"Variety is the spice of life" they say -- and a bigger bunch of lunatics than those on your corridor you'll never find.

-- The Fantastic Folio of Facts, 1992

Beyond the seemingly innocent door behind the porters lodge, and past the first kitchen leads to a whole wide world of adventure. The inhabitants of the 10 rooms V/A 018 to V/A 026 could have easily fitted the description of the biggest bunch of loonies that you've ever met.

THE NAMES HAVE BEEN CHANGED TO PROTECT THE INNOCENT. ANY INACCURACIES IN THIS STORY AND IN THE ORDER OF THIS STORY ARE DUE TO MY AGEING MEMORY.

Once upon a time, when Carter was returning to his room, he was stopped by Kennedy, who asked him what would be considered a normal question, except for the fact that Carter was being asked where Kennedy's bed was. Carter's reaction was one of stunned surprise. Had Kennedy perhaps left the bed lying under all that junk on Carter's desk? How could anyone lose something as large as a bed? Apparently, Eisenhower had hidden it in his room when Kennedy was out. Little were they to know that this would become an instant fad. Kennedy, soon found the culprit and his bed was returned. The next victim was Clinton, who was chased out of the kitchen when he left his door open, and when the bed was nicked. Only this time, the bed was not immediately returned. Clinton was then involved in a treasure hunt where he was continuously walking backwards and forward between Vanbrugh, Derwent, and the Charles, hunting down the next elusive rhyming clue, only to be told that he was constantly being misled. After the Derwent bop, everyone went back to our kitchen in Vanbrugh, and Clinton wanted his bed back, as he was thinking of going to bed soon. To add to the atmosphere, a copy of the Independent had a new headline stuck to it which read: "The bed thief strikes again". In fact, it was not long before he did strike again. When everyone was in Reagan's room, we suddenly had the idea to steal his bed (he was not around then), and hide it on the bicycle shed in a place that could be seen from the kitchen window. Clinton was not aware of this, so he might think that Reagan's bed was his. Reagan might also see his bed, and think that it was Clinton's. To help catalyse the chaos, someone wrote a fake quote on the kitchen's list of quotes, attributed to Reagan which read "Where the F**k's my bed". We were hoping that he would somehow see this quote and then realise that something did happen to his bed. When Reagan returned, we were all trying desperately to make him look at the quotes list by asking him to turn his head round so that we could all appreciate the full view of his haircut. This was having no effect, and in a measure of desperation, we told Clinton, who had just returned that we could see his bed on the roof of the bicycle shed. Reagan looked outside, and instantly recognised his bed outside. After that, there followed the spectacle of us all retrieving the bed from the rooftop, and dragging it back to Reagan's room. At around this point, someone remembered that Carter told them that he had a new poster, which they wanted to see. It was only a matter of moments before everyone poured themselves into Carter's room to look at the poster, including the bed thief. Carter was then asked to pose for a photo. He was lying on his bed reading the copy of the Independent which we had just changed. An attempt by the rest of the ensemble to pinch Carter's bed was thwarted when someone tried to hide under Carter's bed couldn't, because Carter was storing his suitcase there. Otherwise, they would have hidden under Carter's bed until everyone had gone, and then discretely remove the bed. Instead of being bogged down by their failures, the crowd instantly took the opportunity to re-steal Reagan's bed. There was something hilarious about jointly moving someone else's bed across a corridor at 1am that can only be appreciated when you are actually actively in the midst of this endeavour. Everyone was really getting a rush from all that activity. A porter even caught us in our act He saked us "What are you up to", and Reagan replied "Just getting my bed back". Eventually, we all went to bed, Including Clinton, who didn't have a bed to go to. Clinton's bed was returned the following day. Churchill (someone from C block), who had hidden the bed in his room (which is an impossible feat in itself, considering the size of rooms in Vanbrugh, although how he hid it with all the mess in his room without gluing it to his ceiling is beyond me), had mistakenly believed that Clinton was contemplating suicide, so he returned the bed.

After that, there wasn't another bout of bed stealing until the next term. This activity seemed explosive, as the stealing of one bed immediately prompted anyone to enter anyone else's room to steal the bed when the door was unlocked.

And where are they all now? The passage of time, and the increased workload has placed all this into the past. Carter, however proposed that the new SU building be named 'The Clean Pancake Building', in honour of the state of student culture in both the present (meaningless), and future (silly, bizarre, surreal, outrageous, etc.) Carter almost ran for SU president in the spring of 1995, but due to project work, did not have the time. His main proposal was to build a replica of the Berlin Wall on campus built entirely out of LEGO. It was somehow hoped that this action would encourage greater attendance at UGMs. And - oh yes - Carter won 1st place in the RAG annual lack of talent in 1995.

That idiot of a genius, Andrei 'manic' Ellman, Aaardvark by royal appointment (aka. Hieronymous 'wheee splat' Bonkmeister, aka. 'Carter')

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