Dear Dumb Diary Year Two #1: School. Hasn't This Gone on Long Enough?
Page 1
School. hasn't this
gone on long enough?
Think you can handle
Jamie Kelly’s FIrst year of diaries?
#1 Let’s pretend this never happened
#2 My pants are haunted!
#3 Am I the Princess or the Frog?
#4 never do anything, ever
#5 can adults become human?
#6 the problem with here is that it's where i'm from
#7 Never Underestimate your dumbness
#8 It’s Not My Fault I Know Everything
#9 That’s What Friends Aren't For
#10 The worst things in life are also free
#11 Okay, So Maybe I Do Have Superpowers
#12 Me! (Just Like You, Only Better)
And don’t miss . . .
Year Two #2: The Super-nice are Super-annoying
School. hasn't this
gone on long enough?
BY JAMIE KELLY
SCHOLASTIC INC.
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Sydney Mexico City New Delhi Hong Kong
Jim Benton’s Tales from Mackerel Middle School
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright
Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted,
downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into
any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means,
whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without
the express written permission of the publisher. For information regarding
permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 557
Broadway, New York, NY 10012.
e-ISBN: 978-0-545-45617-3
Copyright © 2012 by Jim Benton
All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc.
scholastic and associated logos are trademarks
and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.
dear dumb diary is a registered trademark of Jim Benton.
First printing, January 2012
Tell your teacher that you should get
extra credit for reading this book.
Special thanks and an A+ to Kristen LeClerc
and the team at Scholastic: Steve Scott,
Jackie Hornberger, Anna Bloom, and
Shannon Penney. Glad you’ve all
gotten another year dumber, too.
School. Hasn’t This
Gone On Long Enough?
Dear Whoever Is Reading My Dumb Diary,
If you’re smart, you’ll stop reading it
right now.
Seriously, just think this through. You’re
probably imagining that I’ll never know,
but believe me, you’ll say something or do
something, and that little clue will be all
it takes.
And you want to know
why that’s all it
takes?
Because I’m another year older, and another
year wiser. I’ve been at this whole diary thing
since I was just a little kid. Nothing gets past
me anymore.
And I’m smart.
Really smart. I’m smart like
one of those geniuses you see in a movie where
they can’t figure something out so they go to
her and she’s got this beautiful head of
not-
blond hair
and they ask her to solve the
big problem that is facing the world.
And she’s all like, “Yeah, I have the solution,
and it will save the day, and I want you all to
notice how I’m not using the math I learned in
school to solve it.”
AND THE WORLD IS SAVED, and to
show their appreciation, the citizens of the world
make math illegal and eventually everybody
is going on and on about how they’ve always
secretly hated math and they’re glad it’s gone.
I’m smart like she is.
Signed,
P.S. I know you should never call people
stupid or morons or idiots. But I didn’t call
anybody those names. I
WROTE them here
in my diary — my private, private diary that I
KNOW my parents would never snoop through.
They understand that I really trust them to
respect my privacy, and I understand they would
probably really hate to lose that special,
intelligent, mature trust that we share.
P.P.S. I know that friends of mine (and friend-
like people, also) wouldn’t read my diary.
Not
because they don’t want to lose trust, but more
because they don’t want to lose consciousness.
Sunday 01
Dear Dumb Diary,
Mark has 100 grapefruits. If his friend Sean
takes 10 and his brother Brad takes 4, how many
grapefruits will Mark have left?
This is a problem they asked me to solve one
time in math.
The solution was obvious: Mark is irrationally
hoarding grapefruits and it’s not helping that the
people closest to him are stealing them.
They told me I was wrong, but I really believe
I nailed it, and they just couldn’t accept the fact
that making Mark face his grapefruit problem was
the solution.
Although it’s really Math himself that needs
to address things.
I, for one, believe that somebody needs to sit
Math down in a chair and say, “Math, it’s time that
you stopped creating issues like this for yourself.
If you won’t, we think you should start solving your
own problems, and not come crying to us
whenever you want to know the solution to some
imaginary drama that you’ve cooked up.
“Also, Math, you make us do really ugly,
contorted faces while we’re working on you, and
that’s just unfair.”
And here’s a surprise: I’m not doing great in
math class.
It’s not because I’m stupid, because I’m
NOT. Ask anybody. They’ll tell you I’m not stupid.
(Actually, there is a custodian with an eye
patch who might tell you that I am, but I was just a
third grader at the time and lots of third graders
get talked into playing indoor golf by their best
friends.)
A moment of nostalgia: For many people, it’s
very hard to mention the word “stupid” without
thinking of one of your very dearest friends.
In my case, that friend is Emmily.
You remember how Emmily’s dad got a really
great job offer and they had to move, right? Just
like that, Emmily stumbled into our lives, and then
just like that, she stumbled back out again. (And
also, while in it, she mostly stumbled.)
I still miss her every single time I see
somebody push on a door marked “pull,” or bite
their own finger while eating, or ask something like,
“If vampires can’t be seen in mirrors, h
ow do they
know if their jeans make them look fat?”
Monday 02
Dear Dumb Diary,
Math today.
Mr. Henzy, my math teacher, still seems
interested in teaching me math in spite of a great
deal of evidence that it can’t be done. It’s kind of
cute in a way, like watching a baby try to reach
something just outside his crib. A big, mean,
boring baby.
See, he gives me math problems, but I know
that deep down, I’m his math problem. It probably
looks like this:
Jamie + number junk = Mathematician
Sure, this problem looks simple, but it isn’t
working out for him, so he gives me bad grades and
sent a note home to my parents, who let me know
over dinner that they were not happy about it.
They’ve given me until the end of the quarter, in
about four weeks, to improve my grades or else.
They have no idea what the “or else” is, of
course, or they would say what it was instead
of “or else.”
Like always, “or else” just means “something
we haven’t thought of yet but you won’t like it one
little bit.” But whatever you do, don’t ask what it is.
Like I heard about this guy who had this
cousin that knew this kid that went to the same
school as this one girl, and her parents knew these
other parents who were upset with their daughter
because of something she did at school or a
hospital or at the orthodontist or something, and
they used the old “or else” on her and she made the
mistake of asking them, “OR ELSE WHAT?”
Sometimes parents freak out when you
demand to know what “OR ELSE” means, and
that’s what these parents did. The next thing this
girl knew, she was waking up in the woods
surrounded by seven dwarves. True story.
I think that’s what happened, I don’t know.
I might be mixing up two different stories here.
Anyway, nothing against dwarves, but it was
probably pretty confusing to wake up surrounded by
seven of them in the woods.
I’m wondering if four or three would be any
better.
That’s why I immediately called Isabella
because, along with most other things, she is a
well-known expert on getting notes sent
home from teachers.
Isabella’s parents have received all of the
Five Known Types of Letters Home:
• Your child is having trouble getting to class
on time.
• Your child is having trouble completing
homework.
• Your child is having trouble on tests.
• Your child is having trouble behaving.
• Your child is trouble.
Isabella’s first impulse was that I should tell
my parents that the teacher had sent the note home
accidentally, and that it was meant for another
girl named Jamie in my class, and that the other
Jamie was probably having a pretty good laugh at
all of our expenses right now. She said to tell my
parents that nobody would blame them if they
simply refused to ever read another note from this
teacher again or take his calls, seeing as how he
can’t even keep his students’ names straight.
I had to admit, for something right off the
top of her head, that wasn’t too bad. But I told her
that I didn’t think lying was a good idea, and she
agreed — unless you’re certain you can’t get
caught, of course, and then it’s a great idea.
Isabella is very giving, so she had a couple
other creative ideas for me, but I had to pass on
those as well.
Then Isabella started asking me all about my
grades, which was peculiar, because my friends and
I don’t typically discuss grades.
This is probably because if your grades are
too good, people will call you a teacher’s pet. If
they’re too bad, they’ll call you an imbecile. And
if they’re too average, they’ll call you some other
thing — I don’t know what, but believe me, this is
middle school. I’m certain that we have come up
with some kind of mean name for a person with
averageish grades. Meanness is what we do here,
folks. It’s best to just try not to get called anything.
Middle school has contributed many words to
the English language, and in particular, those which
promote the Science of Meanness. Please
enjoy this small sampling.
Tuesday 03
Dear Dumb Diary,
Those healthy brown cereals that are
manufactured to improve old people’s intestines
are the worst way to start your day.
A lecture about your grades from your
parents is probably second.
When Dad brought it up this morning, I
pointed out that I’m doing well in all of my
classes except math.
And Dad was all like, “You have to do well in
all of your classes.”
And I was all like, “Who really needs to be
good at math, anyway?”
And Dad was all like, “I do. I’m an accountant.
It’s my job. It’s how the bills get paid around here.”
And I was all like, “Dad. If everybody was
good at math like you, they wouldn’t have had to
hire you. Face it, the less people everywhere know
about math, the better off our family is.”
And Dad’s mouth snapped shut like a big old
math textbook. He looked helplessly at Mom.
Yeah, that’s what I thought, Math Guy.
Mom chimed in and said that I needed to
start thinking about growing up, and that includes
thinking about things like the good grades I’ll need
to get into college.
I asked her why I even needed to go to
college. It’s not like I want to be a doctor or a
lawyer or anything. Even foot doctors probably
don’t have to go to college for more than a month
or two, since they only doctor one small part of
people and it doesn’t even have guts in it.
She stared me down. “You might not even
know what you want to be yet. Besides, one day
you’re just going to want to be able to tell people
that you went to college. I love telling people that I
went to college,” Mom squawked.
“You could tell them that even if you hadn’t
gone,” I said. “You could tell them anything. Tell
them you’re an orthodontist ballerina
astronaut if you want to.”
Then Mom’s mouth snapped shut and she
looked helplessly at Dad.
“She gets this kind of stuff from Isabella,”
he said.
You risk a lot when you beat your parents at
an argument. Parents have ways to win, even when
they lose.
Wednesday 04
Dear Dumb Diary,
Mrs. Avon is my language arts teacher this
year, and she’s one of those people with really
huge pink gums, so when she flashes her giant smile
at
you, she looks like a bowl of that strawberry/
vanilla/chocolate ice cream after the chocolate ice
cream has already been eaten. It’s not unpleasant
in any way, but you really can’t help but notice.
And stare.
In spite of all of that extra gum, she’s a great
teacher and it’s amazing how much different I feel
in her class than I do in math.
In her class, I’m a star. I like to read, I like
to write, and I’m even willing to sit patiently
through her lessons about things like pronouns. I
have to admit, pronouns were actually a pretty
good invention, so that instead of always saying,
“I saw King Alphonse Luigi Bartholomew VanFart
the Third,” we can just use a pronoun and say, “I
saw him.” This saves time, and lets King Alphonse
Luigi Bartholomew VanFart the Third (and the other
VanFarts) know that we are SO not impressed.
And here’s the thing about that: Why is it that
people think it’s so classy to add “the Third” or “the
Fourth” to the end of their names?
Like, Henry the Eighth. EIGHTH? That just
makes me think that something isn’t exactly
working out with the Henrys.
The people in England were all like, “We’ve
actually gone through SEVEN of these things and
we haven’t liked any of them. We’re up to eight
Henrys now. We wanted to try a Tony or a Justin,
but all they had were Henrys. Ugh.”
And besides, you numberers, the rest of us
could all add “the First” to the end of our names if
we felt like it.
Although there are much better adjectives to
choose from.
Back to Mrs. Avon. I hardly even have to pay
attention in her class and my grades are really
good. More than anything, I believe this proves that
there is something terribly wrong with Math.
Math should be that way as well.
At first, like everybody, I was all right with