Comments | bsc_snark: Babysitters' Summer Vacation

anabellabobella in bsc_snark

Babysitters' Summer Vacation

Jun 08, 2015 22:19

You know what? I loved this book as a kid. I loved it a lot. When my turn to check it out from the school library finally came up (the wait lists were loooooong), I kept rechecking it out for several weeks until my local Walden Books (remember that place?) finally got a copy in, and then I begged my parents to take me to the mall to get it. I ( Read more... )

diabeetus, obligatory 1950s reference, time keeps on slippin', super special #2: babysitter's summer va, meeting canceled? no way!, stoneybrook goes on vacation, summer hijinx, character we'll never see again, editors are overrated, kristy is replaced by an alien, facepalm

Comments 8

danidee92 June 9 2015, 15:31:08 UTC

Why does Jessi have bangs?-- She looks more like Mary Anne. Jessi's design on here has always annoyed me.

Dawn's favorite movie is The Parent Trap since she might want Sharon and Jack to get back together. Did Dawn ever hint at that? I thought she wanted Sharon to dump Tripp and marry Richard-- Yeah, what the hell?

The parents were saying things like, "Oh, my baby. Going away for two entire weeks. You're growing up so fast. You'll probably come back taller than I am." (And hopefully smarter, I thought.)-- And she prides herself on being good with kids...

Kristy gets a top bunk, and steps on the other CIT's hand on the way down. I swear they do that on purpose. The other CIT, Sally, tells her there will be a dance, WITH BOYS, and Kristy gets excited. Um, what?-- Since when does Kristy care about guys? I hate when Ann proves she doesn't even know her own characters.

I can't wait for more!

cryptaknight June 9 2015, 15:31:41 UTC

Huh. I went to YMCA camp, which was surely not as pricey as all that, because my parents never would have paid that much just to get me out of their hair for the summer. Later, I was a Junior Counselor for them (same as CIT, I'd imagine) and they paid me. YMCA is probably too lowbrow for the BSC, though. I do imagine most of these families are well off, just because of the locations that they live in and the fact that money doesn't ever seem to be an issue for anyone other than the Pikes, and they have a billion kids.

None of our counselors ever got curtains around the bed. I'm jealous.

anabellabobella June 10 2015, 01:21:20 UTC

Even if the PIke kids all went for a couple weeks only, that's almost $40,000 BEFORE the additional fees, and this is on top of that Sea City vacation they take every two weeks to go stay in a massive mansion on the beach that amounted to about $50,000 based on my research that included taxes and a house that's currently available (and it less expensive than were available earlier this year). If that's the Pikes' idea of being poor, then I want to be a Pike very badly. I'd love to be as "poor" as them. Poor people don't spend $40,000 or more to send their kids away for two weeks. Poor people are lucky to send their kids to the local community center for weekly swimming classes.

jolikescake June 9 2015, 21:10:06 UTC

Ha I loved this book so much too as a kid! I actually went to camp as a Counselor when I was 19 and it was very much like this one - and VERY pricey, one session was $5k, and the full summer was just over $12k. It was also upstate NY and it was full of extremely rich kids. Privately run camps like this are not cheap by any means.

Also 13 year olds were still considered campers. The CIT programme didn't start until kids were 16 years old which makes way more sense cause when we had staff meetings we sure as hell weren't gonna leave our 12 year olds unattended with a bunch of 13 year olds supervising - we'd have had no cabin to come back to!

Forcing a kid like Charlotte to go to camp for two weeks is just cruel. Yes it can be a good experience and help build self esteem but it can also do the opposite - destroy a fragile kid's self confidence and make them nothing more than miserable for two weeks. Not cool Johanssens.

jolikescake June 9 2015, 21:11:19 UTC

In hindsight we really weren't paid enough to deal with the crap some of those brats served up.

anabellabobella June 10 2015, 01:17:54 UTC

Some of the kids in the CIT pic on that site look younger than 16, but what gets to me is the idea of JR CITs when a CIT already is a jr. counselor. So...jr. jr. counselors? I can see having 13-year-olds as counselors' assistants, but only after an interview process instead of just plain whoever signs up.

Forcing Charlotte to go is so cruel that it literally makes me struggle to breathe for a moment.

sgrfrostedflake June 9 2015, 22:23:12 UTC

My version specifically says that all the BSCers are going for two weeks. I never got the impression that they were already at camp when they asked Stacey to come with them. I believe most of their charges go for two weeks also. Charlotte, for instance. Andrew is left behind because the youngest kids at CM are six and Andrew is only four ( ... )

anabellabobella June 10 2015, 01:13:49 UTC

You're right, Claudia chapter. This version I have has Stacey saying the girls were writing to her saying they still need more CITs at camp, which sounds very much like they are already there, and are short-staffed. When Mary Anne signed up, this is what Kristy said in her letter: the
director said, "Oh, thank goodness, we need more CITs." (Really, she did say that.) Including the parenthetical part. It seems kind of strange that a director would say something like that to a kid who isn't there. I've got a borked copy though, so maybe that line was messed up too ( ... )