Kristy's Big Day Chapters 1-5
Chapter 1
The story starts with Karen telling Kristy and Andrew about Ben Brewer. Apparently Ben Brewer is the ghost of Watson’s grandfather who became a recluse and only went outside to get dandelions so that he could fry them. My brother says he’s going to live in an RV in our yard. I suppose he should take nutrition tips from Ben Brewer. My older cousin says he’s going to build a tree house (only not really because there are no trees, so I guess it’s technically a club house) in his yard. Unfortunately I don’t think he’ll be able to eat dandelions because there’s no grass in the yard. On the other hand, he may be able to eat wasps.
Kristy, like a gigantic idiot, is actually taking this horseshit seriously. Honestly, what thirteen-year-old listens to a six-year-old telling a ghost story and is actually scared? What’s Ben Brewer going to do, brandish a dandelion at them? Instead of telling Karen to stop scaring her little brother and badmouthing her great-grandfather, Kristy merely wonders why she’s allowing Karen to get away with this. Is that all these people do when it comes to disciplining Karen? Just go, “Huh, I think I should stop her. Eh, forget it.” It would have worked wonders if someone actually remembered they were the authority figure and disciplined a six year old girl for once.
Infodump time! But not chapter two level of infodump. No, Kristy just says that Karen and Andrew are Watson’s kids and Watson will be marrying her mother. Pros of this arrangement- Watson is rich and Kristy and her family can get their own rooms, hell, suites if they ask politely. Cons- Watson can be a jerk at times. When has Watson ever behaved jerkishly? Okay, he’s shit at disciplining his own kids, I’ll go with that. But would Kristy really take offense at Watson’s bad parenting behavior? Is she offended on behalf of Karen, or is she worried about how Watson will treat her and her brothers? I mean, if Watson won’t pay attention to his own kids, why would he pay attention to step kids?
Maybe Kristy’s just grasping at straws because she still has some reservations about her mother remarrying. I think the statement should have gone something like, “The pros are that Watson is a rich millionaire who lives in a mansion and will allow my friends to sleep over, and take us all on vacation. The cons are that I will have Karen as my stepsister.” Seriously, Karen will be living in the same house as Kristy every other weekend. That is the biggest and only con. Karen Brewer as your stepsister. If I had to say or even think those words, my soul would shrivel.
The kids come in for dinner, and something is clearly up, seeing as the lights are dimmed and candles have been lit. Now, this means a few things. They are either celebrating, have important news, or they’re running up the electric bill and are trying to save money. Kristy doesn’t see that her mother clearly has an important announcement and only says that they should be eating outside because they’re wasting the nice weather. Yes, it’s not enough to spend your days outside catching tadpoles or making mud pies or playing freeze tag or hide and ghost seek, you have to eat outside, too. Not everybody loves the outdoors, Kristy. Some of us would rather be indoors with an air conditioner and away from bugs and squirrels who try to steal your cookies at the park. Seriously, my family and I went to the park and the bloody squirrels basically leapt onto our cookie bag. And I’d like to point out that while it may be a nice day, there will be plenty more nice days and they can have a picnic outside then. Or is Stoneybrook (nearly wrote Forks) only sunny once every 100 of years and only has rain, sleet and hail as weather patterns?
There’s some tension with David Michael and Karen. Karen is used to being the oldest; now she’ll have big brothers and a big sister. And David Michael and Karen are so close in age that Elizabeth is worried that they may compete for toys and privileges. David Michael is also jealous of Karen because she gets to go to a private school. What planet does he live on? My cousin goes to private school and she has to wear an ugly uniform, can’t wear nail polish, and actually has to pay twenty dollars if she doesn’t complete service hours. I think I got a better deal than she did. My guess is that David Michael thinks private schools have real food instead of macaroni that looks like a cardboard cutout. I would have said that maybe he had a jacked up idea of private schools because he saw it on television, then I remembered that letting kids watch television is akin to torture in Stoneybrook.
There’s no mention of Elizabeth or Watson talking to the kids about potential sibling rivalry and adjusting to their new siblings. Nope. The only thing the parents in Stoneybrook are required to do is just have the damn kid, and then leave the parenting to a bunch of goddamn thirteen-year-olds.
Charlie asks for a sip of wine. My brother always wants alcohol at family gatherings. This year at Christmas he asked for a bottle of rum, vodka, champagne, and coke to be put in his stocking. We put a bottle of coke in the stocking. I can’t believe that he thought we’d actually go out on Christmas Eve to get him alcohol. And how the hell did he expect us to fit four bottles in a stocking? Funnily enough, my brother is seventeen just like Charlie. I have to laugh because Charlie says he’ll be at college next year. Oh, Charlie. You poor naïve little dear. Elizabeth announces that they’ve set the date for the wedding and she and Watson want everyone to be in it. Kristy’s going to be a bridesmaid, Charlie is going to give Elizabeth away, Sam is going to be the best man, Karen is going to be a flower girl, and Andrew is going to be a coat rack. Karen also married Boo Boo. Poor kitty. No word on whether or not Karen is a polygamist or not, seeing as how she married David Michael and then Ricky Torres.
It’s kind of funny seeing Kristy get all excited about wearing a long dress and have flowers in her hair, but this is an early book. I’m so used to reading snarks about the later books that I forgot what it was like when the girls weren’t gigantic flanderized versions of themselves. You know if this had been book one hundred Kristy would have slashed that dress to pieces while somehow making it a BSC event.
Chapter 2
Return of the Exposition- Attack of the Contrivances
Kristy comes home on Wednesday to find out that everything has gone to hell because of some contrivances. Contrivance number one- Elizabeth’s company is sending her on a business trip to Europe and Kristy gets all excited and begs to come. I want to go to Europe. I hate being a broke college student. Has Watson ever taken the BSC to Europe? But Elizabeth’s boss scheduled the trip on the day of her wedding. Who does that? Who asks someone to go on a business trip on the day of their wedding? Did the trip have to be on that particular day? Couldn’t another member of the company have gone?
Contrivance number two- The real estate has had an offer on the house and the buyer wants them to move out in a month. I have a couple of theories as to why this is. We all know that the buyers are the Mary Sue Perkins girls. As they are Mary Sues, they are being chased by sporkers and snarkers everywhere and they are laying low. With all the bullshit running rampant in Stoneybrook, the citizens wouldn’t notice two unrealistic perfect girls. My second theory is that the girls are actually thirty and have been masquerading as children. They were posing as the adopted child to a couple, but then they committed murder, so they recruited Mr. Perkins as their bodyguard. Given how much everyone spoils Karen, the girls figured they could get away with anything in Stoneybrook. My third theory is that the Perkins are 700 year old reality warpers and Stoneybrook is their new power source.
Kristy asks why they need the money, seeing as how Watson is rich, but Elizabeth says she doesn’t want to be financially dependent on Watson. I’m pretty sure that’s what she’s saying. She doesn’t want Watson to feel obligated to finance his step kids’ college education. So, does Elizabeth expect Watson to help raise her kids at all? I get not wanting to be a gold digger, but did she and Watson ever sit down and discuss the financial situation? Watson probably makes enough to support the whole family, but I guess Elizabeth still wants to be able to provide for her own kids. So where does she draw the line at Watson helping her raise her kids? She doesn’t want him to pay for college education, but is he allowed to buy them expensive presents? Buy them anything? And if Elizabeth doesn’t want Watson to spend a lot of money on her kids, wouldn’t that lead to sibling rivalry if they’re living in the same house? Karen can get that pony, but David Michael can’t get that ten speed racing bike.
Elizabeth then tells Kristy that the wedding will have to be in two weeks and Kristy just kind of boggles. A very realistic reaction; I would have done the same thing. Then Elizabeth goes crazy and starts shrieking about how a wedding is like having a baby and there are people to tell, flowers to arrange, gowns to pick, and a bunch of other bullshit that makes me say- “Fuck marriage. I’m getting a lover and we are living together and we are getting a cat.” Seriously, though, Elizabeth is acting like a total moron. For some reason, she can’t live in the same house as Watson unwed, because that would be living in sin. I guess the Society of Snobby Rich White People will be camping outside Watson’s lawn to shake their finger and make tsking noises. Elizabeth needs to grow a thicker skin.
Option number two is to go down to the courthouse and just get married then and there. My parents pretty much had a shotgun wedding while my mom was pregnant with me. They just went to the courthouse, saw the Justice of the Peace, and signed the papers. Hasn’t Elizabeth ever heard of renewing your vows or getting married again? You can wait to have the big froo-froo wedding. Or if you’re too lazy to go to the courthouse, you could get someone with the authority to marry you to come to your house and marry you there. When I was four my uncle was getting remarried and he had the wedding in my playroom because of him not being allowed in the Catholic Church because of annulment or divorce. I don’t know. I just remember that my damn toys were missing. That was very traumatic for me. It was almost as traumatic as when my parents took away my crayons. Thankfully I managed to find a magenta and gray crayon wedged between the couch cushions. The worst punishment is when they wouldn’t let me read for a week. Agony.
My point is that Elizabeth is being a gigantic moron. She can either suck it up and accept that she won’t get a frilly wedding right now, but she’s a grown woman and she should know that sometimes plans fall through and you have to wait for things. Kind of like when an episode of my favorite TV series gets pushed back and this episode was airing after that two month long break TV shows have. Or Elizabeth can just go live with Watson. He has a bloody mansion. They can live on opposite sides of the house, for Pete’s sake. But no, she has to rush around like a fool and recruit others to help her plan a frilly wedding in two weeks. Not even a small wedding, a gigantic one. Morons.
Kristy suggests that her mother call Watson. Elizabeth does so and then comes back and starts to pack because they have to move into Watson’s house this very second. I can buy Kristy being upset about moving. I moved from South Carolina to Florida when I was eight. Kristy’s sad because she’ll have to adjust to a new room, new kitchen and bathroom, and she won’t be able to see her friends. It is hard adjusting to a move, so I am sympathetic towards her. I’m always afraid that if I move my new house will be haunted, in addition to, “This room is all wrong!” When my family visited South Carolina one year and we went to see our old house. I was like, “You bastards! What have you done to my room? My bathroom? My playroom? My house is ruined! Wait; is that an angry dog barking next door? I guess I can rage about the destruction of my childhood home in the car- bye!” I really can’t snark Kristy being sad about leaving.
Elizabeth needs Kristy to help her make arrangements for the wedding and it’s such a pain in the ass that Kristy sees why her mother went all Bridezilla and feels sorry for her. I don’t. Elizabeth brought all the resulting bullshit and drama on herself. Either live in sin or just get the fucking papers signed and have a frilly wedding later! Fuck!
Chapter 3
Kristy is so preoccupied with the wedding bullshit that she is late for the BSC meeting. Seeing as how this is an early book, she does not immediately fall to her knees and start flaying herself with a twizzler in penance while somehow subjecting herself to her own death glare. There’s also the bonus of not having ten page character bios.
The club finds out about the wedding and the move, and Kristy is hesitant to tell them that she still has reservations about her mother marrying Watson. This seems totally understandable to me. If my parents ever remarried and I liked their new fiancé, I’d still be a little wary no matter how nice they were.
The girls are all excited that Kristy gets to be in a wedding and start to “ooohhhh” over every detail, which includes the fact that the dress is long with short sleeves and a ribbon slash above her waist. Okay, not sure why a dress like that would elicit such reactions, but maybe long with short sleeves and a ribbon slash is code for some scandalous. Or maybe these girls have no taste.
Chapter 4
Kristy comes home from school to find her mother looking hysterical, which can only mean that more bullshit’s about to go down. Sheila and Kendall (Watson’s ex-wife and her husband) apparently decided to go on vacation and left Karen and Andrew with Watson. What kind of douches do shit like that? You may also notice that Sheila and Kendall are not Lisa and Seth. I have an explanation. Sheila has the power to see the future and she saw that Stoneybrook was going to be stuck on a continuous time loop. So she used a magic spell to create doppelgangers (Lisa and Seth) and she and Kendall fled. They now spend their time working for a secret agency that specializes in tracking eldritch abominations.
Now onto more bullshit and contrivances. Friends and family are coming to help with the wedding because apparently Elizabeth having a puff puff wedding in two weeks was such a dire emergency that they dropped everything. And it’s not like they can hire some help or anything. I mean, it’s not like Watson’s a fucking millionaire or anything. No, they have to enlist friends and family as unpaid labor. Morons. And the friends and family are morons as well for not getting on the phone and discussing plans for their kids. Did they seriously just expect to show up and be like, “What are we going to do with the kids?” Morons.
Elizabeth starts whining about how she will never get anything done with all these kids underfoot. MY GOD, SHUT UP! SHUT UP, SHUT UP, SHUT UP! YOU DO NOT GET TO WHINE ABOUT HOW HARD IT WILL BE TO PLAN A WEDDING IN TWO WEEKS WHEN YOU HAD TWO LOGICAL OPTIONS THAT REQUIRED LESS WORK; YOU WERE JUST TOO MUCH OF A DUMBSHIT TO USE THEM! BUT IF YOU MUST HAVE A GIGANTIC WEDDING IN TWO WEEKS, FUCKING HIRE SOME HELP! YOU’RE MARRYING A MILLIONAIRE, FOR FUCK’S SAKE! YOU’RE TELLING ME THAT WATSON CAN’T AFFORD TO HIRE A DAMN CATERER OR WEDDING PLANNER? YOU HAVE TO ENLIST FRIENDS AND FAMILY? MORON!
*clears throat* Sorry about that. I rarely go capslock rage. I was handling the stupidity pretty well up until this point. I don’t know why I cracked.
Then, huzzah! God came down from on high and gave Kristy a great idea and the angels sang! Kristy volunteers the BSC to watch the kids, and Elizabeth is not above accepting labor from a bunch of thirteen year olds, because she agrees. She offers to pay the club three dollars an hour for each girl. Bitch, are you for real? I wouldn’t watch a plant for three dollars an hour. But do you seriously expect me to watch fourteen kids for that amount? Hell no. I may be a bit biased because I don’t like kids, but that is highway robbery. What, the millionaire can’t pay them more or hire professional childcare? I know that I’m harping on about Watson being a millionaire, but this is ridiculous! It’s bad enough to have to plan a wedding in two weeks, but you aren’t going to hire some help? Morons. I like writing the word morons. It makes me happy. Ifeel I'm going to use it a lot in this snark.
Kristy tries to talk to Sam about the marriage and the move, because she’s worried. This makes total sense. She’s unsure about the boundaries between her family and Watson, seeing as they’re his step kids. Is she allowed to ask him for a few bucks? How much money is she allowed to ask him for? Will she be treated any differently than Karen? How much authority does he have over her? Should she get him presents? Watson and Elizabeth are assholes. Shouldn’t they have discussed this with their kids to prevent awkwardness? But no, everything is going to be hunky-dory because apparently children whose parents remarry never ever have any issues at all with their new stepfamily. Ever.
Here’s the thing about this book. At times I can relate to it. I understand being sad that you’re moving and being worried about your mom remarrying. There was potential for a decent story here, but it got overshadowed by bullshit. Kristy’s worries are magically gone after one of her brothers compares the marriage to a movie and she says, “Stay tuned for part 2!” Cue the corny music.
Chapter 5
Kristy calls an emergency meeting of the BSC to tell them that she’s volunteered them as servants for her mother’s wedding. Instead of giving her looks like, “Bitch, what are you smoking?” they shit their pants at the prospect of three dollars an hour. How much did they usually charge, if three dollars is such a luxury to them? I’m pretty sure you could pay Claudia in gum, though, so maybe three dollars is a lot of money to her.
Of course the club agrees to babysit fourteen children, because it’s not like they had anything better to do. What really gets me is that Kristy expects them to cancel other engagements such as dentist appointments and art class. If I were Claudia, I would have presented Kristy with a very unflattering picture of herself. And I can’t believe that Kristy expects them to cancel dentist appointments? Are they supposed to call their dentist and tell them that they’re babysitting for fourteen kids and they need to cancel their appointment? What fuckery is this?
Kristy lists the names and ages of the kids, but I don’t give shit right now. I will say that the girls will have to watch a baby. I do not trust a thirteen year old girl with a baby. Just no. They get the idea to split the kids up into age groups. I’m sure a ten year old would have been totally cool hanging out with a five year old and a baby. They also get the brilliant idea to give the groups names like the red group and the blue group with matching nametags. The sitter in charge will wear one as well, so that they know what group they belong to. Good grief! This is common sense! Do the citizens of Stoneybrook have such a low I.Q. that an inkling of common sense seems like a stroke of genius to them?