I’m gonna be honest with you. I just got back from a bar, I have a pretty decent buzz that just kicked in, I have to be up in less than four hours, I still haven’t written this post. A slightly longer version of the story is my friend and I ran into people from our graduating class in high school that we never talked to ever at the bar and they were like “Hey! You were smart kids!” and bought us drinks and I am not one to turn down such courteousness and/or drunken stupidity (on a mildly related note, thank you, Cody), and now I’m looking at this chapter, thinking about how I have to write about it, regretting my life decisions that resulted in me co-running a blog about reading terrible books, and, you know what, we all gotta deal, man
This ought to be an interesting post, is what I’m saying.
Chapter Twenty-Four
So the last time we saw Ana and Christian Grey, Christian Grey literally pulled a tampon out of Ana and then had sex with her, effectively ruining any notion I had of possibly having sex in the future, and that is where we left our heroes. That is a bad place to leave our heroes. Worse, this is a bad place to rejoin our heroes, because one might expect that it could really only improve from here, but those of us who are more jaded (and have had to read this book so as to make fun of it on the internet cough cough cough coughhhhhhhh) might expect that UGHHHH I don’t even care anymore.
For example, Ana has a sex dream sort of?
Christian stands in a steel-barred cage.
Well that’s not so abnormal for Fifty Shades of Grey. It’s a BDSM novel with relatively little BDSM in it.
He ambles with athletic grace to the front of the cage.
Who the fuck ambles?
I try to move toward him, but I’m tethered, held back by some unseen force
Is this A) symbolism, B) symbolism, C) symbolism, or D) pineapples. THE CHOICE IS YOURS. I AM SO TIRED.
Okay. Moving on. Ana is woken up by Christian.
“I want to chase the dawn with you.” […]
“I thought you wanted sex,” I grumble.
“Anastasia, I always want sex with you. It’s heartwarming to know that you feel the same,”
These people need to look up the definition of “heartwarming”, because, uh, they don’t really have it down so well.
“What time is it?”
“Five thirty in the morning.”
“Feels like three a.m.”
Because these are so fucking different.
Freud would have a field day – and then he’d probably die trying to deal with Fifty Shades.
Nah, Ariel and I have been able to psychoanalyze Christian Grey pretty accurately from an outsider’s perspective over the past few weeks, so Freud’s probably good. He’d probably die from all the coke, though. I’m so tired.
Ana teases Christian a bit by saying she’s too tired but maybe some spanking would wake her up but HAHA not really. Then Christian’s eyes do things. Cool. They leave, get in his car, and put on some fuckin’ bitching tunes, yo!
“Do you want to choose some music? This is on my iPod.” Christian has that secret smile again.
I can’t see his iPod anywhere. He taps the screen on the console between us, and behold – there is a playlist.
And lo, I bequeath unto thee, my child, a playlist.
“Maybe it’s too early for this: Britney’s at her most sultry.”
Oh, fuck, a novel where a scene with Britney Spears’s “Toxic” is the catalyst for actual dialogue threatens to enter the pseudo-canon. WHY IS THIS OUR CULTURE? But nevermind my own pretentious liberal arts degree level of freakout, Christian Grey himself has a bad reaction to this!
He turns the music down a little more, and inside I am hugging myself. My inner goddess is standing on the podium awaiting her gold metal. He turned the music down. Victory!
How the hell is choosing a song that the person you played it for that you’re completely in love with had to turn down the volume a victory? No, really, I am not sure how someone wrote that sentence and thought, “Yep. Sounds right to me.” But then, as Christian and Ana are driving to Christian’s secret place in a car, we learn a bit more about Christian and his exes, in that he ended things with some of them because they “wanted more”, and gasp this is a real plot twist, guys! After grilling her boyfriend on his exes, Ana decides to ask Christian Grey about having kids, because apparently she’s just trying to ask every awkward and inappropriate question she could possibly ask a significant other while in lengthy car ride.
“Because I don’t want you to get pregnant.”
“Neither do I! Well, not for a few years yet.”
Now, honestly, this is an okay exchange. I could see this. Someone who knows they’re too young to have kids, but wants kids at some point in their life, mentions this in a way they assume is casually. And the other person kind of just ignores it because it’s out of the blue, weird, and inappropriate based on their relationship at that moment in time. Except Ana doesn’t stop before it gets worse.
“And the others?” I press.
He glances at me briefly and just shakes his head.
“Just didn’t work out.”
Whoa, bucketload of information to process.
Ok, I wrote that bit from the book word-for-word, and, um, can anybody see the “bucketload” of “information” in it? Because it looks like there is actually no information in here, but, whatever, I AM TIRED I JUST WANT TO SLEEP.
Anyway, they go gliding because that was surprise, and, being the brilliant “show don’t tell” narrator that she is, here are Anastasia Steele’s thoughts on gliding:
Holy fuck – it’s exciting.
This is actually a point I’d really like to make about how Fifty Shades of Grey isn’t a terrible book because of its plot, but because the writer has NO IDEA how to write. Seriously. Ana goes on an incredible, unique experience, and her first coherent analytical thought is “holy fuck – it’s exciting.” Seriously? All you can muster about this experience is a catch-all umbrella bit of profanity and the most banal adjective used to describe things that are literally anything but super boring? Fucking carbon atoms can do better. They react to all kinds of shit; Ana can’t even go goddamn gliding without having a deeper thought than “holy fuck”. Okay, maybe I could have come up with a better analogy, but I’m taking organic chemistry this summer. Also, I’m so tired.
Christian and Ana go gliding (I need to be up in three hours WHEN IS THIS OVER), go to IHOP (wait what), Ana wants to have sex in IHOP (wait whattttttttt), and Christian says something offensive!
“Can I treat you?” I ask Christian.
“Treat me how?”
“Pay for this meal.”
Christian snorts. […] “Are you trying to completely emasculate me?”
Okay, now I’m gonna break this down a little bit. Whenever I’ve taken a girl out on a date, I like to pay for it. This is because I feel like if I ask someone out, want to spend time with them alone in the context of “I want to spend time with you alone because I like you a lot”, then, yeah, I want to make good on my “let me treat you to this because I like you a lot and want to do something nice for you because I want to do something nice for you and yeah that’s pretty much it” deal, although the opposite seems to be the case in this book, where the romantic interest instead seems to think it’s because it’s a “hahaha, I have a penis” sort of thing because it is apparently 1870 in the year of our Lord. Have I mentioned how much I hate Christian Grey and this book and my life WHOA THAT GOT DARK let us backtrack a bit I hate Fifty Shades of Grey hahahaha that was almost as awkward as how Christian Grey wanted to pay for a meal at IHOP because otherwise his penis would maybe fall off maybe.
Okay, what else happens in this chapter? Ana tells her mom what she and Christian were up to, and Ana’s mom responds with “Gliding? As in a small plane with no engine?” because as if we didn’t just read ten pages where this was literally all that happened, and then Christian can’t make dinner because of a “situation”, but they also email each other about how Ana said something in her sleep and Christian’s all “I want to hear you say it when you’re conscious” and Ana’s all “OMG WHAT DID I SAY IN MY SLEEP OMG” and, guys, I really want it to have been something incredibly surreal with no relation to the plot at all. I mean, apparently one time I woke up the person I was sleeping with to tell them the plot of an episode of Doug and went right back to sleep. I’m not saying this makes any sense, but apparently it happened, and basically what I am saying is the big reveal about what Ana said to Christian in her sleep had better be the plot of an episode of Thomas the Tank Engine or something.
As always your dedication to BBGTs is appreciated.
I agree!
Thank you, everybody 🙂
I’m reading Twilight again in an attempt to figure out what the hell I liked so much about it when I first read it years ago. (I was probably just stupider then.) We’ll have to see if Bella had a more inspired reaction to her nearly identical flying scene with Edward. If she said “Holy crow–it’s exciting” I will never stop laughing.
I almost wish I had an inner goddess like Ana’s. It must be nice to get a gold medal because your significant other turned down the music (did she ask him to? that would have been even better). My SO makes me tea in the morning..imagine what ana’s inner goddess would do for that!
Also-I feel like Britney Sprears is slightly more emasculating than not paying for a meal.
Also 2-just got back from a week long vacation and catching up on this blog is the best part.
she must have all kinds of gold medals. she probably doesn’t even know what to do with them anymore.
we’re very flattered! hearing that people will actually catch up on this blog when they fall behind is wonderful to hear =)
I actually have a sibling and a father who both sleep walk and talk in their sleep. Never has my father said anything remotely romantic to my mother during one of these episodes. (In fact one time he screamed at her to “stop rocking the boat!” and “Ants! Ants everywhere!”)
My sister is married and her husband can confidently say he has never heard anything romantic either. But we have a whole bunch of funny stories to tell. I once caught my sister fidgeting with a toothbrush that she was trying to “replace the batteries” of. Woke up the next morning wondering why she was cradling a toothbrush. I’ve had her interrupt a phone conversation of mine with “OBAMA CAN!” …when I was talking about brainstorming graphs. And she told me once to get my cousin “off the circular lawnmower”. But in her defense, there was a lawnmower race going on outside our dorm window that morning. Eh, college life.
All of these stories are fantastic! A good friend of mine sleepwalks. One time we were hanging out and she found a lightbulb in her purse.
Anyway, ANTS! ANTS EVERYWHERE!
Not really related to the book discussion, but redox reactions suck to memorize, and are *worse* if you have to balance them (electrons are a pain, okay?)
Also, Freud would definitely die of a cocaine OD analyzing them, but I’m pretty sure the book he writes about the results would be a posthumous bestseller.
Ok, he turned the music down because, A.) Britney Spears’s “Toxic” sucks, and B.) it’s entirely too nerve-jarring at 5:30 in the morning, and for this Ana thinks she has some kind of victory? Come ON! This is NOT a love relationship, it’s a freaking power-struggle!
And I think she is mixing up her schizophrenic personalities here, because hasn’t her Inner Goddess been the one jumping and down like a kid about to get ice cream, dancing in a red hula skirt (Why a hula skirt? and why a RED one, specifically?), and smacking her lips with pleasure any time something creepy starts to happen between Ana and Grey? Isn’t it her Subconscious who has been so disapproving of the relationship (a very loosely used term, that) and been so self-satisfied any time Ana manages to annoy Grey and get the upper hand with him? And if she is SO in love with him and wants to get to know him on a deeper level, why the FUCK is she playing these mind games with him? Look, you ditzy little cheesecake, either sign the contract and give it a go for 3-months to see if you can make yourself mean more to him, or tear the damn thing up and go. Really. As we say here in the South, get off the cross, honey; somebody else needs the wood. In other words, make up your damn mind. He’s already demonstrated that defying him isn’t going to make him go all soft and squishy inside and spill his deepest, darkest secrets. If you do think you can get them by giving in and submitting, then tell him, “Buh-BYE!”
Really? Her finally being able to afford to pay for a meal (because it’s IHOP, for Christ’s sake, not 700 Drayton Restaurant at the freaking Mansion on Forsyth) would “completely” emasculate him? Look, I get it that Doms like to be in charge, and it’s a big part of their ego that they need to prove they can protect, provide for, and nurture their subs (notice that LAST word, Grey??), so he would prefer to pay for things because he can and it’s easy for him and he wants to show that he will take care of her. But seriously, it’s ONE MEAL, and at most it will cost her $25 for the 2 of them together. “Completely” emasculate him? Really? “Completely?” Does ELJ actually OWN a dictionary, I wonder?