The Sci-Fi Channel was still showing monsters and spacemen, the History Channel was mulling over World War II, Sally Jesse Raphæl was giving punk rockers makeovers to smooth things out with the parents.

I


  was checking my email this morning, going through some stuff I'd actually downloaded last night. In the online journal mailing list to which I subscribe there was the recurring subject line "death of a princess." I'd been deliberately skipping over these messages, since they reeked of LOTHesque banality. But slowly it occurred to me that more was going on than simply a discussion of where to get the best animated GIF of a nubile pre-Raphælite maiden. Reading a few messages, I realized they were about Princess Diana, who, despite being known only for the guy she once slept with, is certainly the most famous woman alive today. Well, I guess not. She had evidently died. There was no indication of how, but it clearly was a surprise. She wasn't exactly on her death bed, you know.

Excited, yes, giddy with a sense of immersion in history, and giggling for lack of a more appropriate emotional display, I switched on the teevee and drilled through the channels. For such a major news event, the world seemed to be shockingly uninterested. The Sci-Fi Channel was still showing monsters and spacemen, the History Channel was mulling over World War II, Sally Jesse Raphæl was giving punk rockers makeovers to smooth things out with the parents. Impatiently, I cursed them all for their indifference to the princess. After surfing through a number of news shows that inexplicably failed to clue me in on precisely what had happened, I finally found the news I was looking for. It seems the princess was riding with her new playboy lover through Paris in his Mercedes, supposedly trying to escape some picture-snapping members of the tabloid press, when the car veered out of control and slammed directly into a pillar. Of the four in the car, only one of them, a commoner, a body guard, survived. God works in mysterious ways.

On reflection, this surreal turn of events, which would be implausible in fiction, seems to sum up and condemn our media culture in one garrish display. It's a classic manifestation of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, which tells us the more you observe something, the more you affect its behaviour. I see this sort of thing all the time with this journal. In the case of the Princess, the observers stepped on the butterfly they'd come to photograph. It's like John James Audubon making paintings of birds with broken necks. It's sick, it's disturbing, it ruins people's lives, but it feeds a need. There are so many working 9 to 5 without any hope of being famous or achieving anything, and they demand to look in on the "perfect" world of royalty that their labours make possible, a world where talent means nothing next to bloodline and sleepline.

It goes without saying that this is a tragic conclusion to an evidently doomed fairy tale, and it gives me the numb feeling I felt when watching Natural Born Killers. I thought the final scenes of that movie were the most preposterous ones, but having lived to see this, I guess not.

Matthew Hart and the Brazilian Girls had gone off to feed a friend's dog, and by the time they'd returned, they'd heard all about Di's dying. The Brazilian Girls, in a predictable effort to be shocking, had of course said that the death was a good thing. The demise of such an abstract and respected person could only really be cause for celebration for people so cheerfully morbid. Still, Matthew was measureably dismayed by their reaction. But this is not to say he didn't find humour in the somber news. He joked throughout the day about how the lives of AIDS patients, the poor, and the starving had just become a bit harder.

We wondered what our British friend Rory would think.

M


atthew on a Sunday morning can be just a little too intense. While I'm rubbing my head coping with a hangover, he's usually pacing the floor and proposing various adventures. Today, he was divided between going tubing down the James or hopping on a freight train and riding to Waynesboro. I'm sure he would have considered other adventures, but no one could think of anything else. The plan to go tubing had been spawned several days ago when Rory suggested that Dave Matthews' girlfriend (whom he knows) might want to come along. The plan had grown from there, to possibly include Dave Matthews and -I don't know- maybe even Mick Jagger. The Brazilian Girls wanted to go tubing, while the rest of us gradually reached a consensus that the day was entirely too cold. I doubt the temperature was much in excess of 70 degrees F.

Matthew said he was the last person to leave last night, and that he was pretty sure the keg was dead, but just to make sure, we went to check one last time. But of course all we could produce was air.

Matthew and I went down to the Haunted House to look for Rory but instead we found Tyler. He was subdued but reasonably happy. The house was in good condition in the aftermath of last night's party. True: it wasn't the most rockin' party we'd ever attended, but the one keg had evidently been killed off. That was better than the Kappa Mutha Fucka housewarming (where we couldn't even kill off a keg of Red Hook).

Matthew said he was the last person to leave last night, and that he was pretty sure the keg was dead, but just to make sure, we went to check one last time. But of course all we could produce was air.

Suddenly, Matthew decided we maybe should go to the beach, that is, Virginia Beach. It's three hours away, so we'd have to get going.

But back at Kappa Mutha Fucka, our options seemed limited. Leticia was willing to drive us in her parents' car, but there could be no drinking on the way. What kind of fun would that be? Deya said her car was experiencing cooling problems. Monster Boy's car is always on its last legs. And these days my car is making a distubing noise from one of the wheels. We considered enlisting Rory and his Pea Green Machine, but Rory showed up, he said he'd have to work this afternoon at 3. It looked like we'd have to hop a train after all.

Rory appeared to have been sobered and troubled by Diana's death. I don't know why or even if I can know why. I've never understood the attachment the British have to their royalty.

W


e gathered up backpacks and, after lingering for awhile in the front yard of the Haunted House, rode with Rory to the Corner. Somehow eight of us managed to fit into his car.

So Matthew and I ran ahead of our contingent, figuring that the others in our dirty, boisterous, immature throng were going to kill this goose laying golden eggs.

I was famished and had intentions of buying some food. But then I remembered that someone, in an effort to entice new students to buy stuff, was giving away free pizza on the Corner. So Matthew and I ran ahead of our contingent, figuring that the others in our dirty, boisterous, immature throng were going to kill this goose laying golden eggs. The friendly woman signing people up for the Corner Meal Plan (a cashless student feeding program concocted by Corner restaurants to more effectively compete with dining halls) was the one giving away the free pizza. She handed Matthew and me a box that contained several pieces. Our friends caught up quickly, but had to wait until another shipment of free pizzas arrived before they could have any. So they continued up the street to the WNRN raffle desk and picked up boxes of free personal toiletries (the razor and deodourant sample packs). As could be expected, Jesse delighted in shooting shaving cream all over the place. By contrast, I intend to make judicious use of all the free stuff in the sample pack I picked up on Saturday.

Matthew said that sometimes he feels like he's getting old, that he no longer appreciates the wanton destructiveness and obnoxiousness of his friends. I agreed vehemently. I'm tired of seeing punk rock friends squander good things.

When the pizzas arrived at the Corner Meal Plan desk, our grubby friends descended in force. I couldn't bear to watch; I imagined them acting like hogs at the trough. In the end their wanton abuse of the free pizza give away saved me having to buy lunch; we all ended up being well fed and ready to start drinking.

Rory drove us to the IGA near the Downtown Mall and I bought a 5 litre box of cheap blush vino from what contributions I could raise. The other day Rory saw that some free tabloid newspaper contained coupons for free All Sport thirst quencher drinks. Instead of taking just one issue, he took the whole stack.

Matthew tells me that according to Rory, it's a very British thing to take full advantage of every opportunity to obtain free stuff. This is why normal newspaper vending machines are unheard of in England; someone would just steal the whole stack with the intention of selling them one by one, only (of course) to end up saying "fuck it" and ditching the stack in the street. Rory himself has the uniquely British love of free things. For example, whenever he sees a tire on the side of the road, he stops and takes it with him. But he soon realizes it's worthless and chucks it out several miles later. Astrologically, then, it seems England must have been born with Taurus Rising.

The plan was all very far fetched, since it required us to do lunch with Dave Matthews.

Rory distributed coupons to all of us, and we all got free All Sports in the IGA. There was a little confusion among the cashiers as to whether they should accept the coupons, especially one from each of us, but in the end they did. However, as we were about to leave, a cashier ran out to stop us, demanding that we pay sales tax. No problem; in total it came to 24 lousy cents!

Once we had our vino and our All Sports, it was time to hop a train. Rory parked on 9th street and we all walked down the tracks, eventually to a long chain of sidelined freight cars. It turns out they were filled with raw wheat. There must have been enough wheat there to supply all of North America's bread needs for an entire week. We all sat up on top of the cars, playfully tossing the wheat around or laying in it. When I was bored, I slipped off on my own, eventually to Cocke Hall at UVA.

W


hile I was doing my usual routine, I received an urgent email from the sixteen year old South Carolina girl mentioned the other day. Her name is Katie, by the way. It seems she'd hatched a crazy plan to have her Dad fly her up to visit me in an airplane that he shares with some other guys. The plan was all very far fetched, since it required us to do lunch with Dave Matthews. It seems that her Dad was only willing to make the flight if it resulted in lunch with a celebrity. No, I'm not making this up. You see, I'd almost jokingly mentioned that my friends and I might be going tubing with Dave Matthews, and she'd made it into a necessary component of an elaborate scheme.

Not only that, but Katie had been almost frighteningly persistent in tracking me down. First she'd called my house, then, using 411, had systematically called businesses throughout the Corner to see if I was there. The email, by the way, reached me the instant she sent it, or the instant it left AOL's overworked machines at least.

As usual, I set the pace with my ferocious gluttony.

So I called her and we discussed the probablity of doing lunch with Dave. I said it just wasn't going to happen. I suggested helpfully that she deceive her parents instead, but that idea gave her a funny feeling. When the call concluded, she went off to hatch some other scheme.

I


n the evening, we watched a couple of extremely trippy, bizarre, and impossible-to-follow movies that Monster Boy rented. One was WAX or the Discovery of Television Among the Bees and the other was Faust. I didn't really like either one, because they made absolutely no sense and seemed to be overly repetitive. Television Among the Bees relied on lots of early-90s computer effects and scenes from the Gulf War, while Faust depended mostly on claymation and marionettes for its special effects. Faust bored me so badly that I went off to bed somewhere in the middle of it.

While watching the movies, we drank Natural Ice and ate three bags of corn chips (obtained in multiple runs to local convenience stores). Matthew Hart made an excellent bean dip, but he was distressed at how fast he had to eat in order to be able to eat anything at all. As usual, I set the pace with my ferocious gluttony.

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