LIST FIVE PEOPLE WHO COULD CONCEIVABLY BE JO-C-ROX

 

Michael Moscovitz (I wish)

Boris Pelkowski (please no)

Mr. Gianini (in a misguided attempt to cheer me up)

My dad (ditto)

That weird boy I see sometimes in the cafeteria who gets so upset whenever they serve chili and there’s corn in it (please please no)

     AAAAARRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Friday, October 24, G & T

 

     It turns out that since I’ve been gone, Boris has started learning some new music on his violin. Right now he is playing a concerto by someone named Bartok.

     And let me tell you, that’s exactly how it sounds. Even though we locked him and his violin into the supply closet, it isn’t doing any good. You can’t even hear yourself think. Michael had to go to the nurse’s office for ibuprofen.

     But before he left, I tried to steer the conversation in the direction of mail. You know, casually, and all.

     Just in case.

     Anyway, Lilly was talking about her show,Lilly Tells It Like It Is, and I asked her if she’s still getting a lot of fan mail—one of her biggest fans, her stalker Norman, sends her free stuff all the time, with the understanding that he wants her to show her bare feet on the air: Norman is a foot fetishist.

     Then I mentioned that I’d received someintriguing mail lately. . . .

     Then I looked at Michael real fast, to see how he responded.

     But he didn’t even glance up from his laptop.

     And now he is back from the nurse’s office. She wouldn’t give him any ibuprofen because it is a violation of the school drug code. So I gave him some of my codeine cough syrup. He says it cleared his headache right up.

     But that might also have been because Boris knocked over a can of paint thinner with his bow and we had to let him out of the supply closet.

 

     HERE IS WHAT I HAVE TO DO

 

1. Stop thinking so much about Jo-C-rox

2. Ditto Michael Moscovitz

3. Ditto my mother and her reproductive issues

4. Ditto my interview tomorrow with Beverly Bellerieve

5. Ditto Grandmère

6. Have more self-confidence

7. Stop biting off fake fingernails

8. Self-actualize

9. Pay more attention in Algebra

10. Wash PE shorts

 

Later on Friday

 

     Talk about embarrassing! Principal Gupta somehow found out about my giving Michael some of my codeine cough syrup, and I got called out of Bio and sent to her office to discuss my trafficking of controlled substances on school grounds!

     Oh, my God! I really and truly thought I was going to get expelled then and there.

     I explained to her about the ibuprofen and the Bartok, but Principal Gupta was totally unsympathetic. Even when I brought up all the kids who stand outside the school and smoke. Do they get in trouble for bumming cigarettes off one another?

     And what about the cheerleaders and their Dexatrim?

     But Principal Gupta said cigarettes and Dexatrim are different from narcotics. She took my codeine cough syrup away and told me I could have it back after school. She also told me not to bring it to school on Monday.

     She doesn’t have to worry. I was so embarrassed about the whole thing, I am seriously considering never coming back to school at all, let alone on Monday.

     I don’t see why I can’t be home-schooled, like the boys from Hanson. Look how they turned out.

 

HOMEWORK

 

Algebra: problems on pg. 129

English: describe an experience that moved you profoundly

World Civ: two hundred words on the rise of the Taliban inAfghanistan

G&T:Please

French: devoirs—les notes grammaticals: 141–143

Biology: central nervous system

ENGLISH JOURNAL

 

My Favorite Things

 

FOOD

Vegetarian lasagna

 

MOVIE

My favorite movie of all time is one I first saw on HBO when I was twelve. It has remained my favorite movie in spite of my friends’ and family’s efforts to introduce me to so-called finer examples of cinematic art. Quite frankly, I think thatDirty Dancing, starring Patrick Swayze and a pre–nose-job Jennifer Grey, has everything films likeBreathless andSeptember, created by supposed “auteurs” of the medium, lack. For instance,Dirty Dancing takes place at a summer resort. Movies that take place in resorts (other good examples includeCocktail andAspen Extreme ) are just plain better, I’ve noticed, than other movies. Also,Dirty Dancing has dancing. Dancing in movies is always good. Think how much better Oscar Award–winning films, likeThe English Patient, would be if they had dancing in them. I am always so much less bored at the movies when there are people dancing on the screen. So all I have to say to the many, many people who disagree with me aboutDirty Dancing is: “Nobody puts Baby in the corner.”

 

TV SHOW

My favorite TV show isBaywatch. I know people think it is very lame and sexist, but actually it isn’t. The boys are as scantily clad as the girls, and in the later episodes at least, a woman is in charge of the whole life-guarding operation. And the truth of the matter is, whenever I watch this show, I feel happy. That is because I know whatever jam Hobie gets into, whether it is giant electric eels or emerald smugglers, Mitch will get him out of it, and everything will be done to an excellent soundtrack, and with stunning shots of the ocean. I wish there was a Mitch in my life to make everything all right at the end of the day.

     Also that my breasts were as big as Carmen Electra’s.

 

BOOK

My favorite book is calledIQ 83. It is by the bestselling author ofThe Swarm, Arthur Herzog.IQ 83 is about a bunch of doctors who mess around with DNA, and they unwittingly cause an accident that makes everyone in the world lose a bunch of IQ points and start acting dumb. Seriously! Even the president of theUnited States . He ends up drooling like an idiot! And it’s up to Dr. James Healey to save the country from being populated by a bunch of overweight morons who do nothing but watch Jerry Springer and eat Ho Hos all day. This book has never gotten the attention it should receive. It hasn’t even been made into a movie!

     This is a literary travesty.

 

Even later on Friday

 

     What am I supposed to do about this stupid English journal assignment,Describe an experience that moved you profoundly? I am so sure. What do I write about? The time I walked into the kitchen and found my Algebra teacher standing there in his underwear? That didn’t move me, exactly, but it was certainly an experience.

     Or should I talk about the time my dad spilled his guts about how it turns out I am the heir to the throne of the principality of Genovia? That was an experience, although I don’t know if it was profound, and even though I was crying, I don’t think it was because I was moved. I was just mad nobody had told me before. I mean, I guess I can understand that it might be embarrassing for him to have to admit to the Genovian people that he had a child out of wedlock, but to hide that fact for fourteen years? Talk about denial.

     My Bio partner Kenny, who also has Mrs. Spears for English, says he is going to write about his family’s trip toIndia last summer. He contracted cholera there, and nearly died. As he lay in his hospital bed in that far-off foreign land, he realized that we are only on this planet for a short while, and that it is vital we use every moment we have left as if it were our last. That is why Kenny is devoting his life to finding a cure for cancer, and promoting Japanese anime.

     Kenny is so lucky. If only I could contract a potentially fatal disease.

     I am beginning to realize that the only thing profound about my life so far is its complete and utter lack of profundity.

 

JeffersonMarket

 

The freshest produce—guaranteed

Fast, Free Delivery

 

 

Order no. 2764

 

1 package soybean curd

1 bottle wheat germ

1 loaf whole-grain bread

5 grapefruits

12 oranges

1 bunch bananas

1 package brewer’s yeast

1 quart skim milk

1 quart orange juice (not from concentrate)

1 pound butter

1 dozen eggs

1 bag unsalted sunflower seeds

1 box whole-grain cereal