Will the Real Raisin Rodriguez Please Stand Up?

Â
Published by the Penguin Group
Penguin Young Readers Group
345 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.
Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.
Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4P
2Y3 (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)
Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
Penguin Ireland, 25 St Stephen's Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd)
Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a
division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd)
Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi - 110 017,
India
Penguin Group (NZ), Cnr Airborne and Rosedale Roads, Albany, Auckland 1310, New
Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd)
Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd, 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196,
South Africa

Â
Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

Â
Copyright 2007 Â© Alloy Entertainment and Judy Goldschmidt

Â
Produced by Alloy Entertainment
ALLOYE
NTERTAINMENT 151 West 26th Street
New York, NY 10001

eISBN : 978-1-595-14058-6

Â
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data is available

Â
The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author's rights is appreciated.

Â
The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

http://us.penguingroup.com

To Mr. Sherber Brennan Jr. Here's hoping that by the time you read this, you'll have a first name.

Monday, December 13

6:30 PM, EST

Hello Kitties,

This morning I woke up an innocent child. Someone who led a simple existence, consisting mainly of going to school, seeing friends, eating meals, and sure, making an occasional appearance on the talk show circuit. (You knowâthe one in my room.)

But tonight? Tonight I go to sleep an experienced woman of the world.

Wait a second! Did I just say woman? I can hardly believe myself. Woman used to be a dirty word to me. One that made me think of someone outfitted in head-to-toe Dress Barn. With one hand on her hip and the other wagging a very waggy finger. Who thinks poopie jokes aren't funny or amusing.

But here I am, dressed in my up-to-the-minute empire-waist dress and ballet flats, with both hands on my keyboard, enjoying a good chuckle over that ol' zinger about the ghost poopie (Where'd it go?), yet a woman nonetheless.

I guess I had it all wrong.

It's funny, there are so many things I didn't understand before this afternoon that suddenly make more sense.

Raisin Rodriguez Discusses Things She Didn't Understand Before This Afternoon That Now Make More Sense

A Q&A with RR

Â
RR: Why do girls want to spend so much time hanging out with their boyfriends when we all know that when it comes to the important things, like picking out the right pair of shoes for an outfit or describing what your hair looks like in the back, boys are pretty useless?

Â
Raisin Rodriguez: You know, until quite recently (just this afternoon, to be exact) I'd wondered the same thing. But then I spent a good forty-five minutes making out with my brand-new boyfriend, CJ Mullen, and I discovered the answer. As it so happens, making out with your boyfriend is extremely fun. Quite possibly more fun than anything else. But as it also so happensâand this is the kickerâyou must be in very close proximity to a boyfriend in order to make out with him. So, that's where the time issue comes into play. You have to physically spend time with them in order to make out with them.

Â
RR: Why do some girls always manage to bring the conversation back to their boyfriends no matter what you happen to be discussingâeven if it's your old Barbie doll collection or your preferred brand of tampon?

Â
Raisin Rodriguez: I know that girl! Raisin playfully
holds her nose in the P.U. gesture. A moment passes as
she loses herself in thought. Gosh, I hope I'm not her. She shakes her head vigorously as if to erase the thought.

Here's the thing: once you've made out with your boyfriend, everything else in life seems like just a little less fun. So, this girl who's always talking about her boyfriend is really just doing this to keep the fun alive. I guess the problem is that the very thing that keeps the fun alive for her kills it for the rest of us.

Â
RR: Wow, you really seem to have all the answers. There's one more thing I've been wondering. . . . I hesitate for a moment.

Â
Raisin Rodriguez: Ask away . . . anything . . . She looks for a sign of approval from the girl she brought along with her, who may or may not be her publicist. Though she is only four. The girl gives her a nod to signal the go-ahead.

RR: It's not exactly related. . . .

Â
Raisin Rodriguez: Well, try me . . .

Â
RR: OK . . . since you said that you understand things better than you used to, I thought maybe you'd understand this. There's this Beck song that always runs through my head and it really bugs me. I just can't understand why he's so darn sure he's going to lose the baby.

(Raisin Rodriguez's eyes light up and are nearly ejected from their sockets. She waves her hands furiously.)

Â
Raisin Rodriguez: Oh. My. God. I had the exact same problem with that song! I mean, exact. If he knows he's going to lose the baby, then maybe he should just put it in one of those Snugli things. But then, the moment CJ and I parted ways, I caught myself singing the line, “I'm a loser, baby, why don't you kill me?” As if I had known the correct lyrics all along. I'm telling youâthis whole experience has helped me to understand the world so much better than I used to.

Â
RR: Oh, wow. I'm a loser, baby. That makes so much more sense. I feel so much better now.

Raisin Rodriguez: That's how I felt. Now if only I could figure out what Coldplay means when they sing, “For you I peed myself dry,” I'd be in really good shape. I mean, how do you pee yourself dry?

Well . . . Rome wasn't built in a day, I guess.

Â
Still, no matter how much wisdom I gain, no matter how womanly I become, no matter how many cryptic song lyrics I decipher, my mother is a mystery to me. Why does she continue to treat me like the child I was this morning? She was on my case the second I stepped foot in the door today. Maybe she hasn't realized that the morning has already passed. And like I said, it really was a great day up until then.

When I last left you, CJ and I were supposed to have pizza with Lynn and Jeremy after school. But Jeremy had one of his CoolerThanYou situations and had to stay late to deal with it. I'm not sure he's cut out to be guest editor. He's had more emergencies in the last month than Lynn had as editor in the rest of the year combined.

Who's ever heard of an editorial emergency anyway? Did someone misplace a modifier? Dangle a participle? He needs to be reminded that
CoolerThanYou is
a seventh-grade zine. Not a trauma unit.

I should be more forgiving. He probably can't help it. It must be all the freckles. They've got to be clouding his judgment.

In any case, CJ and I were on our own, so instead of pizza, he just walked me home. Which was good because I got to be alone with him and his cinnamon-scented goodness. Not to mention his long eyelashy handsomeness. His scary-smart scary-smartness. And his violin-playing-cartoon-drawing-non-talkative-weird-but-in-a-cute-way wayness. Which meant we could make out a lot more than if JereLynn had been sitting across the table from us. I'm not even sure how to go about it while people are eating. I mean, what's the etiquette?

. . . Especially when there's cheese involved.

Â
Forty-five glorious minutes later I walked into the house and right away my mom was like, “Raisin Ramona Rodriguez, how many more times do I need to remind you to call your father about your Berkeley trip?”

“One more?” I answered as I climbed up the stairs to my room.

“RRRRRRRRRRRRAY-ZIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIN,” she said, stomping up behind me. “I don't appreciate your jokes, young lady. Now please don't make me have to ask you again.”

Jokes? Who said anything about jokes? And right then and there, I had what my father would call “a moment of clarity.” I realized exactly what the problem is between me and my mother. It's so obvious, I can't believe it took me this long to realize it. The problem is her. Or more specifically, her sense of humor. She doesn't have one. If she did, she never would have thought I was joking. She would have known that to be a joke, there would need to be something about a rabbi and a priest. Or people screwing in a lightbulb.

All I said was “One more.” Which was not at all a joke, but exactly what I meant. I can safely say, in all sincerity, that the next time she reminded me to make that call, I'd probably have gotten right on it. It's just that particular moment wasn't an especially good time for me. At that particular moment, calling my father completely interfered with my immediate plans to stare off into space and relive my afternoon with CJ over and over until it was finally time for us to talk on the phone.

Comments:

Logged in at 6:55 PM, EST

kweenclaudia: if i didn't know better, i might think you weren't excited to see us.

Logged in at 6:57 PM, EST

PiaBallerina: Raisin? Is it true? Have you lost interest in coming to see us?

Â
7:06 PM, EST

You guys . . . I'm so sorry. I didn't mean that at all. It's not that I'm not looking forward to seeing you guys. In fact, as you, my most devoted readers of
TwoScoopsofRaisin.com
know, I've been thinking about little else since I moved here. You know I love you guys more than anything.

It's just that I've been waiting so long to hook up with CJ and now that I finally have, I'm not so psyched about having to leave him so soon. What if he stops liking me while I'm gone? I know they say “absence makes the heart grow fonder,” but they also say “out of sight, out of mind.” It's all very confusing. Whoever “they” are (I suspect it's Paris Hilton and her family, but I still don't have all the facts) really ought to make up “their” minds because it looks like I'm leaving in ten days and I'd like to know what to expect when I return.

In the meantime, I think I'll call Lynn and see whether she knows which is really the truth.

Other books

NightFall by Roger Hayden

A Corpse in the Soup by Morgan St. James and Phyllice Bradner

Chain of Command by Helenkay Dimon

The Memory Garden by Mary Rickert

Love Gone Wild: A Contemporary Romantic Comedy by Michele Bardsley

A Dance of Chaos: Book 6 of Shadowdance by David Dalglish

The Wolfman by Jonathan Maberry

Cricket in a Fist by Naomi K. Lewis

Alice by Judith Hermann

Blood Oath (#3, Mystic Wolves) by Belinda Boring