Though I don't know what to think about three 8th graders being led on by a nine-year-old. Haley told Mary Anne she felt guilty about it, but Mary Anne told her to suppress the feelings like she does, and let them out later when everyone least expects it not worry about it.
Meanwhile, Dawn's finalizing plans for the sleepover. So, 11 chapters into this book, we FINALLY get to what the title's all about. This book should have been called Dawn and the Great Relief Project or Dawn Saves the Zunis or something. Mary Anne comes home and Dawn tells her the Stoneybrook News interviewed her over the phone, and is coming to the sleepover, with a photographer. The toy store's donating prizes, and Pizza Express is donating pizza, and they'll be bringing their stuff over when the photographer's there. See? Being involved with the BSC is the BEST publicity any business in Stoneybrook could ever ask for!
And there will be only be four teachers there. So 100 kids, and four teachers, who I guess are there to pick up the slack while the BSC runs the show since they're so much better with kids than teachers are. And some cafeteria workers are showing up in the morning to cook breakfast, pancakes and juice all donated by the supermarket. Mary Anne and Dawn spend the rest of the chapter organizing games and activities and we can finally move onto the point of this whole book!
Chapter 12:
Not only does this chapter open with dialogue, it opens with lines and lines of dialogue! It's right before the sleepover, and the BSC is at SES, setting up the gym, along with the teachers. While everyone runs around, setting things up, Dawn's on the phone with Mr. Morton, the owner of Pizza Express, who's cancelling because he ran out of flour. Dun dun dunnnnn. Dawn's almost near tears, but borrows Kristy's Mind Control Ray manages to guilt trip Mr. Morton/mention she'll call another pizzeria in Mercer and with that, he says he'll call up the supermarket to get some flour, albeit whole-wheat flour. Wow, Dawn's mind control really works. There's going to be pizza, and it'll be slightly healthier!
While Dawn's doing that, Mary Anne is setting up her tape deck (oh-hoh-hoh, this dates the book), Kristy is organizing the table setup for food and prizes, Stacey and Claudia are decorating...and Mallory and Jessi are helping Ms. Besser spread out wrestling mats on the floor. Oh, sure - make the junior officers do the grunt/Charlie Work (*points to icon* any other It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia fans here?)! Wrestling mats weigh a TON, this is just more evidence that Everyone Hates Mallory.
Dawn said their plans hit a few snags by that Friday. The reporter said he might be late because he was covering a town meeting. Doesn't he know that in Stoneybrook, the BSC always takes priority? He must be new. Then there was the problem with the pizza, and the SES principal, Ms. Reynolds, couldn't bring her CD player, so Mary Anne had to convince Richard to let her bring her tape deck. If it's her tape deck, why did she have to convince her dad to let her bring it?
Shortly after six, Watson the Millionaire drops off David Michael, and leaves cursing to himself, because it means he's still left with Karen and Andrew at home. More and more kids show up and while Dawn tells some boys not to set up their sleeping bags yet, the loud sound of Raffi blasts through the gym. It's the song about Noah and the ark, and I can't find it anywhere on youtube, so instead I'm posting this classic:
I do have to add...I love Raffi and I was a huge fan of his when I was a little kid...but these kids are 7-10. Aren't they a little too big for Raffi's target audience? I listened to Raffi when I was Andrew Brewer's age and younger. Although I have no clue what they'd play instead...Disney music? Since this is Stoneybrook, what about the Wizard of Oz soundtrack?
Ok, nitpicking over. An hour later, the reporter and photographer show up and interview the BSC and the kids. While they do that, Dawn notices a sad boy, who then bursts into tears and says he wants to go home. While he's screaming and crying, a few other kids start to sob, so Claudia and Mary Anne go to comfort them. Dawn momentarily panics, because she thinks all these kids are going to have to leave, but they only end up having to call two parents. Meltdown averted.
After the two kids leave, the pizza arrives and Dawn describes the smell as incredible and says the kids are practically drooling. Oh yeah, thirty pizzas at once? Dammit, now I want pizza. Mr. Morton supervises his employees as they bring in the pies and soda, and manages to get himself in a few photos, since the reporter and photographer are still there. Attention whore! Don't you know when you help the BSC out, you don't expect anything in return? They don't! Except for their $1.50 an hour.
The BSC and teachers pass out the pizza, and Dawn looks forward to the toy store arriving next, because that means the real fun can begin. And I still want pizza.
Coming up, three full chapters of sleepover hijinks, a touching moment, and the BSC saves the day! Again.
Chapters 4-6
Chapters 7-9
Whoops...sorry about the delay on the next part of this one, guys. I promise I'll get it done soon! If I start a snark, I finish it!
Ok, when we last left off, the BSC swooped into Stoneybrook Elementary School to organize a food/clothing drive for the kids' Zuni pen pals in New Mexico (because, you know, the school wasn't planning on doing anything). Forget that none of the BSC really has any connection to the pen pals - if someone needs help, the BSC will always be there to save the day!
So the kids went to work to raise money - the Pikes held a carnival (for once, not one run by the BSC), which was almost ruined by the Perfect Perkinses' dog Chewy. And the Rodowskys organized a garage sale, which was almost ruined by all the kids stealing stuff from their parents without permission to donate to the sale. That got sorted out, but not before we were left with some foreshadowing about some of the kids getting a little too overeager with wanting to win a prize at the big sleepover.
Chapter 10:
"That's a big box!" And with that, Dawn starts this snark off with a great, big...
Or, would that be "That's what HE said?" Anyway...
Dawn's remarking on the big box of donations from Buddy Barrett. As soon as he sets it down, Dawn asks if he's expecting a receipt, and sure enough, Dawn has to scribble one down for him. Damn, these kids are taking this seriously! I wonder if Dawn regrets ignoring Mary Anne's concerns that the kids would get too competitive. She glances at the thick legal pad she's holding, which is filled with inventory of all the stuff that had been donated. She said at one point, there was a line of kids waiting to drop stuff off at the barn. See how influential the BSC is? More like, see how powerful Kristy's Mind Control Ray is.
Dawn takes down what Buddy brought over - various clothes and food items. Included in there is a silk nightgown, which I'm guessing is something like this, since Mrs. Barrett is Stoneybrook's resident MILF and all. Dawn asks Buddy if his mother was cool with donating an entire case of powdered baby formula and he says yes, since Marnie grew out of it ages ago (and has moved onto eating Kleenex. Gabbie Perkins laughs at her). Before Dawn can ask anything else, Buddy asks again for a receipt, so Dawn gives it to him and he leaves. Three more kids show up right after Buddy, and one of them is the little smartass from the BSC's assembly, Rob Hines, and Dawn remarks he's been to the barn three times that week. Wow, more foreshadowing!
When she finally closes shop for the day, Dawn looks around at everything in the barn, which is now crammed full with donations. Some of the stuff is the usual things you'd see getting donated to a clothing drive, including old and worn shoes and ancient fashions like a leisure suit. *gasp* Tommy Pickles, you donated your dad's old disco suit again?
However, Dawn also comes across a gorgeous, silky nightgown with what looked like a hand-painted flower pattern, brand new running shoes, and some designer dresses. Ok, if there's all these nice clothes at Dawn's barn, brought in over the past week, why haven't angry parents been storming in, with kids in tow, to claim their clothes that their dumb kids took without asking? Are the parents in Stoneybrook that stupid? Dawn is too busy wondering why some of the donations are so nice. Wouldn't she have some suspicions after reading Claudia's entry in the BSC notebook about the garage sale? Then again, maybe she couldn't make it through, since that was a particularly painful Claudia entry.
She looks next at the food donations, and surprises us by not bitching about the cans of beef stew and tuna ("Why are these MONSTERS donating cans of DEAD ANIMAL CARCASS?!? Ick! Yuck!"). Instead, she finds it very odd that among the nutritious, inexpensive, and long-lasting donations, there's gum and candy bars and tins of cookies and imported chocolates and caviar and a canister of hot cocoa. Well, the gum and caviar's kind of weird (and wouldn't that be perishable too?), and chocolate would melt if it was shipped, depending on when this book takes place. But I don't see anything wrong with cookies. My Girl Scout troop used to volunteer every year at the town food drive, which was held at a local church, and our job was to sort everything by type (corn, peas, beans, cranberry sauce, etc), then split it among the boxes that were going to each family. And we used to get unique donations too - cake mix, frosting, cookies, I vividly remember finding a bag of tortilla chips in one of the collection boxes. It may not be a staple, like a can of corn, but non-perishable is non-perishable. Right? Dawn also thinks donating hot cocoa is stupid because why would anyone send hot cocoa to people who lived in the desert? People living in warmer climates never drink hot cocoa, Dawn?
Ok, I spoke too soon about Dawn not realizing that kids are cheating with the relief drive. Her eyes travel over to another area of the barn, and she observes suddenly, the nice stuff didn't seem so...nice. Over there is a brand new suit with a receipt from the tailor's in the pocket, with the name HINES on it. So apparently Mr. Hines bought a suit last week, had it tailored, then decided to give it away. Something was very wrong. And after what had happened at the yard sale, I had a feeling I knew exactly what.
Bravo, Dawn. The last horse finally crosses the finish line.
The next morning, Dawn tells Mary Anne her suspicions, and Mary Anne said she was thinking the same thing too. Dawn wants to know why Mary Anne didn't say anything (and I do too - why do these girls never say anything and keep stuff to themselves?), and Mary Anne said she didn't want to assume. Besides, I imagined how happy the pen pals would be when they saw such nice things. Because she's sweet, innocent Mary Anne who could never pass judgement on anyone. Wishful thinking, and it would be nice to see someone donate fancy, expensive things to a relief effort, so I see what she's saying, but at the same time, it isn't the norm, so it would raise a red flag to me if I was Mary Anne, especially after what the kids pulled at the garage sale.
Dawn doesn't know what to do about it. Mary Anne says they should talk to the kids, and while Dawn complains that they can't show up at everyone's houses, Mary Anne says they won't have to, since the ones who keep showing up with unauthorized donations will be back, since they're trying to rack up receipts to count towards a prize. Ok, fair enough. I'm still wondering why they haven't been getting phone calls from parents, asking if they can come pick up their things. If I noticed I had a designer dress or new sneakers missing, and knew my kid was donating stuff for a clothing drive, I'd put two and two together and ask them what was going on.
Conveniently, the Hines family shows up later that morning. They can't be looking for their stuff, because they don't mention anything about it. Mary Anne and Dawn instead take the opportunity to thank the family for their generous donations and point out how nice it was to donate a brand new suit. Immediately the parents remember "Hey! We were looking for our stuff, what's it doing here?" and Mr. Hines asks Rob about it. Rob says he took the suit by mistake. I don't care how young this kid is - even I knew at seven years old that if I wanted something that belonged to my parents, I asked. Mr. Hines also finds a pair of his shoes that he had been looking for, and Rob says he took them because his dad never wears them. Geez, we got someone competing for Claudia in the "Has the Least Amount of Logic" department.
Mr. and Mrs. Hines apologize for the mix-up, take their things back, and leave some bags of donations in return. And sure enough, like the entire town had been listening in on Mary Anne and Dawn's conversation that morning, a few more families show up to get their things back. Finally! Mary and Dawn think up an idea to remedy this situation, so they won't have to deal with any sticky-fingered kids anymore - the children now have to bring a permission slip, which includes a list of what they're donating, signed by a parent when they bring stuff to the barn. Problem solved. And I'm kind of glad Kristy wasn't here for this part, or else she would have flipped a shit and started panicking that the Hines family would ring every doorbell in Stoneybrook, warning families that the BSC encourages kids to steal.
Chapter 11:
I am so tempted to skip this chapter, but I'll see if I can find something, anything to snark in it. So we have a BSC notebook entry from Mary Anne, writing about her babysitting job for Matt and Haley Braddock, and she said she was hoping to take a break from the pen pal project. *GASP* You heartless bitch! When a BSC member is involved in a project, they go in wholeheartedly, no questions asked! Wait until Kristy finds out *cues lightning and thunder clap*
We start out with Haley begging Mary Anne to let her play Madame Leveaux so she can raise money for her pen pal. And no, Haley isn't planning on performing an exotic cabaret on her front lawn. She wants to tell fortunes, which is actually pretty creative. And Leveaux...the old people? No, that would be Lesvieux. Ok, now the french speaker in me is curious. Let me get out my french dictionary that I haven't opened in about four and a half years.
Veaux is apparently the plural of veau. Which means...veal. Haley is Madame Veal? She should thank her lucky stars that Dawn isn't babysitting her.
Anyway, Haley is excited when Mary Anne agrees to help out, and she happily signs her plans to Matt. And while I ponder how Jessi was able to pick up ASL quick enough to communicate coherently with Matt (because Dawn just gave us the explanation of who Matt is), Haley gets to work setting up. She emerges from her bedroom in a costume that Dawn describes as something from I Dream of Jeannie (old tv show! Everyone take a shot!). Haley tries doing an exotic dance that involves "wiggling awkwardly" (ew?) and talks to Mary Anne in an over-pronounced, Eastern European accent. And since this is a BSC book, Lerangis spells it out phonetically. It looks like Mme Noelle's french, but more nasal. If something can look more nasal. Thees eez zuh vay vee speek een Trannnsylvania! I can think of a few Transylvanians who are offended by this stereotype:
They only have an hour until the Braddocks get home, so the kids and Mary Anne get to work, setting up a card table on the front lawn and Mary Anne makes a sign advertising Madame Leveaux's services. Whoa, mind meet gutter. And she actually writes in PRINT on the sign, instead of her usual loopy cursive, so this is the only time I can call Mary Anne's handwriting 100% legible. Haley sits down with a deck of cards which she arranges as a substitution for tarot cards I guess, and Matt decides he wants to practice catching while Haley works her magic. Good lord, this chapter is boring.
So her first customers are Suzi and Marnie Barrett, along with Mrs. MILF. Why is she Mrs. MILF? Well, as soon as she saw Haley, Dawn said she flashed a dazzling smile. A smile from Mrs. Barrett alone could raise enough money to rebuild the school on the Zuni reservation. Mrs. Barrett pays for Suzi to have her fortune told, and Matt pulls the chair out so Suzi can sit down. Haley touches Suzi's forehead while shuffling the cards around and her fortune for Suzi is she sees Buddy at the elementary school's gym, having fun at the sleepover. Um, you'd think for Suzi's fortune, she'd make up something for Suzi and not tell her something about Buddy?
Suzi complains, not because she didn't get her own personal fortune, but because Haley already knew about it and demands her money back. LOL I love the Barretts...but only the Barretts, the DeWitts sucked. Mrs. Barrett quiets her down and lets Marnie get her fortune told as well. Only Marnie isn't too interested, screams "NO!" and starts crying. And there we have one of like three times I can think of Marnie talking in the entire BSC series. Gabbie Perkins would sit down and say "Why I am positively delighted to have my fortune told by you, Haley! What is written in the stars about my future?" Ok, know who Gabbie reminds me of? Dakota Fanning, from the Dakota Fanning Show sketch on SNL. Marnie's her band leader who tries talking about comic books and Gabbie doesn't understand because comic books aren't intelligent enough for her. But I digress.
The Barretts leave, and Haley says she thinks her veil scared Marnie. Mary Anne tells her not to worry about it, and reminds her that it's ok to make up fortunes, she doesn't have to be accurate. Somewhere, Mallory is screaming about how Mary Anne is a LIAR! The next customers are a group of 8th grade boys who just so happen to be walking through the Braddocks' neighborhood. Alan Gray, Pete Black, and Justin Forbes. Let me just say, forget Logan and his hiring a horse-drawn carriage and wanting to buy a ring for his beloved. Alan Gray is the most accurate teenage boy in the BSC series. I have no clue who Justin Forbes is, but from the way Dawn describes him, it sounds like he was a one-note character in another book, and Peter Lerangis needed another immature 8th grade boy for this scene. He prank-called Stacey and said he was from the Atlanta Pig Farm? It sounds familiar, but I don't know what book that was.
Alan sits down wants his fortune told, and calls Haley "Madame Levy-oox" and "Madamee Lee-voke-see-odor." Haley ignores his looniness and pulls a fast one on him, by giving him part of a fortune and telling him to continue, he has to pay more, and ends up collecting two bucks from all three of them. Clever. Though I don't know what to think about three 8th graders being led on by a nine-year-old. Haley told Mary Anne she felt guilty about it, but Mary Anne told her to suppress the feelings like she does, and let them out later when everyone least expects it not worry about it.
Meanwhile, Dawn's finalizing plans for the sleepover. So, 11 chapters into this book, we FINALLY get to what the title's all about. This book should have been called Dawn and the Great Relief Project or Dawn Saves the Zunis or something. Mary Anne comes home and Dawn tells her the Stoneybrook News interviewed her over the phone, and is coming to the sleepover, with a photographer. The toy store's donating prizes, and Pizza Express is donating pizza, and they'll be bringing their stuff over when the photographer's there. See? Being involved with the BSC is the BEST publicity any business in Stoneybrook could ever ask for!
And there will be only be four teachers there. So 100 kids, and four teachers, who I guess are there to pick up the slack while the BSC runs the show since they're so much better with kids than teachers are. And some cafeteria workers are showing up in the morning to cook breakfast, pancakes and juice all donated by the supermarket. Mary Anne and Dawn spend the rest of the chapter organizing games and activities and we can finally move onto the point of this whole book!
Chapter 12:
Not only does this chapter open with dialogue, it opens with lines and lines of dialogue! It's right before the sleepover, and the BSC is at SES, setting up the gym, along with the teachers. While everyone runs around, setting things up, Dawn's on the phone with Mr. Morton, the owner of Pizza Express, who's cancelling because he ran out of flour. Dun dun dunnnnn. Dawn's almost near tears, but borrows Kristy's Mind Control Ray manages to guilt trip Mr. Morton/mention she'll call another pizzeria in Mercer and with that, he says he'll call up the supermarket to get some flour, albeit whole-wheat flour. Wow, Dawn's mind control really works. There's going to be pizza, and it'll be slightly healthier!
While Dawn's doing that, Mary Anne is setting up her tape deck (oh-hoh-hoh, this dates the book), Kristy is organizing the table setup for food and prizes, Stacey and Claudia are decorating...and Mallory and Jessi are helping Ms. Besser spread out wrestling mats on the floor. Oh, sure - make the junior officers do the grunt/Charlie Work (*points to icon* any other It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia fans here?)! Wrestling mats weigh a TON, this is just more evidence that Everyone Hates Mallory.
Dawn said their plans hit a few snags by that Friday. The reporter said he might be late because he was covering a town meeting. Doesn't he know that in Stoneybrook, the BSC always takes priority? He must be new. Then there was the problem with the pizza, and the SES principal, Ms. Reynolds, couldn't bring her CD player, so Mary Anne had to convince Richard to let her bring her tape deck. If it's her tape deck, why did she have to convince her dad to let her bring it?
Shortly after six, Watson the Millionaire drops off David Michael, and leaves cursing to himself, because it means he's still left with Karen and Andrew at home. More and more kids show up and while Dawn tells some boys not to set up their sleeping bags yet, the loud sound of Raffi blasts through the gym. It's the song about Noah and the ark, and I can't find it anywhere on youtube, so instead I'm posting this classic:
Click to view
I do have to add...I love Raffi and I was a huge fan of his when I was a little kid...but these kids are 7-10. Aren't they a little too big for Raffi's target audience? I listened to Raffi when I was Andrew Brewer's age and younger. Although I have no clue what they'd play instead...Disney music? Since this is Stoneybrook, what about the Wizard of Oz soundtrack?
Ok, nitpicking over. An hour later, the reporter and photographer show up and interview the BSC and the kids. While they do that, Dawn notices a sad boy, who then bursts into tears and says he wants to go home. While he's screaming and crying, a few other kids start to sob, so Claudia and Mary Anne go to comfort them. Dawn momentarily panics, because she thinks all these kids are going to have to leave, but they only end up having to call two parents. Meltdown averted.
After the two kids leave, the pizza arrives and Dawn describes the smell as incredible and says the kids are practically drooling. Oh yeah, thirty pizzas at once? Dammit, now I want pizza. Mr. Morton supervises his employees as they bring in the pies and soda, and manages to get himself in a few photos, since the reporter and photographer are still there. Attention whore! Don't you know when you help the BSC out, you don't expect anything in return? They don't! Except for their $1.50 an hour.
The BSC and teachers pass out the pizza, and Dawn looks forward to the toy store arriving next, because that means the real fun can begin. And I still want pizza.
Coming up, three full chapters of sleepover hijinks, a touching moment, and the BSC saves the day! Again.