Freaky Friday by Mary Rodgers.
Title: Freaky Friday.
Author: Mary Rodgers.
Genre: Fiction, YA, teen, humour, fantasy.
Country: U.S.
Language: English
Publication Date: 1972.
Summary: Annabel Andrews is tired of her mother telling her what to do. She's tired of being told to do her homework, clean up her room, and be nice to her little brother, Ape Face. If she were an adult, she could do anything she wanted, like watch TV all day and eat marshmallows for breakfast. One Friday morning, Annabel's wish comes true when she wakes up and realizes she's turned into her mother! But after a major washing machine mishap, losing Ape Face, and a terrible teacher conference, Annabel starts to suspect that being an adult is not as much fun as it seems. One thing's for certain-this is one freaky Friday she'll never forget!
My rating: 7.5/10.
My review:
♥ My name is Annabel Andrews. (No middle name, I don't even have a nickname. I've been trying to get them to call me Bubbles at school, but it doesn't seem to catch on.) I'm thirteen; I have brown hair, brown eyes, and brown fingernails. (That's a joke-actually, I take a lot of baths.) I'm five feet; I don't remember what weigh but I'm watching it, although my mother says it's ridiculous, and I'm not completely mature in my figure yet. Maybe by the summer though.
♥ So far there are only two kids in our family, but look who's already gotten stuck with the brown eyes. Me. The sister of the only blue-eyed ape in captivity. That's what I call him. The blue-eyed ape. Ape Face for short. His real name is Ben.) Anyway, back to my mother.
♥ "Listen!" I screamed at her. "You are not letting me have any fun and I'm sick of it. You are always pushing me around and telling me what to do. How come nobody ever gets to tell you what to do, huh? Tell me that!"
She said, "Annabel, when you're grown-up, people don't tell you what to do; you have to tell yourself, which is sometimes much more difficult."
♥ I gave him a little punch on the shoulder to wake him up.
"Hey," I said, "are you awake?"
"I am now," he said. "Was I dreaming or did you just punch me?" I guess grown-ups don't punch each other awake. He looked sort of annoyed.
♥ Just then the alarm went off. Daddy groaned and I slinked off to the kitchen to make breakfast before he could say anything else. Somehow, I had the feeling that until he'd had some coffee, anything else he said wouldn't be too friendly. And then I realized that after he'd had the coffee he might not be too friendly either because he was going to get instant. It was the only kind I knew how yo make.
♥ "Oh, I handed that in early last week," she said, looking me right in the eye. You want somebody to believe you, you always look 'em right in the eye. It's a slick trick of mine... works every time.
♥ "Bye-bye, darlings, have a nice day," I said, holding the door open for them. But Ape Face just stood there. What was he waiting for, I wondered? Then a grotesque thought came to me. He was waiting to be kissed and I was going to have to do it. So I did-as quickly as possible. But I hoped he didn't expect it again at lunchtime. Annabel didn't expect it at all, she never does. Just as well. I would have felt funny kissing myself good-bye.
♥ "..and is Mrs. Schmauss coming today?"
"Let's see. Today's Friday? Yes, why?"
"Don't let her touch my shirts. She may be a good cleaner but she's a crummy laundress. Be a good girl and you do them, though, because I'm almost out. Good-bye, I'm late, I love you," and out he went, slamming the front door behind him.
What a cute man!
Imagine letting that poor cute man run almost out of shirts!
♥ On the other side of the door stood Boris Harris!
Boris Harris is fourteen, he has chestnut hair and hazel eyes. I don't know how tall he is but it's a good three inches more than I am, and whatever he weighs is just perfect. He lives in our building, he is beautiful, and I love him.
"And he is standing outside our door right this minute holding a spaghetti sieve, and how am I going to handle the situation?" I asked myself. "With charm and sophistication," I answered myself, and with that I hid the bowl of macaroni in a wastebasket, and flung open the door.
♥ "You know, Boris," I continued, "lately, Annabel has completely changed. She is no longer that same person who cut your scalp open with a tin shovel in the playground five years ago."
"Four, " said Boris.
♥ "Anyway," he said, "thanks, and thanks for the Vitamin C. That must be very zappy stuff. Did you notice my cold is completely gone?" And with that, he opened the front door and left before I even had a chance to say I hadn't noticed. Which I hadn't. Oh, the pain of it all, the naked aching pain!
♥ I was hoping to find a good cartoon, but it was after ten and I couldn't even find a bad cartoon. I suppose they figure all the kids are in school and grown-ups like to watch other kinds of shows. Not very thoughtful of them. What about a poor little sick kid who has to stay home, or a poor little kid who's changed into her mother for the day. Not even one "Road Runner"? No sir.
♥ (If there's anything I can't stand, it's "took sick" and "passed on" or "passed away." What's the matter with just plain "died"?)
♥ As far as looks go, let me put it to you this way: She's the next closest thing to a rhinoceros, with a voice that could shatter glass, and she smells funny.
♥ "In that you're going to the liquor store? A ladies' luncheon maybe, but to go around the corner in?"
It's none of her business what I go around the corner in. I know just as well as she does people don't wear velvet with rhinestone buttons in the morning, but they do wear them in the evening and that's what I was dressed for. I don't see why grown-ups keep changing their clothes all day Long. An old rag to do the breakfast dishes in (heck, I forgot to do the breakfast dishes; oh well, Mrs. Schmauss could) a skirt to go to the store in, a dress to go to lunch in, pants to go to the park in, and velvet and rhinestones to go to dinner in. If you count in and out of your nightgown twice, that takes six changes. What a bore! I like to get into one thing and stay in it.
♥ What happened before I finally got her out of the apartment isn't worth describing in detail. Briefly, though, she asked me why I was firing her. I told her she was a liar and a drunk and prejudiced, which were not qualities I admired. She told me I was prejudiced-against Germans. I said I thought she was American. She said her grandfather was born in Germany. I said I had nothing against her grandfather. I didn't even know him. She said how could I know him, he was dead? I said I was sorry to hear it, was she very fond of him? She said she never knew him either, he died before she was born. In that case, I said, would she please give me the key to the apartment-which didn't have anything to do with anything but she was too far gone to notice.
♥ He tsk-tsked a lot, gave me my change, and asked if I didn't want the bottles delivered-the boy could bring them right over. I said no thank you, I would just as soon carry them. If I'd had any idea what was going to happen next, I would have just as soon not carried them. I would, in fact, have been better off dead.
♥ Now, she never lets me stop at accidents. I've told her a million times I only throw up at the sight of my own blood, but she hurries me along, saying, "Don't look, don't look!" This was my big chance.
♥ "What other bad things does she do?"
"Aren't I going to get some lunch soon?" he said, sliding off the stool and jiggling up and down. "I'm awful hungry because the graham crackers didn't go around twice. Also, I have to go to the bathroom." He ran out of the kitchen before I had a chance to ask him anything else, so I decided he might be a lot of other rotten things but he wasn't a rotten rat.
♥ "Here? You invited them here? You wouldn't! Not today! Invite them for tomorrow. Please Bill, how about tomorrow?" (Tomorrow-when maybe with a little luck, she'd be back.)
"No way, darling, they're only in town for one night. And they want to see the children so they're coming at six. I'll be home at five to change, did you do my shirts? And don't panic, you're one terrific cook." Male chauvinist pig!
"You're one terrific surprise after another," I snapped into the phone, but it was too late. He'd already hung up.
♥ Behind the typewriter was the Secretary to the Principal, Mrs. Betty Parsons. How or why the Mrs., I simply can't imagine. You'd have to be out of your skull to want to marry her. Old lemon-lips, old Brillo-hair, old twinkle-tongue. She feels the same way about me, by the way, and judging from the reception I was getting from her now, she doesn't like my mother either.
♥ Could I have gotten raped or strangled by a depraved killer in the dirty movie? or run over by a crosstown bus just as I came blinking out into the sunlight afterward?
My God, my bod! I never thought of it before, but I'm not all that careful with myself. Suppose right now I am lying stone cold dead in the city morgue, and then tomorrow, let's say, my mother wants her own bod back, where does that leave me? Or to be more exact, what does that leave me? Or I'll tell you one thing, possession is nine tenth of the law and if anything like that happens, I'm staying right in here where I am, whether I like it or not. After all, she's responsible for this mess, she can jolly well go back to whoever she's been all day-Queen Elizabeth or Jackie Onassis or somebody.
On the other hand, if I go on being Mrs. Andrews then I will have to explain to Daddy and Ape Face (who loves Annabel so much) and to all the teachers at Barden (who don't) how come I was careless enough to allow my little girl to play hooky from school and get crushed under a bus. Maybe it would be better to work out a trade with my mother and I could be Jackie Onassis.
♥ Have you ever seen someone jump from the lotus position to a standing position in one move? Not in velvet pajamas you haven't and you never will. It can't be done without falling down.
♥ "You bet it is. And we, at the Barden, encourage that kind of spunk and zip. We like to see spunk and zip!" (Spunk and Zip, Spunk and Zip. It sounded like a book about two Swedish brothers. The Adventures of Spunk and Zip. Spunk and Zip in the Frozen Fiord. Spunk and Zip in the Sunken Ship. See Spunk zip. Good Lord, was I going mad?)
♥ And with that, she folded her hands and placed them carefully in her lap, opened her blue eyes very wide, and stared, quite deliberately, at nobody in the room. Every kid in the world knows that trick. It's to keep you from crying. It sometimes works and it sometimes doesn't, but it never works if you blink. She blinked.
♥ "Oh come on, now. Crying because your dog died or your grandmother-that's sensible, but crying over some rotten kid who isn't even dead (as far as we know anyway), that's just a waste of good grief!"
♥ "Your visible discomfort at the sight of tears, for instance. To restrain yourself from crying is to deny yourself a perfectly legitimate and healthy emotional outlet. Children cry. Why shouldn't adults?"
"Children would rather die than cry!" I said through closed teeth.
♥ "So, Miss McGuirk," I said, cheerfully patting her hand, "on Monday morning I'm sure you're going to see a completely new Annabel."
"Let's not get our hopes up too high," said Artunian. "We can't expect her to change overnight."
"Stranger things have happened," I said mysteriously.
"Well then, Mrs. Andrews, I suppose this concludes our little meeting." Mr. Dilk stood up and shook my hand. "And on Monday, we look forward to, if not a totally new Annabel, at least an older and wiser one."
"You bet."
♥ "I just want to know, where is he?"
Boris was apparently in shock. With someone in shock, you shake them. I shook him.
♥ By now, I was in what the movie mags call The Grip of Naked Terror. I always wondered what they meant when they said "her heart was in her mouth" and "her mind was in turmoil." Well, in case you're interested, a mouthful of heart is something like a mouthful of captured frog, and a mind in turmoil simply means all the blood in your body rushes around in your head, leaving you icy cold from the neck down. As for "butterflies in the stomach," there is no such thing. It's June bugs.
♥ He followed me all the way down the hall babbling about how if anything happened to Ape Face on account of him, he would kill himself (not if I get there first), and couldn't he please keep me company-maybe he could be of some assistance (I told him he'd already been of enough assistance, too much in fact.), couldn't he help me call the police...
"Boris," I said through the closed door, "do me a big fat favor and shut up!"
"Can I just say one more thing?" he asked.
"If you make it quick," I said, opening the door a crack.
"I love you," he whispered.
"Your timing stinks!" I said. "You should have told me that yesterday."
"I didn't know you yesterday," he protested.
"That's what you think," I said, and slammed the door in his face. So much for my love life.
♥ "I've lost my mother and maybe my daughter. What's it to you?"
"Nothing, I guess. I mean, I wouldn't consider Annabel any great loss-" A headline flashed through my mind: INSANE MOTHER OF TWO STABS FOURTEEN-YEAR-OLD BABY-SITTER WITH BALL POINT PEN.
♥ "-if you won't save yourself, somebody's got to do it."
Poor thing was all out of breath and almost in tears. I had plenty of breath, but I was almost in tears, too. He really did love me. What a pitiful waste.
♥ Boris shot me another comforting smile. I shot him a smile that said, "Why don't you shut up, Boris, because there is something very peculiar going on here and you are going to make it worse!"
Unfortunately, it's hard to communicate all of that in one little smile, even one little smile through gritted teeth.
♥ "Boris," I said, "Would you please entertain my husband's clients. Mr. and Mrs. Frampton, of Francie's Fortified Fish Finger fame, for a few minutes. Perhaps they'd like to see our kitchen on account of that's their specialty and all. Anyway, Boris, I'm going to ask you to be host because there's something I have to do in the bedroom."
Slitting my throat was what I had in mind, actually, but I couldn't find a decent weapon. Not even a letter opener. Instead, I just sat on her bed and had a made monologue with her. Or at her. (Whichever makes more sense.) At any rate, it was mad in both senses of the word because by now I was feeling good and mad but also good and crazy.
Listen, I quit! I've had enough of this. That's what you wanted, isn't it? You wanted to teach me a terrific lesson? OK, I learned a terrific lesson. But you better get back here fast because things are all messed up and I can't fix them. And if you don't get back here fast, you won't be able to fix them either. Daddy's going to lose the Fish Finger account, and he doesn't have any shirts, and the cleaning woman's been fired. Although I suppose it doesn't matter whether there's a cleaning woman or not because what's left for her to do? Answer me that? Ape Face is gone. GONE! Somebody came and stole him while you were out playing hooky or whatever you were doing. And Annabel's gone, too. Not that that's any great loss, but it's pretty hard to explain and if you think I'm going to be the one to explain it you've got another think coming, Ma. And when Daddy comes home any second now and finds out he's got no kids and a demented wife, he'll move straight to his club. (If he has a club. If not, he'll have to find one.) And then you want to know what's going to happen? I'm going right out that window. Splat on the pavement. You better get back in this bod fast, or you might not have a bod to get back into! Never thought of that, did you?! So if you know what's good for you, now's the time to show up. One, two, three, SHOW!
Where did that get me? Zilch. Maybe a slightly different approach:
All right, I won't go out the window. It's an ooky idea anyway. I'll just lie down on your bed here and close my eyes and count to ten, and you'll be back. OK, Ma? ...nine, ten... Ma?
Oh Ma, please, please, where are you? Where did you go? I need you!
Ma?
MA?
MOMMY!
♥ Furthermore, she should be grateful to me for stopping smoking because if she could stop for eleven hours or so, she could consider the habit kicked. She was indeed grateful. Would I please continue with my story.
♥ In our American history class when we've finished each chapter, Miss Benson makes up questions for us to "think about" and then answer in essay form. The answers to the questions aren't always in the chapter, but they're related to the chapter, and unless you're a total retard, you can usually figure out what you're supposed to say. (For instance, if the question is "How would you, as a British official, feel about the Boston Tea Party?" your essay might begin, "If I were a British official, I'd be pretty tea'd off." Then again you might not, because Miss Benson would give you a zero for being flip.)
♥ After buying The New York Times, which she hadn't yet had a chance to read, Ma went to a little French restaurant she knew in the East Fifties.
"I ordered myself a nice lunch of Senegalese soup, tripe à la mode de Caen, tossed green salad, and more coffee, and read my Times. Or tried to read my Times. It was awfully hard to concentrate with half the restaurant whispering and snickering about me. Adults seem to be under the impression that children are deaf, dumb, blind, and utterly insensitive," she said with disgust.
♥ "Well, sweetie, of course you don't have to go [to summer camp] if you don't want to," said Daddy. He had the look of someone who'd just found nine hundred dollars lying in the street.
♥ What happened when Boris arrived, which he did, right after the camp discussion?
But first, I have to ask you a question: Have you been waiting for this? Have you been waiting for the moment when the chestnut-haired, hazel-eyed, three inches taller, champion Nok Hockey player, maker of meatloaves Boris finds out that the metal-mouthed killer ghoul of Central Park is no longer? That in her place is Annabel the Beautiful? You have been waiting? Yeah, but not as long as I have. I've been waiting for three years.
♥ I'm not going to bother finishing the conversation with Robin. (One of the good things about imagining: you get to cut out all the boring parts and go on with the juicy stuff.)
♥ My mind is wandering. Back to the telephone-which rings again. This time it's a black friend of mine called-let's see... called-uh-Gordon. Gordon wants to know if I'm working at Head Start on Tuesday because he is...
Now Boris knows I am beautiful, loyal, kind and a liberal.
♥ "She looks pretty," don't you think?" Oh, Ape Face! You are a loyal and kind person.
"Yes, she really does. You really do," he said.
I smiled at him and said thank you.
He smiled at me and said you're welcome.
And that, folks, is how it really happened. Not very glamorous, but who cares. At least it happened.
♥ "I'm sure it's fantastically delicious," I said, very gung ho. "You've probably invented something. Beetloaf by Boris. I wonder why I was so positive you'd said meatloaf."
"I know why," said Boris, wearily. "It's because when a person with adenoids says, 'Hello, my dabe is Boris add I've cub to bake you a beetloaf,' you automatically translate that into 'Hello, my name is Morris and I've come to make you a meatloaf.'"
"Hey, you're absolutely right. Aren't you smart! That's a brilliant theory. As a matter of fact, I bet a lot of people think your name is really Morris!" Boris was standing with folded arms, staring at me, smiling the way you smile at an idiot, and nodding his head up and down.
"Yes, they do. Because it is." ZONK!