30 Things I Learned from "Sideways Stories From Wayside School"

I read the 3 Wayside School books recently and decided to do something a little different for my reviews...so I give you 30 Things I Learned from Wayside School. :)

1. Sometimes you can do math the "wrong way" and still get the right answer.

2. "It isn't how many pictures you have, but how good the pictures are. A person could spend his whole life just drawing one picture of a cat. In that time I'm sure Bebe could draw a million cats. But if that one picture is better than each of Bebe's million, then that person has produced more art than Bebe."
   
   
3. If there is no nineteenth story and no Miss Zarves and no note to deliver from Mrs Jewls, then you've already not done your job.
   
   
4. Everyone else's flavored ice cream will always be better than your own. Except Kathy's. "Kathy-flavored ice cream tasted a little bit like old bologna."
   
   
5. "Pigtails are meant to be pulled."
   
   
6. Sammy is the nastiest, grossest, most disgusting student in Mrs Jewls' class.
   
   
7. The green bouncy balls are the best ones on the playground.
   
   
8. If you eat the cafeteria food, weird things will happen.
   
   
9. Sometimes you have to read the story backwards. It was purple.
   
   
10. Mrs Gorf is "frog" spelled backwards. Also, Louis' meanest teacher was Mrs Drazil (Lizard).
    
    
11. Always go up the stairs on the right and down them on the left, so as to avoid traffic jams.
    
    
12. "You need a reason to be sad. You don't need a reason to be happy."
    
    
13. If you're running late for school, always make sure it's not actually a Saturday first.
    
    
14. When Halloween falls on a Sunday, you always celebrate at school the Friday before.
    
15. Socks make you stupid.
    
    
16. You can be free or you can be safe. You can't be both.
    
    
17. "It is very embarrassing to borrow someones pencil and then chew on it."
    
    
18. You'll know you really love a story when you laugh like a giggle box and cry like a leaky faucet.
    
    
19. "There is no Miss Zarves. There is no nineteenth story. Sorry."
    
    
20. When a hippopotamus gets mad, it wriggles its ears. And so does Mrs Gorf.
    
    
21. It's good to be in a group when nobody is strange because nobody is normal.
    
    
22. Cows will walk up 30 flights of stairs, but you can't get them to walk back down again.
    
23. The "Pet Day" chapter in Wayside School Gets a Little Stranger will make you want to do logic puzzles. Curb this desire. Or get out your paper and pencil.
    


24. "Door" is a bad word. From now on, use the word "goozack".
    
    
25. If you do something bad in elementary school and your teacher writes it down in her blue notebook, it will follow you for the rest of your life.
    
26. Babies don't think in words.
    
    
27. To use the new elevators, take the blue one to go up and the red one to go down. 
    
    
28. You will find these books hysterical even as an adult.
    
    
29. Every other school is way stranger than your own.
    
    
30. The author's name is pronounced "Sacker" not "Satcher".

Review: "Spanking Shakespeare"

Spanking Shakespeare by Jake Wizner
3 out of 5 stars

This book caught my eye one day when I was browsing "Shakespeare" on Goodreads, trying to find a Classic a Month, and I thought it looked amusing. Which it absolutely is. On an extremely superficial level. I can see young, teenage boys loving it. So it's good for something, right? I enjoyed it but I'm glad I checked it out at the library. :)

Shakespeare Shapiro is saddled with a horrendous name from his parents and it has affected his life more than he cares to admit. And now, in his senior year of high school, he must come to terms with it once and for all and decide if it is going to continue ruling his life. Shakespeare goes to a prestigious high school which requires all seniors to write a memoir of sorts and he attacks his with crude humor and cringe-worthy honesty. With chapter titles such as "The Time I Got Caught with a Pornographic Magazine in Math Class" and "The Time My Mother Used Emotional Blackmail to Deprive Me of the Only Thing I Ever Really Wanted", you can tell he's really going for the shock value here. He was born on Hitler's birthday, his brother is named Gandhi, and his parents are "anti-rules".

My brother and I were difficult children, but much of this was due to my parents' complete ineptitude. 

But things are not all bad for Shakespeare...he has an English teacher who really believes in his talent and encourages it, he has 2 very good friends (although one is overly-obsessed with his bowel movements), and he gets the girl he desperately wants, in the end (although maybe not the one he knew he wanted). And there are some surprisingly sensitive moments, like when he befriends a quiet girl who seems to have much more serious problems than being sent to a Lord of the Flies-esque summer camp. (Side note: I laughed out loud when he described the Coma Game: no moving, no sound, basically being dead. We taught our young, 5-6 years, sisters how to play Cemetery from Daria lol. (skip to 14:45) They still remember it!)

As Shakespeare gets to know Charlotte, the quiet girl, he realizes that maybe he doesn't have it so bad after all. I mean yeah, he definitely has his issues, but there's always someone out there with it worse. And I think that's what makes this a good read for teenagers, boys in particular. They'll laugh at all the sex jokes and potty humor, but they'll also commiserate with Shakespeare's girl problems, realize maybe their parents aren't so bad after all, and consider why exactly they won't accept help when offered.

The truth is I know exactly why I'm resistant. I don't want a therapist to tell me things about myself I don't want to hear, and I don't want to admit that I have problems I can't deal with myself. It would be one thing if I could just go in and complain about my life, but having to confront and take responsibility for my shortcomings and insecurities is something I have no interest in.