#65: Stacey's Big Crush

Tagline: He's smart. He's handsome. He's 22!

Cover: Stacey is giving us her best "oh, my prince" pose. Wes is smartly oblivious, but way overdressed for a school dance. Jessi is giving her best "girl, please" look, which might be Jessi's most awesome moment ever. Meanwhile, what's happening in the background? Are those streamers, or lights, or what? Where are the balloons falling from? Why does the banner have apostrophes on it? Who is on this decorating committee?

Plot!: Stacey has a crush on Wes, her new student teacher. She gets pretty obsessed with him and is confident she's in love with him (and he's in love with her), but nothing happens because she's THIRTEEN. Dawn and Mary Anne take care of Elvira, a goat, and chaos ensues.

Points of Interest:

• "I knew Mr. Zizmore was giving an oral problem." So that's what the kids are calling it...in 1993.
  
• Stacey calls herself a Divorced Kid and a Latchkey Kid. She's knee deep in a pity party and hasn't even STARTED talking about her diabetes.
  
• Mr. Z tells Stacey that she's his star student. Even though this isn't the big crush, it does have a bit of that about it. Stacey is totally going to have an older man thing as she gets older. Do you think that's because of the divorce?
  
• Stoneybrook Community College has a master's program? A teaching master's program? That...seems strange.
  
• Stacey think that Wesley Ellenburg sounds like the biggest nerd ever. Didn't she learn anything from the time that Kelly dated Marvin Nerdly?
  
• Claudia is Stacey's "one-and-only-best" friend, since she and Laine had a big fight.
  
• Apparently, Stacey and Sam are still "technically" going out, even though they've drifted apart. So is this book after the Shadow Lake? What's the chronology here?
  
• When Mrs. Stone stops by to ask Dawn and Mary Anne to look after her goat, Stacey is not aware that Elvira is not actually a goat, and starts freaking out about things like leaving the two month old alone and feeding her garbage and stuff. Wah-wah....
• Stacey gets really excited about Dawn and Mary Anne taking care of a goat, because she's so sophisticated.
  
• Mr. Ellenberg is compared to Tom Cruise. Okay.
  
• Stacey's dad went to school at Wesleyan. Just in case that comes up in a trivia quiz later.
  
• Okay, so he's completing is B.A., apparently in education, although he just has to do three weeks of student teaching, which does not seem like a lot. So why did Mr. Z it was a master's program?
  
• What's going through Stacey's mind? "Wes. Wild Wes. How the Wes Was Won." Whoa, calm down. Later, she calls him "drop-dead incredibly hunkified gorgeous." Kristy claims there's no such word as 'hunkified.' My spell check agrees.
  
• There's a rumour that Sabrina Bouvier (the middle school student) went out with Mr. Jordan, presumably a student. I HIGHLY doubt that. Maybe she babysat for him or something and someone saw him giving her a ride home.
  
• Stacey spends a lot of time preparing her outfit for math class. Claudia has to tell her that it's not a date. Ugh. Stacey is all kinds of pathetic in this book.
  
• Charlotte has a crusth on Bruce Cominsky, someone we've never heard of before and doubt we ever will again. He sounds...manly. There's also some random girl named Diane Dumschat in her class. That's an unfortunate name.
  
• We also get a lesson that the "whoop" in "big whoop" is like "whoopee," but sarcastic. Thanks, Lerangis.
  
• Wes asks Stacey to stay after school and help him arrange his paperwork, if you know what I mean. And that's where I start disbelieving this book. I'm sure that Wes would be hyper-aware of inapropriate student/teacher relationships and I highly doubt Stacey is being subtle about it - she wanted to wear a ball gown to class!
• Oh my lord. After staying after class to help him with his papers, Stacey announces that she and Wes have a relationship. She is going to be a total bunny boiler when she's older.
  
• Ugh. Elvira unleashes a whole bunch of 'kid' puns.
  
• Oh my lord part two. Stacey starts imagining that she and Wes are goatherds in the Alps. This book is cracked out!
• Wes has Stacey figure out the average grades of everyone in the class. He hides the names, but still. That seems unseemly.
  
• OH MY LORD. Wes drives Stacey to a BSC meeting (in his car!) and on the way there he sings along to a love ballad. INAPPROPRIATE.
  
• So of course, Stacey writes a poem:
  I see two stars in summer's night
  Blinding, hovering, lost in light
  Each so dull in heaven's net
  So each remains as yet unmet
  But Fortune moves in strangest ways
  It lengthens nights, it shortens days
  May this night end and day begin
  And bring two lovers back again.
• Sam calls to invite Stacey to the Spring Fling dance, and even though at the beginning of the book they are technically going out, she tells him she's going with someone else.
  
• HAHAHA Stacey gives Wes the poem. She changes 'lovers' to 'young people' but still. Wes bolts from the room.
  
• The BSC learns the hard way that taking care of a goat is hard work. Gah. Wouldn't they have thought that before? That's how they approach EVERYTHING. "oh, pet sitting will be so much fun! Oh no, it's hard work!" "oh, looking after infants will be so much fun! Oh no, it's hard work!"
• So a week after giving him THE POEM, Stacey corners Wes at the end of math class. He asks if she has a question about the assignment (no), so he asks if she has another poem for him. I laughed out loud.
  
• OH MY LORD INFINITY. She tells Wes that she's in love with him. I am laughing and cringing and it's so awful and I love it.
  
• Sam is going to the Spring Fling with Amanda Martin. Why is this book filled with people we've never heard of before?
  
• Okay, after the whole declaration of love thing, Wes still does things like tell Stacey he's going to miss her....class, and confide in her about a good recommendation. This guy is crazy!
• If the dance is called the Spring Fling, why doesn't the banner say SMS Spring Fling?
• It's never explained why Wes is wearing a tux.
  
• Wes to Stacey: "You're THIRTEEN!" Classic.
  

Final thought: I only skimmed through the Elvira stuff, so I don't know about that, but there's barely any Mallory in this book. Poor Mallory!