At first I thought it was a fake suicide note. "By the time you read this, it's already too late. I'm in my car, or perhaps I've already arrived at my destination; but at any rate, I'm not here and won't be again." It's very real--but she only killed her old self. The last entry in Kim Rollins' on-line journal - - written November 12, but posted at 12:18 today -- tells us she's left her boyfriend of nine years, and headed "south."

This may sound like idle gossip -- but every geek I know had a major crush on Kim Rollins. Pigdoggers discovered this last May.

"For the longest time I couldn't get over a web page by a woman named Kim Rollins..."

"I was really into Kim Rollins page too. I remember when we all discovered it at Vivid."

"I have seen this many a time and remember her well."

Over the summer we bantered about her antics....

"Kim Rollins is alive and well and posting on Usenet, apparently. Our favorite web celebrity gave a very good answer in alt.wedding this April to the question of how to get out of expensive gifts for new brides."

* I give them a card that says "a donation has been made in your name to the Woodland Park Zoo," or some other nonprofit organization. Of course, no such donation has been made! Haw haw! I'm never spending a hard-earned dime on another ungrateful bride again!

Kim actually wrote a wedding advice column--gently deflecting the question of her own qualifications. But her life is changing rapidly....

"Out of deference to Wil, I won't go into the details of my leaving his household, his corporation, his arms. Yes, there is another man involved.... This boy and I have been doing this strange dance forever, where he always assumed that I wouldn't leave Wil. I always assumed that he wouldn't have me if I could. I didn't know he was in love with me until two weeks ago. All he had to do was say the word, and my heart was already with him."

The day has come. It's as simple as that.

"Everything in the house that I felt comfortable calling 'mine' is in a box that I've tape-gunned shut.... For those of you who have my Bryant phone number, the line will ring and ring and I will never, ever be able to pick it up."

And the on-line journal? "I'm leaving the archived entries up, where they will remain until the sysadmin here decides to stop giving free web space to someone who walked off the job with no notice and broke the boss's heart. They're not a true picture of me; they're me with lipstick painted on in such a way that my mouth always turns up at the corners. Look, I'm smiling. But you can see me under the makeup, if you try."

She's also confides she's on "massive doses" of anti-depressants. ("My medication has been changed or increased four times over the last year.")

I browsed through my hard drive, and found files where I'd save snatches from her web page, Kim offering her quirky comments on geek staple fantasies.

* The web ("This is my homepage. There are many like it, but this one is mine. I must use my homepage to destroy the enemy, who is trying to kill me.")

* The Disneyland Hotel. ("The Mickey shampoo/conditioner did no conditioning to speak of and left me dandruffy. The Mickey hand lotion made me peel like an oversized snake.")

* Disneyland's Tiki Room. ("The far corners of the room -- past the crooning flowers where the light drops off -- are reputedly a good place to snitch a lukewarm gin.")

Her journal was always darkly beautiful. One of Kim's first entries was about the day her pet rat August died. ("The last time I held my rat was in Dr. Deeb's waiting room. I kissed the top of August's head and whispered, 'I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It's such a beautiful day.')

The journal's received it's last entry. "This would have been a much more interesting journal if I'd been able to tell you what's really been going on inside," she wrote -- "but I didn't want to let anyone know how badly I wanted to escape until I was sure I could go through with it."

"Five hundred people and I lied, if only by omission, to you all, day after day.... If anything, I envied your illusions."

Ironically, the very first link is still "who ...am I? (A primer to my charmed life.)"

As I read the journal Monday night, the links went dead. Hitting re-load replaced the page with the "File Not Found..." message

Godspeed, Kim.

Check it out yourself

oarsman@pigdog.org