True story: when we watch Fringe, I spend most of the time talking about how dreamy Joshua Jackson is.

When I was a tween, one of my most serious hobbies was collecting BOP and Tiger Beat magazines. My friends and I would go to the drug store and sit in the magazine aisle, leaf through these bubblegum rags, and agonize over our purchases. My weekly allowance would only support my habit up to a point, so I had to be careful if I wanted to get my money’s worth. Sometimes the magazines had only so-so heartthrobs on the cover, but if there was a magazine with a full-size pullout poster of Jonathan Taylor Thomas (JTT!!!), well, obviously that was money well spent.

Some of my friends were already starting to go on dates around this time, even though most of us hadn’t even started our periods. I was shy and socially awkward around most people, and even more so around boys. I had no interest in them and didn’t anticipate ever wanting to have anything to do with them. I mean...I had books, I had my friends, I had my bike, honestly, what else did I need?

Maybe I wasn’t maturing as quickly as my friends, I don’t know, but I didn’t see the appeal of dating. Frankly, what little dating information I’d been able to gather (mostly from old episodes of Saved by the Bell) terrified me. My friends and I often discussed the perfect age to start dating. Most of my friends insisted that, at 12, we were the perfect age to date all we wanted, and you wouldn’t believe the heavy silence that fell when I suggested that maybe 18 was a better age.

I had no real interest in any of the boys in my life but was obsessed with collecting glossy pictures of my favorite teen actors. My room was plastered with the posters and pages I’d torn from teen magazines. I taped them on my bedroom walls like wallpaper. I lived in my head and my head was full of these Hollywood pretty boys. It was easier to pretend that if I should ever meet one of these actors, they’d fall deeply in love with me, and I’d never need to go through the painful dating process. I weaved intricate fantasies around these meetings, based on information gleaned from all the generic magazine articles I’d read about them. JTT liked ice cream. I liked ice cream! Joshua Jackson liked animals! I LOVED animals! Andrew Keegan liked to hike and, well, I liked to walk? Oh the fun we’d have, JTT, Andrew, Josh (yeah, I call him Josh) and I, eating our double-decker ice cream cones while we hiked through the woods and tried to catch wild animals WITH OUR BARE HANDS.

Obviously, these fantasies never became reality, and I (sort of) overcame my fear of boys and dipped my toe into the dating scene. I still spend most of my time in my head, but I eventually outgrew these magazine heartthrobs. Although, if I didn't think Joe would mind, I might still plaster the walls of our house with pictures of Joshua Jackson.

PACEY 4EVA!!1!!11!

This place is a tomb. I'm going to the nut shop where it's fun.

When I was a kid, I read all the time. Like, ALL THE TIME. A few months ago, my mom was telling me a story about how she was in a waiting room, quite obviously deeply involved with her book (dirty), and someone wouldn't stop trying to have a conversation with her. I was all, "MOM. You used to do that to me all the time!" and she was like, "Well, JENNIE, if I didn't talk to you while you were reading, I'D NEVER HAVE GOTTEN TO TALK TO YOU," because that's how much I read, you guys. TRUTH.

Anyway, I also had this problem in that I thought everything I read was true. I mean, I think I knew that I couldn't really travel to Narnia through a wardrobe and that Ramona Quimby (age 8) was not actually a real person. It was more like I wanted the real world to be more like books, all the time. I wanted to write to Mr. Henshaw and I wanted to run around with Maniac McGee and I dearly, dearly wanted to go to Wayside School, even though it was falling down.

Mostly, though, I wanted to be in The Baby-sitters Club. I went back and forth between which character I wanted to be. Sometimes it was Claudia, with her "keen" fashion sense, but I didn't want to have her mean sister. I did try that thing she did, where she hid food all over her room so she could have fun snacks any time she wanted, but it turns out if you do that in real life, your parents catch you and get mad at you because when they asked you where all the snacks were going, you told them your sister was probably eating them and that, my friends, is called lying and I guess parents don't really like lying or something. But I digress.

Sometimes I wanted to be Mary Anne, but I was already desperately shy and bookish, so that was no good. And sometimes I wanted to be Stacey, but not really because man, she was a Grade-A beeyotch if there ever was one, right? Mostly, I wanted to be Dawn, but only because of her beautiful, long hair and the fact that she lived in a house with SECRET PASSAGEWAYS. I knew our house wasn't anywhere near as old as Dawn's house, but that didn't stop me from searching for secret tunnels in the basement.

But the Club sounded fun, no matter which member you were. Probably because there was absolutely no adult supervision and parents had no problem sending ALL the neighborhood kids off on adventures with 13-year-olds, like remember that one time they all got shipwrecked on an island? I mean, they weren't there long enough for it to get all Lord of the Flies, but still...who sends their kid off on a boat with a 13-YEAR-OLD?!

Unfortunately, I didn't have a boat, but I still thought I'd be a good member. Screw that Red Cross Baby-sitting class I took, I learned way more from The Baby-sitters Club. True story. OK, not really, but they did have those super awesome Kid Kits, full of all sorts of fun stuff to keep little ones occupied. I COVETED those Kid Kits, which I know is a sin or something but there are worse sins so just be glad I'm not out there murdering people or building shrines to the Flying Spaghetti Monster or whatever.

I still sometimes wish that real life was more like books. Less work, more play. Adventures that last pages and pages. Kid Kits. But last night, as I was getting my bag ready for volunteering, I rummaged through some of the stuff I'd collected for it. Stickers. Markers. Play-Doh. Bubbles. And wouldn't you know it? It turns out I'd made my very own Kid Kit, albeit about 15 years late. Maybe this real life thing isn't so bad after all.

I don't know how this turned into a therapy session about my elementary teachers. These things just happen.

Work is devouring me whole. It feels funny. I don't like it. I worked all day Saturday, which everyone knows is meant for sleeping in and lounging around in your pajamas watching America's Next Top Model marathons. Geez. And I've actually been working really hard during the weekdays, too, even DURING LUNCH, which everyone knows is meant for surfing the Internets while you eat your PB&J. I don't have PB&J sandwiches every day, though, because that wouldn't be healthy. Otherwise, I'd totally do it. I'm all about being healthy. Which is why Heidi and I are going to play a VP debate drinking game on Thursday. If you never hear from me again, it's because she-who-shall-not-be-named killed me with The Stupid.

Aaaaanywho. In college, sometimes I'd have PB&J for lunch, and also some potato chips and a glass of milk, and Nancy would make fun of me because I was having a kindergarten lunch but WHATEVER. Obviously kindergartners know what they're doing. Once in kindergarten I squirted glue at this girl because she was annoying the shit out of me. I got in trouble and wasn't allowed to make a Mother's Day card. This other kid spilled glue all over his chair ON PURPOSE and sat in it (moron) but he didn't get in trouble. I sort of just realized it, but I think my kindergarten teacher was a bitch.

I don't remember much about my first grade teacher, except that once we had to draw pictures of our families and this led to her calling my parents and telling them I might be retarded. Why do I say retarded? It's so not a good thing to say, but I say it all the time. I'm sorry. Anyway, it was because I drew this picture of my dad and I drew this big, giant bald head with giant eyes (glasses?) and apparently the picture was an indication that I might be special. Then my parents came in for parent-teacher conferences and she saw that that's what my dad really looked like. Also, her name was Mrs. Wetzel, and she'd be like "Wetzel like PRETZEL," which . . . duh.

My second grade teacher made us keep a journal every day. This is where I came up with Figment. And I think this was the year I dressed up like Dorothy and my dad made me my own pair of ruby slippers and I never ever wanted to take them off.

I had Mr. Counts for third grade and I'm pretty sure he was gay. I didn't know at the time, of course, because I didn't know what gay was. I got into an argument with him once about whether men or women were stronger and I was all, "CLEARLY women are stronger because they have to have BABIES and I don't know much about BABIES because I'm only in 3rd grade, but whenever women are having them on TV, they scream a lot THEREFORE they must be strong to deal with all the pain."

My fourth grade teacher's name was Mrs. Castrejon, pronounced "Castra-HONE" but my dad was always like, "How is Mrs. Castra-John," and then I'd get all huffy and pissed. She used to put us in spelling test groups, and if your group won, you got to go out to dinner with her and her husband. When my group won, we went to The Ground Round, where they served vanilla ice cream in tiny, plastic baseball caps and it was AWESOME. OH MY GOD ALSO! She used to let us write stories and she had this whole room devoted to making actual BOOKS to write our stories in.

In fifth grade, I had my favorite teacher EVER. Mrs. Wolfe. She was awesome. After lunch and recess, she'd read to us and sometimes, if the book was sad (Bridge to Terabithia, what?), she'd have to have a box of tissues sitting next to her. This was the year of a presidential election and our class was on the news because of that whole Kids Vote thing, and also because George Bush (the first) was coming to Dayton and we were going to the rally. Only three kids were allowed to talk on the news broadcast, one for each candidate. I really wanted to be one of those kids, so when Bill Clinton was claimed by someone else (I think I've always been a Democrat), I was all, "yeah, Ross Perot would be awesome," just so I could get on TV.

My sixth grade teacher went to my church (back when I, you know, went to church), which I thought was totally awkward. We had to make castles for a project once, and my dad helped me make this castle out of Popsicle sticks that HAD A WORKING DRAWBRIDGE. It was the best thing I've ever made and Mrs. Morgan must have thought so, too, because she totally kept it and never gave it back. Rude.