#38 Kristy's Mystery Admirer: El Final! (Chapters 13-15)
Part I: http://bsc-snark.livejournal.com/497746.html
Part II: http://bsc-snark.livejournal.com/498356.html
Part III: http://bsc-snark.livejournal.com/498898.html
It's the not-so-thrilling conclusion of The World Series of Dice! Kristy is A-OK now that she's sure her sort-of BF isn't crazy after all. There's a dance and an after party where the BSC kikis all night long. And Halloween!
Jesus Christ, y'all. I've written almost 8,000 words about this tripe. That's an impressive waste of time.
Chapter 13
The World Series of Dice is finally under way. Praise the lard. Kristy sends Matt B out as the first hitter of the game and he gets a triple. Kristy signals to him to stay on third base, something she failed to do in the previous game/practice. Jake Kuhn makes it to first base and the ghost writer reveals absolutely no details on how he did so (a hit? Catcher's interference? An error by the Bashers?) but Matt B scores, and the Krushers are on the board!
Kristy finally remembers she has to coach and her team is doing well enough to make Bart look nervous. Kristy makes a calculated gamble by sending the three worst hitters in the universe up to bat in successive order: Gabbie Perkins, Claire, and Jackie. Gabbie gets a hit, Claire strikes out (but doesn't flip her shit), and Jackie gets a home run! Except he sucks at living so he falls down on the way to his teammates after rounding the bases.
Get this kid some carbs or something. Or inner ear meds. He falls down way too much.
The game drags on through most of this chapter and it's close and intense as the Krushers cling to a one-run lead. Kristy sneaks another peek at Bart, who is looking at her "fiercely." Something tells me it's more like this than the good kind of fierce:
Kristy internally monologues about how Bart might get ticked off at her again if her team beats his team and he might not want to go to the dance with her, which would be age appropriate behavior for very young teens.
Fifth inning stretch time! Since the game is only seven innings, they took the customary seventh inning stretch early. Kristy gives her kids a pep talk before she moseys to the refreshment stand, where her older brothers are dutifully selling snacks to raise money for her team. I can't say either of my brothers would cooperate with me long enough to do anything, much less raise money for my softball team. Sam reminds us he's a dweeb by stopping short of complimenting Kristy's coaching skills and Kristy tells the Three Stooges cheerleaders that they're cheering the house down despite the Bashers cheerleaders looking and performing better. Seriously, Kristy alludes to this in the text.
The game begins again and after two more innings with zero description of anything, the game ends with a final score of 8-7 in favor of the Krushers.
The Krushers had won the World Series [of Dice]!
I'm a sports journalist by trade and I wrote a ton of baseball recaps in my day. I'd be stoned to death if I submitted a story with TWO WHOLE INNINGS of no description of anything. Even if both pitchers retired every batter faced on one pitch, which is the absolute bare minimum of activity required to move a game along, I would be required to write something about it. I know this writer knows shit about baseball, but any writer should know enough to not write "the thing is, it happened" as exposition, much less when the event in question has been hyped for the majority of the book.
It came to my attention, after I had written this snark, that Ann herself wrote this book. Why attempt to write about something you know nothing about? Ann could have given herself some help with Baseball for Dummies. I'm not even kidding. The basic stuff she fucked up here is easily explained there.
Anyway, the Krushers are psyched that they won. The cheerleaders give the Bashers a cheer. After the chaos settles down, Bart's still around, and Kristy feels their entire relationship has changed. Could they still be boyfriend/girlfriend?
Rather than confront Bart and work out their issues, she runs to the BSC to reveal Cokie as the psycho note writer. They're satisfied with Kristy's empty threat to tell the whole school and Bart's whole school what she did and they leave, except Shannon. Girlfriend has to work what's left of her appearance in this book, as we will likely never see her again. She asks Shannon if Bart will still go to the dance with her and Shannon tells her to put on her big girl panties and ask Bart herself.
Bart isn't pissed off about losing the game. In fact, he's incredibly happy to see her. Kristy tells Bart about the letters in exactly two words of exposition and the lovebirds part ways after their families tear them apart. Until Friday, they promise.
Shannon comes by Kristy's heezy after the game to give Kristy unsolicited makeup advice. She tries to get Kristy into a dress and Shannon tells her she can't wear a long dress to the dance. Risque! Kristy says she can go in costume because it's a Halloween dance and Shannon insists Kristy has to look good for Bart, who wrote that Kristy is as beautiful as a snow-covered mountain just as she is. Maybe she should show up in one of these:
Shannon is still on Kristy's makeup and nail polish, and for some reason nail polish freaks Kristy the fuck out. She's not so mad about the makeup, but nail polish is a big no-no.
Bart calls and saves her from the madness. He has some wacky-ass costumes for them to wear! Lobster costumes! Which sounds really fun and I'd totally do it, not gonna lie.
Kristy says, "yeah! Fuck off, Shannon!" and smears rouge all over her face in preparation for her turn in lobster couture.
Kristy's Artpop could mean anything.
Shannon's mad and calls Kristy weird. She must not be a Lady Gaga fan.
Damn that was a long chapter, especially since nothing really happened in the narrative and a hell of a lot more could have been written there.
Chapter 14
It's Friday! Gotta get down!
The Halloween Hop is here and Kristy's done up as a lobster, checking out her form in the mirror.
Karen is freaked out by the mutant crustacean in the bathroom and tells Kristy that girls should wear beautiful gowns, ribbons, pearls in their hair, and lots of jewelry to dances.
Karen then asks if Bart is Kristy's boyfriend and she responds that she's unsure. Karen asks why and then Kristy deflects her queries by asking Karen about her costume.
Surprisingly Karen isn't a hateful little turd in this book. It's quite refreshing.
Kristy is nervous about going to the dance because she considers this her first date and she's worried that the kids at her school will judge Bart because he doesn't even go here. This is cute and authentic junior high angst and I appreciate the brief glimmer of humanity in this book.
Everyone's at the dance, from sixth to eighth grade! Everyone has dates except for Dawn and Jessi, but Jessi doesn't mention why she went alone. She must be copying Dawn's individuality. Bart and Kristy walk claw-in-claw into the dance and Kristy is put off by people are staring at the two five foot lobsters that just walked in.
Everyone is dancing and the band is good and there's punch. Costumes are described in base detail. Kristy says she doesn't mind being ignored by Cokie, who is "pretending not to notice" them. I think she needs to get over it. Kristy gets nervous about a slow dance with Bart and mentions that "I had a feeling that I wasn't getting the full effect of things, with all those layers of foam between us."
Costume winners are announced and Kristy and Bart win Most Unusual! Plus they get a free pizza at Pizza Express. I call that a huge win.
They all dance a little bit more before the end of the evening, which ends with Bart kissing Kristy on the cheek. She mentions feeling like she's in love.
That's so freaking cute. I can't say anything more about that.
Chapter 15
At the after party sleepover kiki, the girls plus Shannon gather to tell the T about the dance. Shannon wants the deets about the dance because Ann couldn’t invent an SMS boy to take her or some other reason to squeeze the last 15 seconds of fame she has in this book.
Stacey tells Shannon about Cokie's wardrobe. The queen bee showed up in a lot of makeup, including fake lashes-one of which fell into the punchbowl.
But no, we couldn't get a real time description of that in the narrative, despite being really funny and a prime opportunity to talk shit about Cokie at the dance.
Jessi danced with eight (!) different boys but she's mad cos they were all terrible dancers. They chat about Kristy and Bart winning free pizza and Stacey gets Kristy to spill about Bart kissing her. In front of everyone in the middle of the gym. The girls get all giggly and squealy over that and then Jessi asks Kristy if she's in love. She says nothing and the conversation devolves to Halloween and little kids, because talking about little kids is 8698070 times better than discussing cute boys and kissing. Totally.
They bring up Cokie's Halloween stunt last "year" again and Stacey is all wistful that the ghost writers had her in New York for that. Karen screams from her bedroom apparently due to a nightmare, although I suspect it was the realization that she has to live with herself. The girls go to sleep and more atmospherically creepy stuff happens; branches scraping the windowpane, and another note appears!
It's a ransom note made from cutout newspaper and magazine letters. The psycho is coming to get her at 3AM! There's no escape!
Just kidding. It's Shannon! She pulled a fast one on Kristy and made the note while they were at the dance. So that's why the ghost writer didn't invent some bullshit reason to get her to the Greek dance.
Shannon's fuckery gives Kristy an idea. For someone who says she would rather be ignored by Cokie, she sure thinks about this bitch a lot. She writes a parody of the creepy letters Cokie sent to slip into Cokie's locker on Monday at school. Everyone laughs at this comedic genius, then the girls go back to sleep and don't wake up until 11am the next morning. Sounds like a good morning after to me.
Oh my lanta, I did it! I survived this. I think I'll postpone Kristy and the Walking Disaster for a later snark, because my body is not ready for more poorly written baseball/softball and the BSC shitting all over Jackie R.
Thank you all for reading, commenting, and otherwise supporting me through this mess.
Part II: http://bsc-snark.livejournal.com/498356.html
Part III: http://bsc-snark.livejournal.com/498898.html
It's the not-so-thrilling conclusion of The World Series of Dice! Kristy is A-OK now that she's sure her sort-of BF isn't crazy after all. There's a dance and an after party where the BSC kikis all night long. And Halloween!
Jesus Christ, y'all. I've written almost 8,000 words about this tripe. That's an impressive waste of time.
Chapter 13
The World Series of Dice is finally under way. Praise the lard. Kristy sends Matt B out as the first hitter of the game and he gets a triple. Kristy signals to him to stay on third base, something she failed to do in the previous game/practice. Jake Kuhn makes it to first base and the ghost writer reveals absolutely no details on how he did so (a hit? Catcher's interference? An error by the Bashers?) but Matt B scores, and the Krushers are on the board!
Kristy finally remembers she has to coach and her team is doing well enough to make Bart look nervous. Kristy makes a calculated gamble by sending the three worst hitters in the universe up to bat in successive order: Gabbie Perkins, Claire, and Jackie. Gabbie gets a hit, Claire strikes out (but doesn't flip her shit), and Jackie gets a home run! Except he sucks at living so he falls down on the way to his teammates after rounding the bases.
Get this kid some carbs or something. Or inner ear meds. He falls down way too much.
The game drags on through most of this chapter and it's close and intense as the Krushers cling to a one-run lead. Kristy sneaks another peek at Bart, who is looking at her "fiercely." Something tells me it's more like this than the good kind of fierce:
Kristy internally monologues about how Bart might get ticked off at her again if her team beats his team and he might not want to go to the dance with her, which would be age appropriate behavior for very young teens.
Fifth inning stretch time! Since the game is only seven innings, they took the customary seventh inning stretch early. Kristy gives her kids a pep talk before she moseys to the refreshment stand, where her older brothers are dutifully selling snacks to raise money for her team. I can't say either of my brothers would cooperate with me long enough to do anything, much less raise money for my softball team. Sam reminds us he's a dweeb by stopping short of complimenting Kristy's coaching skills and Kristy tells the Three Stooges cheerleaders that they're cheering the house down despite the Bashers cheerleaders looking and performing better. Seriously, Kristy alludes to this in the text.
The game begins again and after two more innings with zero description of anything, the game ends with a final score of 8-7 in favor of the Krushers.
The Krushers had won the World Series [of Dice]!
Click to viewI'm a sports journalist by trade and I wrote a ton of baseball recaps in my day. I'd be stoned to death if I submitted a story with TWO WHOLE INNINGS of no description of anything. Even if both pitchers retired every batter faced on one pitch, which is the absolute bare minimum of activity required to move a game along, I would be required to write something about it. I know this writer knows shit about baseball, but any writer should know enough to not write "the thing is, it happened" as exposition, much less when the event in question has been hyped for the majority of the book.
It came to my attention, after I had written this snark, that Ann herself wrote this book. Why attempt to write about something you know nothing about? Ann could have given herself some help with Baseball for Dummies. I'm not even kidding. The basic stuff she fucked up here is easily explained there.
Anyway, the Krushers are psyched that they won. The cheerleaders give the Bashers a cheer. After the chaos settles down, Bart's still around, and Kristy feels their entire relationship has changed. Could they still be boyfriend/girlfriend?
Rather than confront Bart and work out their issues, she runs to the BSC to reveal Cokie as the psycho note writer. They're satisfied with Kristy's empty threat to tell the whole school and Bart's whole school what she did and they leave, except Shannon. Girlfriend has to work what's left of her appearance in this book, as we will likely never see her again. She asks Shannon if Bart will still go to the dance with her and Shannon tells her to put on her big girl panties and ask Bart herself.
Bart isn't pissed off about losing the game. In fact, he's incredibly happy to see her. Kristy tells Bart about the letters in exactly two words of exposition and the lovebirds part ways after their families tear them apart. Until Friday, they promise.
Shannon comes by Kristy's heezy after the game to give Kristy unsolicited makeup advice. She tries to get Kristy into a dress and Shannon tells her she can't wear a long dress to the dance. Risque! Kristy says she can go in costume because it's a Halloween dance and Shannon insists Kristy has to look good for Bart, who wrote that Kristy is as beautiful as a snow-covered mountain just as she is. Maybe she should show up in one of these:
Shannon is still on Kristy's makeup and nail polish, and for some reason nail polish freaks Kristy the fuck out. She's not so mad about the makeup, but nail polish is a big no-no.
Bart calls and saves her from the madness. He has some wacky-ass costumes for them to wear! Lobster costumes! Which sounds really fun and I'd totally do it, not gonna lie.
Kristy says, "yeah! Fuck off, Shannon!" and smears rouge all over her face in preparation for her turn in lobster couture.
Kristy's Artpop could mean anything.
Shannon's mad and calls Kristy weird. She must not be a Lady Gaga fan.
Damn that was a long chapter, especially since nothing really happened in the narrative and a hell of a lot more could have been written there.
Chapter 14
It's Friday! Gotta get down!
The Halloween Hop is here and Kristy's done up as a lobster, checking out her form in the mirror.
Karen is freaked out by the mutant crustacean in the bathroom and tells Kristy that girls should wear beautiful gowns, ribbons, pearls in their hair, and lots of jewelry to dances.
Karen then asks if Bart is Kristy's boyfriend and she responds that she's unsure. Karen asks why and then Kristy deflects her queries by asking Karen about her costume.
Surprisingly Karen isn't a hateful little turd in this book. It's quite refreshing.
Kristy is nervous about going to the dance because she considers this her first date and she's worried that the kids at her school will judge Bart because he doesn't even go here. This is cute and authentic junior high angst and I appreciate the brief glimmer of humanity in this book.
Everyone's at the dance, from sixth to eighth grade! Everyone has dates except for Dawn and Jessi, but Jessi doesn't mention why she went alone. She must be copying Dawn's individuality. Bart and Kristy walk claw-in-claw into the dance and Kristy is put off by people are staring at the two five foot lobsters that just walked in.
Everyone is dancing and the band is good and there's punch. Costumes are described in base detail. Kristy says she doesn't mind being ignored by Cokie, who is "pretending not to notice" them. I think she needs to get over it. Kristy gets nervous about a slow dance with Bart and mentions that "I had a feeling that I wasn't getting the full effect of things, with all those layers of foam between us."
Costume winners are announced and Kristy and Bart win Most Unusual! Plus they get a free pizza at Pizza Express. I call that a huge win.
They all dance a little bit more before the end of the evening, which ends with Bart kissing Kristy on the cheek. She mentions feeling like she's in love.
That's so freaking cute. I can't say anything more about that.
Chapter 15
At the after party sleepover kiki, the girls plus Shannon gather to tell the T about the dance. Shannon wants the deets about the dance because Ann couldn’t invent an SMS boy to take her or some other reason to squeeze the last 15 seconds of fame she has in this book.
Stacey tells Shannon about Cokie's wardrobe. The queen bee showed up in a lot of makeup, including fake lashes-one of which fell into the punchbowl.
But no, we couldn't get a real time description of that in the narrative, despite being really funny and a prime opportunity to talk shit about Cokie at the dance.
Jessi danced with eight (!) different boys but she's mad cos they were all terrible dancers. They chat about Kristy and Bart winning free pizza and Stacey gets Kristy to spill about Bart kissing her. In front of everyone in the middle of the gym. The girls get all giggly and squealy over that and then Jessi asks Kristy if she's in love. She says nothing and the conversation devolves to Halloween and little kids, because talking about little kids is 8698070 times better than discussing cute boys and kissing. Totally.
They bring up Cokie's Halloween stunt last "year" again and Stacey is all wistful that the ghost writers had her in New York for that. Karen screams from her bedroom apparently due to a nightmare, although I suspect it was the realization that she has to live with herself. The girls go to sleep and more atmospherically creepy stuff happens; branches scraping the windowpane, and another note appears!
It's a ransom note made from cutout newspaper and magazine letters. The psycho is coming to get her at 3AM! There's no escape!
Just kidding. It's Shannon! She pulled a fast one on Kristy and made the note while they were at the dance. So that's why the ghost writer didn't invent some bullshit reason to get her to the Greek dance.
Shannon's fuckery gives Kristy an idea. For someone who says she would rather be ignored by Cokie, she sure thinks about this bitch a lot. She writes a parody of the creepy letters Cokie sent to slip into Cokie's locker on Monday at school. Everyone laughs at this comedic genius, then the girls go back to sleep and don't wake up until 11am the next morning. Sounds like a good morning after to me.
Oh my lanta, I did it! I survived this. I think I'll postpone Kristy and the Walking Disaster for a later snark, because my body is not ready for more poorly written baseball/softball and the BSC shitting all over Jackie R.
Thank you all for reading, commenting, and otherwise supporting me through this mess.