Meg Cabot - Mia Goes Fourth

And now it looks like someone has gotten hold of my special lucky underwear, and the next thing you know, it will be

showing up on Ebay! Seriously! There is a ton of Princess Mia stuff being sold on Ebay, like used copies of the

unauthorized biographies of my life. Who is to say my underwear wouldn't sell like hotcakes? Especially the fact that

they are Queen Amidala panties.

I am so, so dead.

Mom has already called the 6th Precinct to report the theft, but those guys are too busy defusing bombs and tracking

down real criminals to go after a laundry swiper. They practically laughed her off the phone.

It is all very well for her and Mr G — all they lost were regular clothes. I am the only one who lost underwear. Worse,

my lucky underwear. Though I fully understand that the men and women who fight crime in this city have more important

things to do than look for my panties.

But the way things have been going, I really, really need all the good luck I can get.

Thursday; January 21

Algebra

Today, before class started, Lana was on her mobile, and this is what I overheard her saying:

'No, I can't make it to Pam's on Friday, I've got this stupid thing to go to. I don't know, it's some patient of my dad's.

Every year she has this stupid dance where everybody has to dress up in black and white.'

I froze, my Algebra I-II textbook only halfway open. Lana's dad, I remembered, all of my blood turning cold, is a plastic surgeon. Could he have been the one who gave Contessa Trevanni her anteater face?

'I don't know,' Lana was saying, into her phone. 'She claims to be some kind of countess. I swear to God, this town is

littered with wannabe royals.'

As she said the words wannabe royals, Lana swivelled her head around — getting her long, shiny blonde hair all over

Chapter Twelve of my Algebra book - and looked at me.

Um, excuse me. I never wanted to be royal. Never, ever, ever did I even remotely suggest to anyone that I thought it might

be cool to be a princess.

Oh, sure, I wouldn't mind being a princess the way Belle became a princess at the end of Beauty and the Beast. You know,

a fairy-tale princess with no problems or responsibilities, except to look pretty and be all sweet to people.

But being a princess in real life is nothing like that. You have to make all these decisions that affect the good of your country. Like should you or should you not make tourists pay for parking? And should you, or should you not, protect dolphins and

sea turtles from pollution?

Clearly Lana has never thought about any of this, however.

'No, I'm not taking Josh,' she said scornfully into the hone, as more of her stupid hair fell all over my textbook. In fact, I

thought about closing my book on her hair, just to hear her scream, but I wanted to hear why she wasn't taking her long-time boyfriend, Josh Richter, to the black-and-white ball with her.

'He is so immature at these things,' Lana said to her friend. 'I mean, at the last one we went to together, he actually started throwing grapes down the front of this one girl's dress. I know. High-school boys just don't know how to act. Besides,

there'll be all these West Pointers there. It'll be nice to be with some college boys for a change.'

Really, I may not have had a boyfriend all that long (thirty-four days to be exact) but it seems pretty disloyal to be looking forward to going to a dance with someone other than your significant other. I mean, I am totally dreading going to the contessa's black-and-white ball without Michael.

And now I am dreading it even more, knowing that Lana is going to be there.

Especially when Mr G walked into the classroom, and Lana — who had learned a lesson from last time — went,

'Oops, gotta go,' into her mobile and hung up, then happened to glance in my direction.

'What are you looking at, fish breath?' she wanted to know.

Now, I happen to know that I don't have fish breath. For one thing, I fully had oatmeal for breakfast, and for another, Lars

is addicted to those Listerine Pocket Pak thingies that melt on your tongue and is always handing them out, and I had just

had one in anticipation of Michael possibly stopping by my Algebra class on his way to Senior English (which he did, to

hand me a CD he burned for me last night of Pearl Jam's greatest hits, even though of course I don't really like bands that

don't have girls in them, except *NSYNC of course, but I will totally pretend that I listened to it and liked it).

So I know that my breath did not smell like fish.

But I didn't get to say anything back to Lana because Mr. G told us to get out last night's homework problems

(which I actually had done) so my opportunity was cut off.

But I am going to remember what she said for ever, because we Renaldo women, we can really hold a grudge when

we want to.

Defn: Square root of perfect sq. is either of the identical factors

Defn: Positive sq. root is called the principal sq. root

Negative numbers have no sq. root

Things to Do:

1. Have Genovian ambassador to the UN call the CIA. See if they can dispatch some agents to track down my

underwear (if it falls into the wrong hands, could be an international incident!)

2. Get cat food!!!!!

3. Check on Mom's folk-acid intake.

4. Tell Michael I will not be able to make first date with him.

5. Prepare to be dumped.

Thursday, January 21,

Health and Safety

Did you see that? They are meeting at Cosi for lunch!

Yes. He so loves her.

It's so cute when teachers are in love.

So are you nervous about your breakfast meeting tomorrow?

Hardly. THEY are the ones who should be nervous.

Are you going all by yourself? Your mom and dad aren't coming with you, are they?

Please. I can handle a bunch of movie executives on my own, thanks. God, how can they keep

stuffing this infantile swill down our throats,year after year. Don't they think we know by now that tobacco kills? Hey, did you get all your homework done, or were you up all night instant messaging

my brother instead?

Both.

You two are so cute, it makes me want to puke. Almost as cute as Mr Wheeton and Mademoiselle Klein.

Shut up.

God, this is boring. Want to make another list?

OK, you start.

Lilly Moscovitz's Guide to What's Hot and What's Not on TV

(with commentary by Mia Thermopolis):

Seventh Heaven

Lilly: A complex look at one family's struggles to maintain Christian mores in an ever-evolving, modern-day society. Fairly well acted and occasionally moving, this show can turn 'preachy', but does depict the problems facing normal families with surprising realism, and only occasionally sinks to the banal.

Mia: Even though the dad is a minister and everyone has to learn a lesson at the end of every episode, this show is pretty good. High point When the Olsen twins guest-starred. Low point When the show's cosmetician gave the youngest girl straight hair.

Popstars

Lilly: A ridiculous attempt to pander to the lowest common denominator, this show puts its young stars through

a humiliatingly public 'audition', then zeroes in as the losers cry and winners gloat.

Mia: They take a bunch of attractive people who can sing and dance and make them audition for a place in a pop group, and

some of them get it and some of them don't, and the ones who do are instant celebrities who then crack up, all the while