#19, Claudia and the Bad Joke
I was gonna go through the Jessi books, but changed my mind. See, I'm a dancer, and dancers love to dance, and be generally active. My summer plans included hiking around Silver Falls and seeing every waterfall, hiking to the top of Multnomah Falls for a picnic, and going to Disneyland, among other things. Basically things that require the ability to, oh, I don't know...WALK. But nooooooo, fuck no. My left ankle's been hurting for a while. Then a handful of weeks ago, I fell and ended up in the ER. Hello, tendonitis! Tendonitis decided to pay me an extended visit and fuck up my life. I'm out of ballet for at least a year, can't do my hikes, and no, Disneyland doesn't let you line-hop because you're in a wheelchair, which I'd have to use there. For people who like being sedentary, it's a bummer to not be able to walk. Imagine loving to RUN, and instead having to have your 5-year-old help you stand. Yeah.
So I can feel for Claudia in this book.
So let's start with
Strangely, there are many variation. The original cover comes in blue, pink, and white, and then the first reboot is in pink. And another reboot. On the Spanish edition, she actually looks Japanese. It's a beautiful cover. This one is clearest:
Now I spent a lot of time in the hospital when I was a kid, but I don't think they kept you oveer a broken leg unless you needed surgery. Who are those kids? I guess we'll find out.
Chapter 1
“You know,” said Kristy Thomas, “I have never been hit in the face with a pie.”
Right off the bat, I'm going to hell because I'm thinking about her having a future career being hit with cream pies. If you don't know... Especially since she said a chocolate pie in the face wouldn't be so bad, and that's a type of cream pie.
So Logan is as a slumber party with the girls. Did 13-year-olds generally know how to get condoms, or are they just hoping Mary Anne won't get knocked up? Maybe if she jumps up and down afterward...
Hell. Who's going with me?
Oh, Lordy, Claudia mentioned Kristy having a big mouth, and upgrade my ticket to hell to an express.
“You know,” said Dawn Schafer, “would only want to get hit with - ”
“We know, we know,” I jumped in. “An all-natural, sugar-free pie. "
I love you, Claudia.
We're treated to an overly-long telling of who called whom to a film festival...what? *scrolls back up*
Ann. Damn you! You wrote this shit! Don't tell us Logan hasn't been to one of their slumber parties, therefore he hasn't heard this food talk, if you aren't going to be clear that they are actually at the library. I' not deleting everything I typed. Fuck you, Ann.
"All" of SB's kids are there for a few old films. I guess at least it's not I Love Lucy.
Do you want the chapter 2 stuff now? Good. I don't want to read it. Claud doesn't give us an outfit description anyway, just "I wear wild clothes, such as baggy pants and sweaters, high-top sneakers, and jewelry I make myself. " So she's really MC Hammer.
Groovy. The kids today still say that, right?
Talk about survivors, Dawn is a champion one. She’s an individual, too. She stands up for what she believes in, even when no one else believes in it, and she dresses the way she pleases, and does things her own way. She’s not stuck-up, though, and she doesn’t step all over people, trying to get her own way. In fact, she’s one of the nicest people I know.
...
...
...
...
I must dissect this.
Talk about survivors, Dawn is a champion one.
Oh mah gawd, she once had to spend a night at an airport. And if she's a champrion survivor, does that make her a professional victim?
She’s an individual, too.
No, she's not. She's a typical snot-nosed PETA-warrior.
She stands up for what she believes in, even when no one else believes in it,
It's not that no one else believes in her causes. She's just bitchy about it.
and she dresses the way she pleases,
So do all of you.
and does things her own way.
Which is the same as everyone else.
She’s not stuck-up, though, and she doesn’t step all over people, trying to get her own way.
HAHAHAHA! I want some of the drugs you're using.
In fact, she’s one of the nicest people I know.
Have you MET Dawn?!
Her two paragraphs on Mal may be the nicest in this series. No snark, just complimenting her level-headedness, and being prett nice about Mal's looks. Mal wishes her freckles away and wants her hair to be straight, and wants contacts. Just a nice intro.
And Jessi isn't planning to become a professional ballerina in this book.
But just then, the man got hit in the face with a coconut cream pie.
“Awesome!” whispered Kristy. “That’s my dream!”
I'll go pack m bags as soon as I post this.
Chapter 2
Dawn had arrived. Mimi must have let her in. Mimi knows my friends, and they love her as much as I do. She loves them right back. That’s just the kind of person Mimi is.
Love for Mimi! But why did she have to let Dawn in?
Dawn wrinkled her nose, plainly meaning, “Junk food. Ew.”
What was that about Dawn not being stuck up?
Do we need to know how the club works? No. Amazing how chapter 2 stuff used to be stretched out into two chapters.
Blah blah, nothing but Mrs. Perkins calling for a sitter, some padding about that, and Mrs. Sobak, a newbie, calls. If you can't guess the newb is park of the plot, you're in the wrong snark club.
Claud's concerned. She knows other people who've babysat for Betsy, so wants to know why her mother is now calling them. Rather than wonder too, so-brilliant Kristy says not to knock it.
Foreshadowing. Kristy squirts Mary Anne with disappearing ink, but only she's laughing. What an uncomfortable scene to imagine, just a bunch of girls watching disappearing ink dry while one laughs hysterically.
Chapter 3
You know how we never see the girls hanging out one-on-one aside from their besties? Or even hear about it? Well, Jeff's back in Cali, and Sharon works late many nights, and when she's not, she is out with Trip. Do any of you recall how Dawn used to stay at the Kishis for dinner sometimes? I don't, but I admit that I like it. That gives this bookt he feeling of the girls, despite their obvious flaws, actually being friends.
It's very strange.
Dawn's not staying tha night. Might have been better if she had. Maybe Claudia would have been spared her parents' open disapproval of her B on a math test. In these earlier books, perhaps the reason she started doing so poorly in school is she figured why bother trying when a respectable B gets you the scorn of your parents. Sadly, Claudia was proud of her B, but was eager to change the subject since her parents harshed her buzz.
After dinner, Mimi helps Claudia with her homework and there's nothing snarkworthy. It's a long section, and shows Mimi's patience.
Ckaud finishes, and goes to her room. Ashley Wyeth calls. She and Claud have a friendship where they cycle between fighting and making up. So! Just like the BSC! She just has a homework wuestion, and we don't even get to know what it is.
Oh yay, the old "Prince Albert in a can" prank call form some anonymous person.
This is Prince Albert in a can. Do you have Prince Albert in a can? Yes? Then you'd better let him out! If someone says no, which EVERY minor should say, then there isn't really a response. It was a bad joke. And this, so far, is a dull book.
Chapter 4
Things don't look good when other ex-sitters of a kid tell you they'll be thinking of you when you're sitting for a kid.
Time skip. She arrives at the job, and the kid looks harmless enough. Mrs. S is overly eager to get out the door. She said a total of nine sentences, if you count "Ta-ta" as a full sentence. Then she's out the door.
Claudia, you're fucked. Run. Hide.
Right away, she falls for the fly-in-an-icecube, and a dribble glass. Apple juice gets on a dry-clean-only shirt, and who wears something tha has to be dry-cleaned to a job babysitting a kid who other sitters told you would mess with you?
Talk about jokes, then Betsy offers her some gum. Claud is suspicious of Betsy keeping the Wrigley's for herself, and offering a plain-wrapped one. Betsy reluctantly trades, and HA! It turns out she swapped he wrappers. Clever for an 8-year-old.
Claud should know by now to not trust the kid who is proud of not being trustworthy, and so, when they go to the swingset, she takes the one Betsy points her to, without first checking it out or telling Betsy to use it first. I don't know how it would really hapen, but the chain--y'know, this stuff that is welded:
was broken. Claudia goes flying. We get a rather good description of Claudia's fear and how her leg didn't hurt, but felt strange, and she knew it was broken. Why couldn't all of Ann's writing me more like that? Oh, right, because it would mean she's a semi-decent writer, and we all know she barely ranks above Stephanie Meyer and EL James.
Chapter 5
Turns out Betsy knew the chain was broken. Again, how does that happen? Swing chain is strong enough to hail heavy vehicles.
Claud's in shock, and being very level-headed. If I saw my own leg broken, I'd be crying and freaking that they'd have to operate. I don't want any more surgeries and scars! But she's eerily calm when she asks that brat if she can follow instructions, and to call 911, explain they need an ambulance, and then to call her mom, and if she can't reach her, then her dad, and if she can't reach him, then to call the Rodowskies, where Dawn and Mal are sitting a group of kids. I doubt kids today would know what she's talking about when she says the number is in the phone book.
Poor Claud's shaking and afraid she's going into shock. This is entirely realistic, and so is her snapping into emergency mode.
Mal AND Dawn both arrive with the kids they were sitting. Mal takes the kids to the yard, and Dawn is the nicest we'll ever see her, being totally supportive and telling Claud she's not going to go through this alone. She went and called Claud's mom, and her parents will meet her at the hospital. Dawn's going to go to the hospital with Claud, and Mal will wait with the kids. Yup, they even thought to leave a note for Mrs. Rodowsky. So no worries about her getting home and freaking about the kids being gone.
After Claud is in the hospital, Bratsy finally apologized.
We sped toward the hospital. I was sort of disappointed that the driver didn’t make the siren wail. I guess they only do that for big emergencies - I mean, like for car accidents. I was glad I wasn’t a big emergency, but roaring along with the siren blaring would have been exciting.
Okay, that part is making me cry because I've been that big emergency, a couple times. I died once in the back of an ambulance. The medics refused to give up though. I later found out the driver was yelling at the cars who couldn't get the fuck out of the way when a 14-year-old in the back had no heartbeat and wasn't breathing. It's incredible how many people don't get the fuck out of the way. Ambulances aren't cops. They don't turn on the sirens just to go through reds, then turn them off on the other side, and hope we'll buy the excuse that a call was cancelled in that quick two seconds.
I nodded. I thought of the last time I was in the hospital - right after Mimi had her stroke - and I began to cry.
Can't even snark that. And we know what will happen the next time she's at a hospital.
“Hey,” said Dawn, running along beside me. She found my hand and held it. “Don’t worry, Claud. I mean, go ahead and cry. That’s okay. But I know everything’s going to be all right. I just know it. Why don’t I go watch for your parents? I can tell them where you are. Then I’ll come find you. Or your mom and dad will, okay?”
Who is this Dawn, and why is she being so sweet and touching my heart a bit? Damn you, you alien being!
Someone gives Claud a shot of something that makes her sleepy, and when she wakes up, her leg is casted. Lucky. I've heard stories about people having their legs reset while fully aware. What she probably got was this amazing drug called Versed. You're away, but you won't remember anything. It's an amnesiac, and as long as you don't build up a resistance to it from getting it so many times (like me... :( ), then it will be your best friend when general anesthesia isn't a good idea, and you don't want to remember anything.
Her parents tell her she'll be in the hospital for a week. Nope. Not unless it's through the skin. They send you home. I remember when a girl at school broke her leg pretty bad. 4th grade. She was back at school, with her cast and crutches, a few days later.
But I don't get much of a chance to snark that because...
A vacation and flowers and visitors sounded nice. But the hospital didn’t. I kept thinking of Mimi. When she was first in the hospital, she was hooked up to about a zillion machines. I was afraid to go near her. She looked dead. The doctors didn’t know if she would walk or talk again.
Oh, the feels.
But a horrible thought occurred to me then. What if I’d broken my right arm instead of my right leg? What if I’d broken it so badly that I couldn’t use it again? Couldn’t paint or sculpt or draw? Suddenly I was angry. I was angry at Betsy for putting me in such a rotten situation; angry at Kristy for starting the Baby-sitters Club in the first place; angry at myself for going to the Sobaks’, even after I’d been warned that Betsy was a practical joker. What was wrong with all of us? Couldn’t we see how stupid we were?
I was angry at the whole world.
I'm pretty angry at the world since I can't dance for a fucking year, but this though ocurred to me too. What if I couldn't use my arm for a year? I do have an issue with mild tendonitis in my wrists from my work, but what if I couldn't use my arms for a long time? My mother-in-law had a torn rotator cuff, and couldn't move her shoulder or arm for three months. At all. What a nightmare.
Claud's anger is so incredibly understandable, and probably the most self-aware anyone gets in this series. She was warned. I think she should also be more mad at Kristy because Claud asked about why Mrs. S. was calling them instead of her other sitters, and Kristy handwaved her concerns.
I hope her parents sue the Sobaks, but we all know that no attorneys would be called. This is one of those situations where an attorney is entirely justified. They know their daughter pulls dangerous pranks a lot. For fuck's sake, their own regular babysitters won't come around anymore! That should tell you your kid is fucked up and you're failing as a parent! But they also have a broken swingset, something they know kids will usually want to play with, and they don't bother to tell Claud, "Hey, don't use the swingset. It's broken." They didn't even bother to give Claud a heads-up that their brat had a tendency to do pranks enough that they had restricted her from mail-ordering prank items. They are negligent, and they are terrible people, and they should be sued. This accident was avoidable if they had cared to tell her. But no, Mrs. S. wanted to get out the door so fast that Claudia didn't even have a chance to say a single word to her. They concealed known dangers, and now Claudia is injured and will lose out on babysitting money, school, activities, and have a lot of pain and suffering to go along with it. They're lucky it snapped when it was going forward. If it had snapped when she was starting to go back and was still leaning back, she would have landed on her upper back or head, and could have broken her neck or upper back. Guys, this is an extremely serious issue, and you can bet Betsy won't be appropriately punished.
The Sobaks take the award form Watson for most permissive shitheads.
Also I don't know how I never noticed this, but Ann's writing is very detached. She writes like she's giving a quick play-by-play without any real detail. I don't know if they're outside on a sunny way, if the swingset was on grass, nothing. l can get the equivalent of a stick figure in my head, the basic circle and lines, but no detail to flesh out the person, or this story. For all the ragging we do on Ellen, Peter, and so on, at least their writing is more engaging, even if only because it's not bland.
We need a tag for criminally-negligent parenting. This book takes the cake on it. We've seen criminally-stupid parents (Island Adventure and Snowbound, anyone?), but the negligence in this book is intentional. The Sobaks withheld very important information.
So I can feel for Claudia in this book.
So let's start with
Strangely, there are many variation. The original cover comes in blue, pink, and white, and then the first reboot is in pink. And another reboot. On the Spanish edition, she actually looks Japanese. It's a beautiful cover. This one is clearest:
Now I spent a lot of time in the hospital when I was a kid, but I don't think they kept you oveer a broken leg unless you needed surgery. Who are those kids? I guess we'll find out.
Chapter 1
“You know,” said Kristy Thomas, “I have never been hit in the face with a pie.”
Right off the bat, I'm going to hell because I'm thinking about her having a future career being hit with cream pies. If you don't know... Especially since she said a chocolate pie in the face wouldn't be so bad, and that's a type of cream pie.
So Logan is as a slumber party with the girls. Did 13-year-olds generally know how to get condoms, or are they just hoping Mary Anne won't get knocked up? Maybe if she jumps up and down afterward...
Hell. Who's going with me?
Oh, Lordy, Claudia mentioned Kristy having a big mouth, and upgrade my ticket to hell to an express.
“You know,” said Dawn Schafer, “would only want to get hit with - ”
“We know, we know,” I jumped in. “An all-natural, sugar-free pie. "
I love you, Claudia.
We're treated to an overly-long telling of who called whom to a film festival...what? *scrolls back up*
Ann. Damn you! You wrote this shit! Don't tell us Logan hasn't been to one of their slumber parties, therefore he hasn't heard this food talk, if you aren't going to be clear that they are actually at the library. I' not deleting everything I typed. Fuck you, Ann.
"All" of SB's kids are there for a few old films. I guess at least it's not I Love Lucy.
Do you want the chapter 2 stuff now? Good. I don't want to read it. Claud doesn't give us an outfit description anyway, just "I wear wild clothes, such as baggy pants and sweaters, high-top sneakers, and jewelry I make myself. " So she's really MC Hammer.
Groovy. The kids today still say that, right?
Talk about survivors, Dawn is a champion one. She’s an individual, too. She stands up for what she believes in, even when no one else believes in it, and she dresses the way she pleases, and does things her own way. She’s not stuck-up, though, and she doesn’t step all over people, trying to get her own way. In fact, she’s one of the nicest people I know.
...
...
...
...
I must dissect this.
Talk about survivors, Dawn is a champion one.
Oh mah gawd, she once had to spend a night at an airport. And if she's a champrion survivor, does that make her a professional victim?
She’s an individual, too.
No, she's not. She's a typical snot-nosed PETA-warrior.
She stands up for what she believes in, even when no one else believes in it,
It's not that no one else believes in her causes. She's just bitchy about it.
and she dresses the way she pleases,
So do all of you.
and does things her own way.
Which is the same as everyone else.
She’s not stuck-up, though, and she doesn’t step all over people, trying to get her own way.
HAHAHAHA! I want some of the drugs you're using.
In fact, she’s one of the nicest people I know.
Have you MET Dawn?!
Her two paragraphs on Mal may be the nicest in this series. No snark, just complimenting her level-headedness, and being prett nice about Mal's looks. Mal wishes her freckles away and wants her hair to be straight, and wants contacts. Just a nice intro.
And Jessi isn't planning to become a professional ballerina in this book.
But just then, the man got hit in the face with a coconut cream pie.
“Awesome!” whispered Kristy. “That’s my dream!”
I'll go pack m bags as soon as I post this.
Chapter 2
Dawn had arrived. Mimi must have let her in. Mimi knows my friends, and they love her as much as I do. She loves them right back. That’s just the kind of person Mimi is.
Love for Mimi! But why did she have to let Dawn in?
Dawn wrinkled her nose, plainly meaning, “Junk food. Ew.”
What was that about Dawn not being stuck up?
Do we need to know how the club works? No. Amazing how chapter 2 stuff used to be stretched out into two chapters.
Blah blah, nothing but Mrs. Perkins calling for a sitter, some padding about that, and Mrs. Sobak, a newbie, calls. If you can't guess the newb is park of the plot, you're in the wrong snark club.
Claud's concerned. She knows other people who've babysat for Betsy, so wants to know why her mother is now calling them. Rather than wonder too, so-brilliant Kristy says not to knock it.
Foreshadowing. Kristy squirts Mary Anne with disappearing ink, but only she's laughing. What an uncomfortable scene to imagine, just a bunch of girls watching disappearing ink dry while one laughs hysterically.
Chapter 3
You know how we never see the girls hanging out one-on-one aside from their besties? Or even hear about it? Well, Jeff's back in Cali, and Sharon works late many nights, and when she's not, she is out with Trip. Do any of you recall how Dawn used to stay at the Kishis for dinner sometimes? I don't, but I admit that I like it. That gives this bookt he feeling of the girls, despite their obvious flaws, actually being friends.
It's very strange.
Dawn's not staying tha night. Might have been better if she had. Maybe Claudia would have been spared her parents' open disapproval of her B on a math test. In these earlier books, perhaps the reason she started doing so poorly in school is she figured why bother trying when a respectable B gets you the scorn of your parents. Sadly, Claudia was proud of her B, but was eager to change the subject since her parents harshed her buzz.
After dinner, Mimi helps Claudia with her homework and there's nothing snarkworthy. It's a long section, and shows Mimi's patience.
Ckaud finishes, and goes to her room. Ashley Wyeth calls. She and Claud have a friendship where they cycle between fighting and making up. So! Just like the BSC! She just has a homework wuestion, and we don't even get to know what it is.
Oh yay, the old "Prince Albert in a can" prank call form some anonymous person.
This is Prince Albert in a can. Do you have Prince Albert in a can? Yes? Then you'd better let him out! If someone says no, which EVERY minor should say, then there isn't really a response. It was a bad joke. And this, so far, is a dull book.
Chapter 4
Things don't look good when other ex-sitters of a kid tell you they'll be thinking of you when you're sitting for a kid.
Time skip. She arrives at the job, and the kid looks harmless enough. Mrs. S is overly eager to get out the door. She said a total of nine sentences, if you count "Ta-ta" as a full sentence. Then she's out the door.
Claudia, you're fucked. Run. Hide.
Right away, she falls for the fly-in-an-icecube, and a dribble glass. Apple juice gets on a dry-clean-only shirt, and who wears something tha has to be dry-cleaned to a job babysitting a kid who other sitters told you would mess with you?
Talk about jokes, then Betsy offers her some gum. Claud is suspicious of Betsy keeping the Wrigley's for herself, and offering a plain-wrapped one. Betsy reluctantly trades, and HA! It turns out she swapped he wrappers. Clever for an 8-year-old.
Claud should know by now to not trust the kid who is proud of not being trustworthy, and so, when they go to the swingset, she takes the one Betsy points her to, without first checking it out or telling Betsy to use it first. I don't know how it would really hapen, but the chain--y'know, this stuff that is welded:
was broken. Claudia goes flying. We get a rather good description of Claudia's fear and how her leg didn't hurt, but felt strange, and she knew it was broken. Why couldn't all of Ann's writing me more like that? Oh, right, because it would mean she's a semi-decent writer, and we all know she barely ranks above Stephanie Meyer and EL James.
Chapter 5
Turns out Betsy knew the chain was broken. Again, how does that happen? Swing chain is strong enough to hail heavy vehicles.
Claud's in shock, and being very level-headed. If I saw my own leg broken, I'd be crying and freaking that they'd have to operate. I don't want any more surgeries and scars! But she's eerily calm when she asks that brat if she can follow instructions, and to call 911, explain they need an ambulance, and then to call her mom, and if she can't reach her, then her dad, and if she can't reach him, then to call the Rodowskies, where Dawn and Mal are sitting a group of kids. I doubt kids today would know what she's talking about when she says the number is in the phone book.
Poor Claud's shaking and afraid she's going into shock. This is entirely realistic, and so is her snapping into emergency mode.
Mal AND Dawn both arrive with the kids they were sitting. Mal takes the kids to the yard, and Dawn is the nicest we'll ever see her, being totally supportive and telling Claud she's not going to go through this alone. She went and called Claud's mom, and her parents will meet her at the hospital. Dawn's going to go to the hospital with Claud, and Mal will wait with the kids. Yup, they even thought to leave a note for Mrs. Rodowsky. So no worries about her getting home and freaking about the kids being gone.
After Claud is in the hospital, Bratsy finally apologized.
We sped toward the hospital. I was sort of disappointed that the driver didn’t make the siren wail. I guess they only do that for big emergencies - I mean, like for car accidents. I was glad I wasn’t a big emergency, but roaring along with the siren blaring would have been exciting.
Okay, that part is making me cry because I've been that big emergency, a couple times. I died once in the back of an ambulance. The medics refused to give up though. I later found out the driver was yelling at the cars who couldn't get the fuck out of the way when a 14-year-old in the back had no heartbeat and wasn't breathing. It's incredible how many people don't get the fuck out of the way. Ambulances aren't cops. They don't turn on the sirens just to go through reds, then turn them off on the other side, and hope we'll buy the excuse that a call was cancelled in that quick two seconds.
I nodded. I thought of the last time I was in the hospital - right after Mimi had her stroke - and I began to cry.
Can't even snark that. And we know what will happen the next time she's at a hospital.
“Hey,” said Dawn, running along beside me. She found my hand and held it. “Don’t worry, Claud. I mean, go ahead and cry. That’s okay. But I know everything’s going to be all right. I just know it. Why don’t I go watch for your parents? I can tell them where you are. Then I’ll come find you. Or your mom and dad will, okay?”
Who is this Dawn, and why is she being so sweet and touching my heart a bit? Damn you, you alien being!
Someone gives Claud a shot of something that makes her sleepy, and when she wakes up, her leg is casted. Lucky. I've heard stories about people having their legs reset while fully aware. What she probably got was this amazing drug called Versed. You're away, but you won't remember anything. It's an amnesiac, and as long as you don't build up a resistance to it from getting it so many times (like me... :( ), then it will be your best friend when general anesthesia isn't a good idea, and you don't want to remember anything.
Her parents tell her she'll be in the hospital for a week. Nope. Not unless it's through the skin. They send you home. I remember when a girl at school broke her leg pretty bad. 4th grade. She was back at school, with her cast and crutches, a few days later.
But I don't get much of a chance to snark that because...
A vacation and flowers and visitors sounded nice. But the hospital didn’t. I kept thinking of Mimi. When she was first in the hospital, she was hooked up to about a zillion machines. I was afraid to go near her. She looked dead. The doctors didn’t know if she would walk or talk again.
Oh, the feels.
But a horrible thought occurred to me then. What if I’d broken my right arm instead of my right leg? What if I’d broken it so badly that I couldn’t use it again? Couldn’t paint or sculpt or draw? Suddenly I was angry. I was angry at Betsy for putting me in such a rotten situation; angry at Kristy for starting the Baby-sitters Club in the first place; angry at myself for going to the Sobaks’, even after I’d been warned that Betsy was a practical joker. What was wrong with all of us? Couldn’t we see how stupid we were?
I was angry at the whole world.
I'm pretty angry at the world since I can't dance for a fucking year, but this though ocurred to me too. What if I couldn't use my arm for a year? I do have an issue with mild tendonitis in my wrists from my work, but what if I couldn't use my arms for a long time? My mother-in-law had a torn rotator cuff, and couldn't move her shoulder or arm for three months. At all. What a nightmare.
Claud's anger is so incredibly understandable, and probably the most self-aware anyone gets in this series. She was warned. I think she should also be more mad at Kristy because Claud asked about why Mrs. S. was calling them instead of her other sitters, and Kristy handwaved her concerns.
I hope her parents sue the Sobaks, but we all know that no attorneys would be called. This is one of those situations where an attorney is entirely justified. They know their daughter pulls dangerous pranks a lot. For fuck's sake, their own regular babysitters won't come around anymore! That should tell you your kid is fucked up and you're failing as a parent! But they also have a broken swingset, something they know kids will usually want to play with, and they don't bother to tell Claud, "Hey, don't use the swingset. It's broken." They didn't even bother to give Claud a heads-up that their brat had a tendency to do pranks enough that they had restricted her from mail-ordering prank items. They are negligent, and they are terrible people, and they should be sued. This accident was avoidable if they had cared to tell her. But no, Mrs. S. wanted to get out the door so fast that Claudia didn't even have a chance to say a single word to her. They concealed known dangers, and now Claudia is injured and will lose out on babysitting money, school, activities, and have a lot of pain and suffering to go along with it. They're lucky it snapped when it was going forward. If it had snapped when she was starting to go back and was still leaning back, she would have landed on her upper back or head, and could have broken her neck or upper back. Guys, this is an extremely serious issue, and you can bet Betsy won't be appropriately punished.
The Sobaks take the award form Watson for most permissive shitheads.
Also I don't know how I never noticed this, but Ann's writing is very detached. She writes like she's giving a quick play-by-play without any real detail. I don't know if they're outside on a sunny way, if the swingset was on grass, nothing. l can get the equivalent of a stick figure in my head, the basic circle and lines, but no detail to flesh out the person, or this story. For all the ragging we do on Ellen, Peter, and so on, at least their writing is more engaging, even if only because it's not bland.
We need a tag for criminally-negligent parenting. This book takes the cake on it. We've seen criminally-stupid parents (Island Adventure and Snowbound, anyone?), but the negligence in this book is intentional. The Sobaks withheld very important information.