Powered by RedCircle
At long last, it's an all-Elizabeth-and-Jessica book! No school (almost)! No friends (almost)! No teachers! Just our twins and the most ridiculous dinner date disguise debacle since Mrs. Doubtfire. Julia Kenney Smith joins Marissa in the (actual) studio!
Todd is back, tell a friend
So, Liz and Todd are IN LOVE AGAIN, and all is right with the world...except for the fact that Todd goes to school an hour away with snobs, they're both too infatuated with one another to keep up with their commitments, and it's about to be Snobs vs Slobs (yes, somehow Sweet Valley is the slobs) in the big Battle of the Schools! Not to mention, Courtney Kane is back, and she's pissed! Author (and OG Gladiator!) Libbie Hawker helps walk us through this morass.
Gotta Grow Up Sometime podcast
More on Swans Crossing
Hope you don't zap yourselves!
Chris and Paris from Terrible Book Club return! Jessica slums it in electronics class and Lila scams her pedagogically lazy dressmaking instructor in the TEACHER CRUSH b-plot. Plus, super-spoilers for Olivia's future! Extra drama indeed!
Listen to Terrible Book Club
More about The Zorn Palette
THE BELOW TRANSCRIPT WAS AUTO-GENERATED. Sorry for any nonsense!
[00:00:04] Marissa: It's extra drama for book number 57 teacher crush
Hello, Chris Paris and Marissa that's me are back again to talk more about teacher crush.
[00:00:28] Chris: Would an appropriate moments momentg up the B plot that we've been entirely ignoring? Cause we're kind of talking about, we're talking about consequences of actions,
[00:00:37] Marissa: I think it's about time that we should get through the B plot. Uh, you guys alluded to Jessica's awfulness , but we haven't said much about Jessica so let's, uh, let's talk a little quickly about what's going on in the B plot.
[00:00:50] Chris: Um, essentially Jessica gets it in her head that Lila is lying about her dad working at some movie
[00:01:00] Marissa: her
dad's dating
her dad is his dad is dating a soap opera star named, Anika hunt. And Jessica thinks that Lilah is making this up.
[00:01:08] Chris: And so, you know, she's ha she has to come up with a project for her, for electronics class. And she has no idea what to do until she has the brilliant stroke of genius to rig up a lie detector, to catch Lila in her lie.
[00:01:22] Marissa: It's going to be so embarrassing when the whole school finds out that Laila was lying about Anika hunt and her dad.
[00:01:28] Chris: of course she did. It's Randy to do the work for her once again, which also Randy just does it. And there's no consequence for this action also
[00:01:38] Marissa: Okay. Although she does get embarrassed at the end of the book, because she's hosted by her own petard. Right? Like she is, they put
her in the lie detector
[00:01:48] Chris: but the hoisting is not even like a foot off of the ground. The patard is comfortable and fine because, so she puts Laila in there, lie detector machine as if a lie detector is like admissible objective evidence, which as I'm sure we all know by now it's true cash.
[00:02:05] Marissa: Right. That's that's a
[00:02:06] Chris: it's made by a high school student and intellect two week electronics course yet.
Totally admissible evidence, Jessica. Anyway, she hooks the thing, turns out Laila, isn't lying about that. Or at least her lie detector says that. And like, there's like one line about a couple of people laughing that at Jessica for like, it was like, not even really laughing. It's just like some people were kind of giggling.
And then Jessica was like, well, all right, I guess, and then nothing happens after
that. She's mildly embarrassed, slightly a little bit. But faces no true consequence for honestly, like putting Wila through a lot of bullshit because previously she's like directly accusing Laila, like basically going, like, I know you're making this up.
[00:02:47] Marissa: And Lila is hurt. Her feelings are hurt that Jessica would accuse her of such a thing. Of course, Lila has got her own drama going on through the mini courses. This book is got a lot of plates spinning and Lila's plate is that she's in this dress design class. And the book has planted for us from the very beginning that Jessica has the dress that Lila is making.
In like, uh, this designed exactly the same way as what Lila is making and, apparently even the same fabric because when Lila screws up her dress to the point that she would be mortified to wear it in front of everybody, which is something she's supposed to do as a part of this dress design class, is that there's like a fashion runway at the big, you know, showcase event, she needs to borrow Jessica's dress so that she can lie and pretend that she is wearing the dress that she made.
So as to save face, luckily Lila has a bit of dirt that she is using as bait to kind of trade Jessica. Uh, like I have a secret. I know you can't stand anybody having a secret. So if you let me borrow the dress, I'll tell you
my secret. and the secret doesn't have anything to do with this book.
That's a secret, it's just set up the next one.
[00:04:04] Paris: I also like, while we're talking about this, this is, this is a moment when, when Laila's grappling with the dress disaster, this is another moment where these course, these mini courses were revealed as total horseshit because Lila goes to her teacher and is like, Hey, you know, I really had a hard time.
I couldn't, you know, something, I messed up. She like sewed a frill on the wrong side of the dress. I don't know. She did something needed help. She goes to the teacher and the teacher says
the whole point of the workshop is to design and wear your dress. The teachers sympathetically after Lila told her what a mess her dress had turned in.
I'm sorry, Lila, but you shouldn't feel embarrassed. I'm sure a lot of students' projects haven't turned out exactly the way they planned.
Well, no, you should be like, oh, man, you're just learning a new skill. You've only been learning this for two weeks. Sure. Let me help you because showing you how to fix the stress is a learning experience in fashion.
Like learning how to salvage something you made that didn't come out the way you wanted is, is a valuable skill in, in fashion. Yes.
[00:05:19] Marissa: Hmm. Yeah, no help from her at all.
She
seems
[00:05:22] Chris: lady is absolutely phoning this shit in that, like, this is a perfect mentor opportunity. This is like the reason you are teaching people. If you don't teach people by just saying, do the thing and then watching them do the thing to like good bad, that's not teaching. You must give them guidance and put them on a path that makes them make slightly less mistakes than they would normally, or at least needless mistakes, or at least give them some helpful advice on how to fix a mistake.
This. And I, you know what, no teacher in this book at all is of any quality. I have none of the teachers here, maybe the electronics guy, but even the electronics guys, like pick a project. Okay. I'm going to sit here for the rest of the two weeks while you do your project,
[00:06:04] Paris: The electronics, uh, Drexel gives them a handout. That's like, here's some electronic shops you can call. I don't know. Like basically you may as well have just said, fuck you kids. Good luck. I'm going to collect this check.
[00:06:17] Chris: zap yourselves.
[00:06:18] Marissa: Well, you know who, so what we're seeing is like the teacher who's the most hands-on, who's the best teacher, really of all the mini course teachers box.
[00:06:27] Paris: well, you know what though? I have bones to pick what the art in this book and Stuart, all right. There's like a, there's a, there's a part in this. I think it's like the, the scene where Olivia and Stewart's kind of relationships starts to foment, where he is talking about, uh, this particular type of painting I think it's most commonly known as the Zorn palette where you use a set of limited colors to create all the colors you need.
So you use for, I think it's usually four colors. Some, maybe five, I'm not an artist, but my partner is sort of, kind of pick up things here and there. And, um, basically like you choose these four colors and then you are able to give the impression of other colors based on the way that you use them through the use of like, um, you know, shading and stuff.
And in the book it's like, all right, kids, Stuart's like, all right, I want you to paint green without painting green. But then instead of, you know, using this as an opportunity to actually talk about the and pallet or like, or some real art techniques, Stuart just kind of goes, you know, just do it. And then there's no explanation.
And Olivia just magically knows how to do it. It boggles my mind and like the other parts where they're talking about art, we really only get one description of a painting and it's Olivia one of Elizabeth Olivia's early paintings and it just says it's flowers in a garden. Everything else. It literally is just like shapes and colors and textures.
Like there's
[00:08:00] Marissa: yeah, we have no idea what style of painter,
uh, Stuart is or what style of painting Olivia is doing that she is succeeding at. So while we know that she's working in a car,
[00:08:12] Paris: I mean for, yeah, for God's sake, tell me it's a rippling blue square or like a matte red circle or like a seascape on the Atlantic coast. Like it doesn't take a lot of effort to give me that detail. And I just drove
[00:08:27] Marissa: Yeah, it, it makes me think that they must be abstract paintings or else they would have been described more, but who knows? Maybe the author just really couldn't decide or didn't know anything about art. It's possible.
[00:08:39] Paris: It's true.
[00:08:41] Marissa: So Lila has this big secret that she is, holding out over Jessica.
And she ends up not even actually, Jessica doesn't even get the secret as like payment. Like if the secret comes out at the birthday party that Olivia has at the end in front of everybody but I really want to tell the gladiators what the secret is. Do you guys remember,
[00:09:01] Chris: It was someone's ex-boyfriend is moving back to
[00:09:04] Marissa: right. It makes sense that it wouldn't have stood out to you all in, uh, you know, having read the book, uh, you know, weeks ago at this point because you haven't read the other books, but for me I'm, I, my eyes are wide. Todd Wilkins is moving back to sweet valley and , they put Elizabeth in the very end of the book.
They put Elizabeth in Jessica's lie detector test and Lila in like the bitchiest move she possibly could have pulled, asks Elizabeth point blank. So are you worried about the fact that your boyfriends would be back to town and you will have another boyfriend now? Like, is that a problem for you at all?
Knowing full well that Elizabeth has no idea that Todd is moving back to town and that's how she breaks the news.
[00:09:52] Chris: Okay. So Elizabeth also mildly sucks too, I guess.
[00:09:55] Marissa: We'll wait, why does Elizabeth suck?
[00:09:57] Chris: I am incorrect. I can't keep track of these people.
[00:10:01] Marissa: Elizabeth is the one who. Um, Todd Wilkins is her ex boyfriend and they broke up because Todd moved away and then Jeffrey moved to town and then Elizabeth and Jeffrey started dating. So,
[00:10:13] Chris: Elizabeth. Ex-boyfriend. I'm sorry. I will. Wow.
[00:10:16] Marissa: all right. I mean she's, sometimes Elizabeth definitely does suck, but in this particular case, but I think the suckiest thing about her is that she might still be harboring feelings for her ex boyfriend, which is not great when you have a new boyfriend, but,
[00:10:29] Chris: also, I feel like a heated coat hanger would be a lot easier to make than a fucking lie detector. In two weeks he had coat hangers, like a couple of resistors, right. A little insulation,
[00:10:39] Marissa: Yeah. Then she Randy.
[00:10:42] Chris: and he like builds. Like he like, oh, here's a pulse oximeter, Jessica. Like, he just makes one also actually, hold on, there's this point?
This, I completely forgot about this until now. I think Jessica might also be a little stupid about this lie detector works because at one point earlier, when she's like testing out the lie detector, She's like, oh, let's get your like baseline pulse reading. And she goes, oh, okay. I've got it. It's one 20 over 80, which is a blood pressure reading.
But then later on someone else like sets up the lie detector and
they're like, okay, let's take your, yeah, Randy Mason sets it up. He's like, okay, let's take your baseline pulse. Oh, 73 resting heart rate, which is like normal resting heart rate reading. So I was trying to struggle to think if like the, the author just didn't understand what was like a pulse reading or if that was just a subtle jab at Jessica, not knowing what the fuck you're supposed to even be reading on the pulse oximeter part.
[00:11:39] Marissa: I like that second reading, because we are, the book keeps us a little bit in the dark about the play by play of what work Jessica's doing, because she's definitely doing something like she's clearly very enamored of this invention. He's works on it a little bit at home and she takes it with her from school to, you know, to the party.
Cause she's just so excited about it. But all of the ideas for how to make it work, come from Randy. And he must've helped her with the actual electronics. Cause I don't think she was really paying attention in class. So I think she's into it more, maybe more than she cares to admit. But I agree with you that the book gives us no sense that she actually knows that much about how it works. Winston's invention is a voice-activated toaster. Lila teases, Jessica, at one point that maybe she is going to invent an electronic boy finder.
[00:12:33] Chris: That's just Tinder, right? That's just Tinder,
[00:12:42] Marissa: We're at a point now in sweet valley diaries where I have not read any further than where we're at for the first 50 books I had already read them and we, before the podcast started, but once we got to book 51, it's all been new material for me,
[00:12:56] Chris: okay. So can I bring up the one thing that I learned as I did a little bit of mild research for sweet valley high, which is a future spoiler here. So I suppose listeners,
[00:13:07] Marissa: Spoiler alert, spoiler alert
[00:13:08] Chris: yeah, this is for like, I, I was just, I was just on the sweet valley high Wikipedia page. Cause I was looking, I was trying to make sense of who, what characters were, who
and like so there's a character section. And for some reason, the Wikipedia page on sweet valley high decides to tell you the ultimate fate of every character, there's like one line about who they are. And then like the horrible shit that happens to them later on. And I'm not going to say all of them, but this is what convinced me that sweet valley was cursed.
But I just, I want to zero in on Olivia's ultimate fate, apparently,
because this recontextualized a lot of lines in the book for me here. So once again, spoiler alerts to all listeners here and I hope Marissa. I mean, I'm,
[00:13:47] Marissa: I can take it. I can take it.
[00:13:49] Chris: Okay.
[00:13:50] Marissa: found out all sorts of interesting things about what happens in these books. Although I do try to avoid the, the danger, the danger zone. That is,
uh the Wikipedia
[00:14:01] Chris: Also, but like Olivia has like two lines on her character on the Wikipedia page. It's like, Olivia is kind of the artsy student at sweet valley high later, she dies in an earthquake and I'm like, what the fuck? Like it doesn't, it doesn't say when at all. So like when there's a line in the book, that's like, this was the best birthday that Olivia ever had.
I'm like, yeah, fucking was, I guess wasn't it.
[00:14:28] Marissa: Man. I can't believe that it's going to even be an earthquake book, man, every once in a while these books get so blood thirsty, they just have to kill somebody off. And I'm sorry, it was Olivia.
So by, by book 57 point, we have definitely had, at least, I hope I'm not forgetting anybody. Sorry. Gladiators. If I am, we have had two deaths in the series so far already, Tricia Martin and Regina Morrow.
[00:14:53] Chris: Oh, I see. I know one of these, I also read one of these. One of these is pretty fucked up. This is
[00:14:56] Marissa: it was Regina probably who you're thinking of. I never realized how much sweet valley high was like, uh, the game of Thrones books. It was just like everybody that you love don't get too attached to their they're getting offed eventually. Not literally everybody, but a very high percentage of them do seem to pass away at some point for drama's sake.
That's what we're all about here. Drama. And today of course, extra drama. Maybe we gotta bring you guys back on for whatever this Olivia earthquake book is. You can
[00:15:30] Chris: There's also that. And then there's the, there's the other Jessica thing that I read that once I read that on the Wikipedia page, I was like, truly fuck Jessica from all angles at all times.
Which again, we're not going to say anything. I don't want to spoil too many more things, but
[00:15:43] Marissa: Well, now that I, now that I'm not sure what's coming, it's not always readily evident from the books and the books, brief descriptions, what wild things are gonna happen. So maybe we'll maybe it'll come as a surprise, but if I see it coming based on the plot description, I will call upon you to, to be my guests.
And thank you so much for being my guests on this week's and last week's episode of sweet valley diaries. And for reading this book and bringing your, a unique brand of a book dissection, terrible book dissection to our humble, uh, program.
Hey guys, Marissa, just chiming in here real quick. You may have noticed that our friend Paris was uncharacteristically quiet during much of this extra drama episode. That was due to a technological difficulty that I didn't notice in time to fix. If it had in fact been fixable, who knows. I gotta be honest with you. I don't even remember if I asked her to tease book 58. Uh, but I would hate for you to miss this very exciting cliffhanger. So I'm going to read it for you right now, before the episode is out.
And I'll try not to sound too excited about it.
What will happen to Elizabeth and Jeffrey when Todd Wilkins returns to sweet valley. Find out in sweet valley, high number 58. Broken hearted.
Well, thank you so much again, guys. And remember gladiator to check out terrible book club, wherever fine podcasts are distributed. And, uh, we'll talk to you next time.
[00:17:15] Paris: thanks for having us on today.
[00:17:17] Marissa: I've got it all right in my brain here. Yeah.
[00:17:28] Chris: I like it.
Posted at 08:00 AM in Jessica, Lila Fowler, Podcast | Permalink | Comments (0)
personality matters
Haley Tubbs returns to talk about the science field trip that wasn't, and whether Jessica is right about guys with "too much of a sense of humor." What fun! All in the the name of LOST AT SEA, of course.
THE FOLLOWING TRANSCRIPT IS AUTO-GENERATED. APOLOGIES FOR THE MANY TYPOS!
Extra Drama #56
Marissa: [00:00:00] extra drama for book number 56, lost at sea
Hello everyone. I am your host, Marissa flax, Bart. Welcome to extra drama and welcome to our guest this week. Haley
tubs. Hi Hailey.
56 haley: [00:00:30] Hello.
Marissa: [00:00:32] Well, we've been talking about the rollicking sea adventure and the deserted island drama that is lost at sea, sweet valley high number 56. And it all started with a lowly extra credit science field trip.
56 haley: [00:00:48] The catalyst.
Marissa: [00:00:50] the catalyst. Ooh, a good, a good science word. Did you ever go on a cool science field trip? Like this? This seemed like so extra
to me.
56 haley: [00:01:00] it did. So I'm honestly, I'm still... ba-dum-shhhh, ocean plug. So.
I have two brothers, um, both of them were able to go on the field trip. It was the eighth grade field trip that every eighth grader in my hometown went on. Um, and it was a, it was called sea camp. And it was a week in the keys where you do just a crash course of Marine biology and the Florida keys.
Um, get on a bus you drive overnight to get there. and they have all these stories. They talk about like, you know, snorkeling with sharks, deer that would just approach you in the keys. Everyone having like close encounters where they got to feed deer, not really necessarily a Marine biology thing, but that was a cool story
lots of people had, yeah, you got to like research things in an actual lab. Um, a lot of just like this field trip, a lot of, you know, driving around on boats, I'm sure tide pools were a huge part of it, anyways, when it came time for me to go on the field trip, they booked the field trip over Halloween weekend.
Halloween was on a weekend this year and nobody signed up. So they canceled the field trip because they didn't have enough interest. And I've been sad about it ever since.
Marissa: [00:02:21] aww, just, like Elizabeth would have been, awww,
56 haley: [00:02:27] know, I'm sorry that that's not a particularly uplifting answer to your question, but that is what this reminded me of from the beginning.
Marissa: [00:02:35] amazed to know that there is such a thing that happens like that is so similar to the trip that these kids went on. I mean, you up in Florida, right?
a little bit more like California than where I was in high school, which was in Northwest Indiana, on lake Michigan. We were on a body of
boy, I sure don't remember ever going on a science field trip to do anything on the water in lake Michigan. I don't remember doing any cool science field trips in high school, really. I mean, maybe I'm just forgetting about them, but so they couldn't obviously couldn't have been that cool. W you know, I was in girl Scouts, so we had a certain amount of like that element of like being out in nature and
56 haley: [00:03:15] True,
Marissa: [00:03:16] you know, lots of different kinds of badges that you get for, know, learning about different kinds of plants and all that stuff was a big part of my childhood, but it wasn't a part of science class.
a part of like recreation.
56 haley: [00:03:31] Yeah, definitely.
Marissa: [00:03:33] I had some cool science experiments that were like out in the field when I got to college, actually, there were sort of like science courses that you took if you were not on a, kind of more science-y track,
we had, a core curriculum, like requirement for every different area.
So like, you ha you still had to take science, even if you were a film studies major. Like I was, but doing that, we got to do some pretty cool stuff. We had an early assignment where we were like measuring the cosmic microwave background. Even at the time I was like, this is wild
because we had this, you don't really, it's the university of Chicago.
We had this like really intense equipment at our disposal. So we're like
56 haley: [00:04:15] amazing.
Marissa: [00:04:17] I honestly don't remember how we did it, but I remember that I remember being up with like this telescope and like observing something. And the information that we observed was like, whatever way we crunch the numbers showed us that that's, that's what we
were observing.
56 haley: [00:04:34] That's amazing. That's so cool.
Marissa: [00:04:36] That's pretty cool. also this thing. We have like monk parakeets here in California, those pretty little green
56 haley: [00:04:42] Yeah,
Marissa: [00:04:43] They also exist -- at least they did when I was in college, in, in Chicago, Hyde park, especially. And so we had this, experiment that was like kind of a field experiment where we went around, like trying to observe them and like talking about where we, where we saw them.
And that
was, that was fun.
56 haley: [00:05:00] I went on, so not to just talk about Tappity the whole time, but it's applicable very much so here. Um, so, uh, we, were doing a week on the rainforest, um, and the activity that particular week, um, because typically we'll do like a fun magic school bus style mission, um, where we go on a science adventure, I'd very narrative adventure and learn something, learn many things, hopefully, um, and have fun while doing it.
And then we'll have other activities we'll have, um, you know, our more, hands-on either creating something or doing an experiment type activity, um, and then a trivia type activity. But the one that I'm about to talk about is we have a drawing activity as well. and this particular drawing activity for the rainforest was to draw a parrot. So I was like, you know, what I'm going to do for these Tappernauts, um, is I'm going to go out and I'm going to find those little green parrots. Um, and I'm going to film a video of myself with one of them and blow their minds.
Cause we're drawing them this week and this will be great because they exist where I live. Um, so I went on this hike out in Malibu where I had seen them before and I spent. Maybe two hours tracking down these parrots, I would hear them and like go towards the sound. And eventually there was, um, there was a few in a tree pretty far away.
So I used as much zoom as I could on my phone camera zooming in trying to find these parrots. was they're very loud,
Marissa: [00:06:21] their sound is a good way to find where they, where
they are.
56 haley: [00:06:24] definitely. So I had zoomed in and I got a pretty clear picture. I was like, okay, my Zoom's enough to where you could at least see like little green specks on, on the trees. So I could be like, these are, the parrots we're drawing. Um, so I leave the hike a little hungry. So I stopped at a pavilions in the pavilions parking lot immediately above my car.
This tree is FULL ofthese green parrots, like closer than I'd probably ever seen a bird like this, they were just everywhere. And I was like, man, well, I could have just gone grocery shopping. I didn't have to go out into the wild, but Southern California is crazy as is evidenced in, Lost at Sea with their wildlife encounters.
It's thrill wild down here.
Marissa: [00:07:06] Yeah. I haven't seen a bear yet, but definitely you have some monk parakeets, sightings.
56 haley: [00:07:13] hope that wasn't too much of a tangent, but that story, but you talked about the monk parakeets and
Marissa: [00:07:17] me. I of like the, this is the tangent zone, uh, extra drama is, but seems like it seems very much on topic to me, we can change the topic away from science to, to one other little thing that, you know, we talked a little bit of in the main episode about this interesting kind of psychological undercurrent to Lost at Sea, which was Winston the class clown. And there was a line that really stood out to me that I thought could be kind of fun to talk about. And I'll like, I dunno, just sort of like dish session kind of way,
. Early on when Jessica is annoyed with Winston and thinking about how she doesn't know what Maria sees in him.
It's certainly not. Uh, his looks says
Winston was lanky and awkward with no muscles worth mentioning,
56 haley: [00:08:07] Yeah.
Marissa: [00:08:08] but goes on to, she thinks to herself, , he was an institution at sweet valley, high invited to every party because he provided free entertainment. But boy, I'd rather date a guy with absolutely no sense of humor than one with too much thought. And, uh, thought when I read that sentence, I was like...really?, I, it's, I mean, too much sense of humor does sound pretty bad, but like no sense of humor. I don't know. What did you think? What do you, did you notice that at
all? Is it just me.
56 haley: [00:08:47] Definitely. But I think it's also because, um, and I hate to admit this because of what this has about me. Um, but I had to learn that exact lesson in college. Um, I, uh, so I didn't really date much in college. Um, and, uh, there was this, um, strapping gentlemen. We had a real meet, cute, uh, my senior year in an elevator, um, where we discovered that we lived across from each other in an apartment building.
And he left a note on my door saying like, if you ever need milk or sugar, you can know where to find me. And I was like, okay. Um, turns out that's the most clever thing he will ever say in his life? Um, he's very, very handsome.
Marissa: [00:09:28] man. He
got on your hands.
56 haley: [00:09:31] So, um, uh, very attractive. And at that point in my life, I thought like, if I'm attracted to you, like the rest will come, you know what I mean?
Like, that's the Mo I was like, I think at this, at this particular moment in my life, I think that that is the most important thing. And as long as we're attracted to each other, like a relationship can happen, boy, was I wrong? So I think I really came to know this when, um, we were literally sitting on a couch in his apartment, just pulling teeth, trying to have a conversation with each other.
And we started playing words, with friends, because that was popular at the time. Um, uh, I was like trying to joke about things, didn't understand any of them and truly my life. That was the first time that I was like, personality matters. And like, I was probably too old to be learning that lesson.
but I was like, truly, there is more to a relationship. Like you need to have a sense of humor. And that's when I realized that that was an important thing for me. My husband now is very, very silly. so sure
Marissa: [00:10:30] And I spend least one day a week sort of making dumb jokes in a, in studio in Burbank, like really, really dumb jokes
we're
Yeah.
56 haley: [00:10:43] So,
Marissa: [00:10:44] really hard today at a joke that I wrote that wasn't even a joke. It was just like a repetition of words, know, it just, I laughed so hard.
I really cracked myself up.
56 haley: [00:10:58] oh, tappity is a Haven for corny jokes like that. It's where they all belong. They can all live their best lives, all those corny jokes. Um, but yeah, so I really, uh, I really felt that I was like, oh, Jessica in your life. You will learn that the way somebody looks is the least important part of your relationship.
Marissa: [00:11:20] Will she learn that? I hope she learns it
56 haley: [00:11:23] I mean, I think that my husband is a handsome man. I am attracted to him as well. So I'm not saying like I learned my lesson and now, you know, he's silly and that's enough if he's listening to this podcast. Um, but,
Marissa: [00:11:35] yes.
56 haley: [00:11:35] I learned in, in that moment, that was my exact thought is like, oh, you're young, soon.
You will know that too much sense of humor is maybe the most attractive quality in another human being, because it's a long life. It's a long life. There are many ups and downs,
Marissa: [00:11:50] Yeah,
56 haley: [00:11:51] when you have a Marissa knows very well, the trials and tribulations of us having a one-year-old and trying to go about our lives with our one-year-old child, but takes 200% of our energy at all times.
And Marissa is, oh
Marissa: [00:12:05] at all times.
56 haley: [00:12:06] yeah, it doesn't all working together.
Marissa: [00:12:10] He's great. I like him a lot,
yeah, no, I, for me, I'm really, I am the sort of person that, like, me, there's a big difference between seeing and acknowledging that someone is physically attractive and actually being attracted to them. if I. Saw someone who was really attractive. And I learned that they were dumb.
Like I, the attraction, it wouldn't like, it's not that it would cease it's that it would never have had a chance to like foam it.
56 haley: [00:12:44] Yes,
Marissa: [00:12:45] wouldn't have gotten to the point to be attracted to them. Whereas on the flip side, if someone is not visually appealing to me, but I get to know them and I'm like a Maria Santelli in that way, you know,
56 haley: [00:12:56] absolutely.
Marissa: [00:12:57] doesn't sound like my type physically, but if I got to, I mean, nor really, he sounds like an annoying little shit, but if I got, if I. I will have to admit if I were stranded on a deserted island
and he were single, I would have started thinking as soon as he started showing a great guy he was, I would have started thinking about how like, oh, well, if we're stuck here for too long, you know what I mean? We might have to keep each other warm at night.
You know, I would
56 haley: [00:13:24] Thousand percent.
Marissa: [00:13:25] to that place that Jessica never goes. Even when she's fantasizing, I read a quote in the main episode about how she's thinking about how he's going to look like rip van Winkle with those long beard, and she's going to have scraggly.
doesn't think about their little children that they're going to have or how be married by like a, you know, a coconut on a stick
you know,
56 haley: [00:13:46] And it was dangling. She was like, you know, my sister's going to get married. My brother's going to get married and I'm going to grow old with Winston, but doesn't move towards like the marriage. Like she, she talks about two weddings and then uses the phrase, grow old with Wednesday and, and still, it doesn't come to the point she's like, maybe him.
But one thing I will say that I, sorry.
Marissa: [00:14:09] oh, I suppose. And I'll tell you, Jessica, I don't know how long she could go without having some, some physical affection.
you know, they would at least have to make out a little bit, I think, after, after three or four days,
56 haley: [00:14:23] I mean, she couldn't go six hours without a date on this field trip. So I mean, multiple days.
Marissa: [00:14:30] so true. It's so
true.
56 haley: [00:14:32] I will say I appreciated that they set Jessica up. Like, I don't know. I maybe had to change my perspective on it a little bit from being like they weren't, I'm sorry, if this is too harsh of a word, you can tell me, uh, they never like slut-shamed her, you know what I mean? Like, it was kind of empowering the whole time.
Her being like Jessica plays the field, like Jessica is in control. Like she is like, know. Like they, uh,
she was kind of like a Samantha in sex in the city. Like she was like, um, they referred to her like playing the field and they talked about her, like, you know, her being boy crazy and all these things.
Um, but I feel like they kind of did it in an empowering way. Like they never, they never,
Marissa: [00:15:11] Jessica is. That's what she's into. It's like in the
56 haley: [00:15:14] Hmm.
Marissa: [00:15:15] you know, a different character is into like taking pretty pictures know, Elizabeth likes to write, you know, Jessica likes to
chase boys.
56 haley: [00:15:24] definitely. And she was definitely in control on her pursuit of Ken Matthews. Like she, like, she made her move when she wanted to like. And, uh,
Marissa: [00:15:34] says something to Laila on the boat. When she, before she does that, that's like, let's have a little fun. She's just like, I'm going to go. I'm going to go play this game
now where I
56 haley: [00:15:42] definitely it was like a traditionally and I don't mean to sound sexist saying this. It was like a traditionally masculine energy, especially in 1989 when, when this was written, you know what I mean? Like the idea of being like I'm on the prowl, I'm on the pursuit. Like Ken Matthews is like, you know, like my prey of the day.
Marissa: [00:16:00] never really thought about that. We
like third wave feminism coming into play and see valley high,
56 haley: [00:16:10] It's really
Marissa: [00:16:11] wave, acknowledged. Haley, thank you so much. See, this ended up being a juicy or topic than I thought it might
56 haley: [00:16:23] sure.
Marissa: [00:16:24] for our extra drama. Thank you so much again for doing this with me, for reading the book
56 haley: [00:16:29] Thank you.
Marissa: [00:16:30] being great
56 haley: [00:16:31] Thank you.
for being great.
Oh my pleasure.
Marissa: [00:16:36] You're welcome. And gladiators, uh, tune in next week to find out about teacher crush, which we're really crossing our fingers and, uh, ourselves that, uh, there's not going to be any, anything too upsetting, uh, occurring within the pages
56 haley: [00:16:54] can't wait to listen in and find out because I'm on and breath.
Marissa: [00:16:58] All right. Well, if you want to borrow it, I can lend you
my copy.
56 haley: [00:17:01] hooked now. So have to read the first 55.
Marissa: [00:17:05] Yeah, I think it's a great idea. Um, well thank you so much for listening and, uh, remember to subscribe to the show if you haven't already and to tell a friend Haley, thanks again so much for being here. I'll
56 haley: [00:17:20] you.
Marissa: [00:17:22] Bye.
We did it.
56 haley: [00:17:44] And I was like, I'll start now. And I'll read a little bit, each day. I have like, you know, three or four days to read it and I just read the whole thing. It like clipped along. It was like, well, Hey, like I can't stop. I have to know.
Posted at 09:31 AM in Jessica, Podcast, Romances, Science, Winston Egbert | Permalink | Comments (0)
Sit right back and you'll hear a tale...
Part island fantasy, part survival guide, part extra credit assignment, LOST AT SEA is the first Sweet Valley High novel to feature a character getting lost at sea and assumed dead. Professional science enthusiast Haley Tubbs joins Marissa to dig into this book and what it has to say about the true nature of Winston Egbert. Fun!
Watch Haley on the Tappity Kids' Science App!
What is a predicate adjective? (strap in, kids)
What is a Gilligan's Island?
What is a bandeau?
Subscribe to Marissa's newsletter, Metaforia.
Posted at 08:10 AM in Danger, Jessica, Podcast, Winston Egbert | Permalink | Comments (0)
"Is this all just a long non-sequitur?"
Jack and Tanner are back for more THRILLER talk. What all-time-greatest film is this book's plot remixed from? How would the BSC handle this mystery? Would a t-shirt fit over Jack's head? Find out all this and more (sort of) in today's EXTRA DRAMA!
Links:
Posted at 08:24 AM in Elizabeth, Film, Jessica, Podcast, Romances, Super Thrillers, Terrible Accidents | Permalink | Comments (0)
I joined Jack and Tanner of the Baby-Sitters Club Club podcast last week to discuss the very horny, thrillingly problematic Sweet Valley High #3: Playing with Fire. An honor and a privilege!
In addition to their storied program, you can hear Jack and Tanner on Sweet Valley Diaries #26: Hostage! and on a forthcoming episode of that show (Surprise!).
Posted at 04:06 PM in Bruce, Fashions of Sweet Valley, Jessica, Podcast, Romances, The Droids | Permalink | Comments (0)
Why is it never "two-therapist weekend"?
The title of this book makes a promise, and that promise is kept in ways both thrilling and hilarious. Also somewhat harrowing. Teya Patt (FOR ALL MANKIND) joins Marissa for the play-by-play of this masterpiece of juvenile (?!) fiction.
CW for stalker-y, abusive behavior...but as ever, it's all deliciously over the top and (spoiler alert) everything's fine in the end.
Posted at 03:30 PM in A.J. Morgan, Breakups, Danger, Elizabeth, Insanity, Jessica, Podcast, Romances | Permalink | Comments (0)
Just chattin' about John qua John
Marissa and guest reader Dr. Daniel Okobi tackle, but don't really answer, a big-but-vague question: Is John Pfeifer a good guy in this book? Also: Jessica's Philosophy on Men, and what's up with this new tennis girl?
* * *
There's a new Sweet Valley Diaries podpage!
Continue reading "Extra Drama #52: I Guess It's Okay to Go Home with John for Now?" »
Posted at 09:08 AM in Danger, Jessica, John Pfeifer, Parents Who Just Don't Understand, Podcast, Romances | Permalink | Comments (0)
Saving frenemies from Big Al since 1989
Marissa and Mary consider the realism of gritty 1980s teen gambling. Is it harder or easier for a kid to get into money troubles in the 2020s?
And another thing: what do these supposedly “ugly” earrings of Jessica’s look like? And where can I buy them?
Should Jessica have a low-balance credit card?
These and other questions explored, if not answered, in this extended exploration of themes from Sweet Valley High Book 51, AGAINST THE ODDS.
Posted at 11:18 AM in Danger, Elizabeth, Jeffrey French, Jessica, Kidnapping, Minor Characters In the Spotlight, Podcast, Sports | Permalink | Comments (0)
