“Coach! I liked the sound of that.”……..BSC # 20: Kristy and the Walking Disaster

Memory Reaction

I…am coming up with nothing. I know I read this book a million times, because I found my old copy and the cover was worn off. And I remember the complete plot. I just can’t remember what I thought of it. I am even having trouble guessing what my childhood brain would have thought (thinking about it now).

Revisited Reaction

Kristy realizes that her siblings and some of her neighbors really like softball, but all suck at it. She hears about a guy in her neighborhood who has his one softball team for kids, but he can’t take on any members. So, she decides to start her own team, the Kristy’s Krushers. Most of the standard BSC clients join – at least the ones that suck at sports. Basically, the team is for kids who are too or too embarrassed or young to play in Little League.

The kid who coaches the other team, is Bart, who Kristy immediately develops a huge crush on. The two of them decide to have a game between their two teams. Bart’s team has some older kids so they beat the Krushers pretty easily. But then Bart asks Kristy out, which thrills her, and they decide to have more games between the two teams.

As for the title reference to “walking disaster,” that is Jackie Rodowski. He is on the team, but constantly causes disasters because of how klutzy he is. I don’t know why he is named in the title, he isn’t really in the book more than any other kid on the team. Kristy does single him out (in her head), to keep pointing out how he always looks messier than the other kids. It is kind of mean, especially since Jackie seems like a sweet kid. But again, he doesn’t do anything to drive the plot. He’s just there.

High/Lowlights

• There is some foreshadowing to Emily’s adoption, because Kristy tells us how her mom wants another kid. She is surprised because her mom is at least thirty-seven. She doesn’t know how old her own mom is?

• Kristy gets nervous around Bart because he looks at her like she is a hot movie star. It kind of reminds me about when Alan asked her out and she was so flattered someone liked her that she said yes.

• Myriah and Gabbie Perkins are apparently gifted at sports as well as everything else.

• What exactly is a “rec room?” I have never heard anyone use that term to describe their house, except of course in the BSC. I would guess it is a basement, but Kristy talks about going downstairs to the rec room, then downstairs again to the basement. Am I just clueless about something?

• The team wants to spell “crushers” with a K, to go with Kristy’s name. Karen is a brat and complains they are spelling it wrong. She even refuses to use the K on her team shirt. Brat. I thought she was supposed to be creative, not an obsessive compulsive.

• I don’t really see Charlotte Johanssen being a cheerleader. At first she just writes the cheers, but she ends up cheering at the game.

• Gabbie Perkins is on the team, at two-and-a-half. I think when I read these originally, I didn’t really realize how little that is. How can someone that young really play baseball? And what parent lets there kid play at that age? It is absurd.

• Jackie breaks a window at the elementary school with a baseball, and the school makes him pay for it (or his parents, anyway). I am trying to decide if that would really happen, or if the school would use insurance.

• Dawn sees Kristy talking to Bart at a practice and then writes in the club notebook about how she can tell Kristy likes him. That seems a little bitchy, but also like something a real teenager would do.

• The boys on Bart’s team make fun of Matt Braddock for being deaf. Assholes.

• So, Bart is oblivious to his team making fun of the Krushers while it is happening. But later, he tells Kristy he found out and apologizes. I want to know how he found out? Did the kids confess or something?

• The BSC actually cancels a meeting the day before the game. I’m shocked.

• Ha. After the game, Bart asks Kristy to walk home and her family and Claudia and Dawn all give each other these knowing looks. It is kind of funny, but Kristy is so happy when he says he wants to be “friends,” which is kinda cute.