The One Where it Snows. A Lot.

It's time to get Snowbound with the BSC! So I appreciate that this Super Special, the 7th, is a little more realistic than them taking a fancy two-week vacation or getting shipwrecked on an island, but it is a tad on the boring side. It just snows a lot (two and a half feet) and we hear about their own little adventures. Big freakin' whoop. There's a running gag that the weatherman has been predicting snow, but they haven't seen a flake of it so when snow is reported for Wednesday, nobody believes it. However, by Wednesday evening it starts to snow pretty hard and school is cancelled on Thursday. By Friday the roads are cleared and school is open, which is good because they can also all go to the Winter Wonderland Dance which is Friday night. Yay! 

So let's talk about each girls' "adventure":

Jessi has to spend the night at her dance school in Stamford. I should mention that they decided to cancel that day's meeting of the BSC. Not because of the snow, because, remember, they didn't know it was going to snow. No, they cancel because they're all going to be busy. I suppose this is somewhat true, but really it's because it's supposed to start snowing around this time on Wednesday and then all the girls would be stuck at the Kishis' and we wouldn't get our Super Special! 

So Jessi is at dance class, practicing for The Nutcracker which she will be performing in. She's excited because Quint, who we met in the last Super Special is coming to Stoneybrook from New York via train to go to the dance with her. I think this is the first romantic interest we've met from a Super Special that has made an appearance in another book. Jessi's dad is supposed to pick up Quint at the train station first, then pick up Jessi at her school. Man, that would be so awkward if your dad was going to have some time alone with your sort of boyfriend/date to the dance.

After dance rehearsal, it begins to snow really hard and parents call to say they're going to be late, then they call to tell them they won't be able to make it so all the kids will have to spend the night. Luckily there's a kitchen at this dance school (not sure why) that's stocked with instant soup, dried fruit, and cookies. Better than nothing, I guess.

The most absolutely ridiculous thing is that Quint shows up at the dance school. Apparently he walked from the train station. WTF? Isn't Stamford a pretty good sized town? The dance school must be a five-minute walk from the train station (on a good day) and maybe it took Quint 15-20 minutes to get there. That's the only way I'm buying this. Although, even if it were ten miles away, I can't really blame Quint. I sure as hell wouldn't want to spend the night at a train station. (Hey, I've seen Adventures in Baby-Sitting! I know what happened to poor Brenda!) 

I had to roll my eyes because Jessi acts like such a goody two shoes by helping the younger kids get ready for bed with the help of Quint. Christ on a cracker, Jessi, I'm sure there are plenty of adults to help with that. You don't need to show off your baby-sitting skills all the time. However, when she's in line to use the phone to call her parents, it was nice of her to comfort the younger girl in front of her. I think those smaller moments are better, anyway

Dawn has to spend the night at the airport. She and her mom are there to pick up Jeff who is flying in to spend Christmas with them. It starts snowing when they leave for the airport and the streets are already getting slippery. Sharon, who isn't even going very fast, bumps into a mailbox and says a word that Dawn has never heard her mom say, but that she's heard in movies that she isn't allowed to watch. So either the word is "fuck" or "shit". I drop the f-bomb all the time if I'm driving in snow (which I hate to do), so my vote is for that one!

They reach the airport where they find out that Jeff's airplane has been rerouted to D.C. where he will stay overnight at a hotel, then fly to CT the next morning. While Sharon is in line to use the phone (ah, what a world we lived in before smart phones were a normal, everyday part of our lives!) to call Jeff and/or Richard, the phones go down. 

Dawn moans in one of her journal entries that spending the night in an airport felt even longer than the time she was stranded on an island for two days. Bitch, please. Sure, I'm sure it's no picnic trying to sleep in a hard plastic chair at the airport, but at least you're with your mom and aren't responsible for four children, one of whom is sick. At least there are working toilets around. At least you can get food (even though you'll probably bitch it isn't healthy enough). At least you have books and magazines to read and things to do. Shut up, Dawn.

The next morning Jeff arrives and they're all reunited. Hurrah. Whatever.

Stacey and her mom get stranded on a back country road after going to Washington Mall for Stacey to get a perm. (Stacey and her damn perms!) Maureen hates driving in the snow, but since it isn't snowing when Stacey gets home from school (even though snow has been predicted, mind you!), she agrees to take Stacey to the mall to get her hair done. So I didn't realize that Washington Mall isn't actually in Stoneybrook and takes about half an hour to drive there. That seems like a really long way just to go to a stupid mall. The closest mall to me is a little over five minutes away. And when I was younger and actually liked going to the mall, it was about that distance too. Now that I'm older I could care less about malls. Who needs malls when you can do all your shopping online? It seems like they're always going to Washington Mall so I just assumed it was a ten minute drive, tops. 

When they leave the mall, it has begun to snow heavily. Maureen gets on the highway and nearly gets into an accident. She decides they're going to get off the next exit and take the back roads home. She says there's too many cars on the highway and hence too many accidents. While I do see her point (there's always some asshole in a four wheel drive who loves to be on everyone's ass while driving in snow, at least in my experience there is!), I feel like the highway is more likely to be plowed and at least if you get in trouble, there are people. But on the other hand, I hate it when there are so many cars around if I'm driving in snow, so I can't really blame her for wanting to get off the highway.

They decide to stop the car and wait until the snow has let up, only when Maureen decides to start the car again, she finds out she's out of gas. Good going there, Maureen. Panic starts to set in because they're in the middle of nowhere and Stacey needs to eat something because of her diabetes. Luckily, out of nowhere, a man comes to their rescue. Not sure why he is out and about in a blizzard, but that's besides the point. He offers to take Stacey and Maureen down the road to where he lives with his wife and six-month-old baby and they eat dinner and spend the night with their new friends.

So I thought this was the same family that Stacey baby-sits for in Stacey and the Missing Ring, the first mystery, because I remember it was a new family and there's a baby in that one, but I don't think it is the same family. 

It is made a big deal that Stacey is missing and isn't home yet in some of the other girls' chapters. Mary Anne and Mallory are sitting for the Pikes and they're worried because the lights at the McGills haven't been turned on at all. Word gets out about Stacey's whereabouts and everyone is super worried. But, of course, they had nothing to be worried about. 

Claudia is baby-sittings for the Perkins and it's super boring. The Perkins parents call to tell her they won't be able to make it home that night and will Claudia stay overnight or take the girls to her house to spend the night? They can't find Chewy at all, but the next morning Claudia hears weird noises in the basement and that's where he was all along. So...when they were searching for him, why didn't they look in the basement in the first place? Also, why didn't such a big and rambunctious dog make more noise? I'm guessing Chewy just wanted some alone time and snuck down to the basement where he took a long sleep. 

The most interesting things about the Claudia chapters are her journal entries. I had to laugh when she spells "disappointed" as disapperntened. How the fuck do you even get that? Why is there an "r" in there? I don't hear any "r" sound in "disappointed". Also, she spells Myriah's and Gabbie's names TWO different ways in the same entry: "Myria and Gabie" and "Mariah and Gabby". (To be honest, if I heard those two names, I would spell them the same as the latter. "Myriah" is such a weird way to spell "Mariah" (I assume it's pronounced the same way). You usually don't replace an"a" with a "y"; so I always want to pronounce it MY-riah, not MA-riah.) 

Oh, she also seems to think that "know" is "no." So how does she spell "no"? "Noe?" Why did her parents let her spend two weeks at art school when they should have had her going to spelling school? 

There's an illustration of Claudia with the two girls and Myriah looks like she's eight, not five, and Gabbie looks like she's five, not two and a half. But I am terrible with guessing kids' ages, so what do I know? 

Like I mentioned before, Mallory and Mary Anne are baby-sitting for the Pikes. One of the reasons they cancelled their Wednesday meeting is because this is an all day job, so those two wouldn't have been able to make it. The Pike parents have plans to spend all day in NYC and they have the most ridiculous itinerary:

-have breakfast at coffee shop

-go to the Met

-go to Natural History museum

-go shopping

-meet up with friends and have lunch

-go to Museum of Broadcasting

-walk around Lincoln Center

-meet different friends for dinner

-go see The Phantom of the Opera.

What the actual fuck? Do the Pike parents not realize it takes time to do all these things? You need to stand in line and get tickets and actually walk around at the museums. Are they just planning on spending half an hour at every place? Also, if they're doing their Christmas shopping, that's going to take a few hours! Especially if they're buying Christmas gifts for their eight children! Then it will take some time to eat all three meals. Why don't they just grab something at the train station for breakfast? And, then, how long is The Phantom of the Opera? Isn't that nearly a three hour show? There is NO WAY you can do all of that in one day! Claire Pike gets my favorite moment in the entire book after she's heard all this and says, "Wow, will you ever get to go to the bathroom?" You know what, Claire? I was thinking the EXACT same thing! 

Because the Pike parents have a marathon day planned in New York, they will be leaving at 5 am and won't her back until nearly 1 am, or, at least, that's the plan. Mary Anne will be spending Tuesday AND Wednesday night with the Pikes. Ugh, forget sleeping at an airport. Forget being stranded in a car during a snowstorm...spending TWO nights at the Pikes' would be my worst nightmare.

There's a cot set up for Mary Anne in Mallory and Vanessa's room and we get this weird scene where Mr. Pike tells her that they'd give her their room, but they'll be using it. Well, duh. Why is he even offering their room to her when they will be sleeping in their bed both nights? Of course, they do end up stuck in New York and have to stay over night with some friends. 

The most exciting thing that happens in these chapters is that the electricity goes out and they have to eat the ice cream so it doesn't melt. The next morning everyone is whining because there's no food (only a few items) and they all act like they're going to die. Dumbass Mary Anne wants to call Pizza Express even though a) they're probably not open at 9 am and b) the roads aren't cleared yet. Even Logan gets a good jab in at her when she talks to him on the phone:

"You're kidding! The pizza place is closed at nine o'clock on a morning when we're snowed in and the plows haven't come through yet? What a shock."

I'm not the biggest fan of Logan, but this did make me laugh.  

They're so desperate that Margo suggests that they make spaghetti with chocolate frosting, which sounds absolutely disgusting. You'd think that Barf Girl would NOT want to eat that. Jordan proclaims he's rather have that then the plenty of vegetables that are in the freezer. Uh, no you would not, buddy. But if they had spaghetti, why didn't they just eat that? Just skip breakfast (if I can do it, so can they) and have spaghetti for lunch. Mary Anne whines to Logan that she's hungry and the next thing she knows, he's skied (yes, skied!) over with some food including bread, peanut butter, and bananas. 

Like Mallory, Kristy is also at home when the big snowstorm hits. She decides to call Bart to invite him over to watch some movies and stay for dinner. I am so confused by the timeline of all the events that happen on Wednesday for Kristy. School probably lets out at 3, and she probably got home at 3:30 since she takes the bus and SMS isn't exactly nearby her ritzy neighborhood. She then does her homework, but tells us she finished early so I'll be generous and say it only took her half an hour, so now it's 4:00. This is when she calls Bart. Instead of inviting Bart to go to the video store (hahahahaha, remember when we had video stores? Kids today don't know how lucky they are they can just stream movies from the comfort and convenience (I had to ask Siri to spell that for me!) of their own homes!), she has Charlie drive her there and she picks out two movies: Uncle Buck and Back to the Future (surprisingly somewhat recent for the time!) She mentions she was "hemming and hawing for so long that [Charlie] said, "Were you hoping to rent something before Christmas?" I'm going to say the drive to the video store, picking out the videos, and the drive back was 45 minutes. And let's tack on five minutes for the phone call she had with Bart. Plus let's tack on another five minutes for when she gets back home and calls Bart to tell him to come over.  So now it's five 'til 5:00 and Bart has arrived. (And shouldn't it be snowing by now?) They watch Uncle Buck AND nearly most of Back to the Future before it's time for dinner. Uncle Buck is one hour and forty minutes. Back to the Future is nearly two hours. This now puts the time at....almost 9:00, right? What is going on here? Did they really eat dinner THAT late? Is this normal for people in Connecticut to eat dinner that late? Did AMM just misjudge the time?

So during the entire time they're watching movies, Kristy is embarrassed because David Michael, Karen, Andrew, and Emily Michelle keep being little pests and want to bother them while they're watching movies. Nannie at least tries to be helpful and has the kids go to their playroom for awhile, but they still manage to escape and come back to bother Kristy and Bart. But, seriously, where the fuck are Watson and Elizabeth? These are THEIR kids. They can't wrangle them up and tell them to go anywhere else in their twenty-room mansion? (I have no idea how many rooms their house is; that was just a guess). I feel like they take for granted that Kristy loves baby-sitting so much and just figure she'd be happy to entertain the kids while she has company over. 

After dinner is about the time that Karen announces it's snowing. Bart is wise to suggest that he go home now, but Watson tells him he should wait because he doesn't want to drive in it. Uh, didn't Bart just walk over? Can't he walk home? Doesn't he live in the same neighborhood. Fuckin' hell, if Quint can walk from the freaking train station in Stamford to Jessi's dane school, then Bart sure as hell can walk from Kristy's house to his house... I bet you THAT'S a lot closer! 

They have dessert of store bought blueberry pie and ice cream. I mention this because Kristy tells us that Nannie stuck the pie in the microwave to heat it up. WHAT? I have never heard of warming up a frozen store bought pie in the microwave....the oven is what I would use for that. 

Elizabeth suggests that Bart spend the night and Kristy is just mortified by this. David Michael asks if Bart is going to sleep in Kristy's room which I thought was rather quite forward for a BSC book! No, of course, he'll be sleeping in one of the guests rooms. 

Kristy is unnecessarily freaking out about Bart spending the night. She doesn't want him to see her in her pajamas (what exactly do her pajamas look like?) and she sets her alarm for 5:30 am. Why? Because she has to get up early to beautify herself. Look, I understand Kristy likes Bart and wants to look cute for him, but I think she goes WAY overboard and this is very out of character for her. (Hmm, did AMM write this book or was it a ghostwriter?) I can see her taking a shower, brushing her teeth, running a comb through her hair, making sure there's no zits on her face, then putting on a cute, but still Kristy-like outfit. That would be more in character for her. But no, she wakes up at the crack ass of dawn to take a shower and shave her legs for the first time. (Why even bother? It's winter! You're wearing long pants anyway!) She blow drys her hair, then CURLS it, which she says it made her hair look like "limp macaroni." Why, Kristy, WHY? Then she proceeds to put on make up. Seriously, who is this person and what has she done with Kristy? 

It sounds like there are only two bathrooms on the second floor. This one and another one that the younger kids share. (Well, I'm sure Elizabeth and Watson have their own bathroom and I hope to God they gave Nannie her own bathroom). But you would think a mansion would have more than two bathrooms on the second floor! Sam and David Michael make fun of Kristy (to which I can't really blame them), but Bart says she looks beautiful. Kristy, I'm sure he would still think you were pretty without all the primping. He obviously likes you. Yeah, that part of the Kristy storyline just didn't ring true to me.

So they go to the dance and we get this illustration:

I can tell Stacey and Dawn apart because only Stacey would wear a short little black dress in the middle of winter! I like Claudia's outfit; only a true trendsetter like Claud could pull that off. Dawn's and Jessi's dresses are very prom-y. Mallory looks very matronly: that's something a mother of the bride (or grandmother of the bride!) would wear. Kristy's outfit looks very young and old-fashioned and Mary Anne's dress looks very dated. They should just all have Claudia and Stacey pick out their outfits for the next dance.