Every once in a while we come across unpleasant people, and my friend Anna is going through an experience with an unpleasant person being the third roommate in the apartment where she rents a room. By some reason these two girls just couldn’t connect and I don’t know how it all started, but, as of right now, they are officially at war, so that is how her typical weekday morning with the roommate goes like:
She wakes up, sneaks into the shower and starts the water running to indicate that the bathroom is occupied. She is then pleased to hear her rommate opening her door 5 seconds later and then slamming it closed again with irritation. Too late b*tch!
After taking her time in the bathroom she comes out to find Andrea (the roommate) monopolizing the kitchen table where Anna likes to sit and eat her breakfast before going to work. She proceeds with preparing the food anyway, taking an opportunity to boil some eggs (it’s summertime, 79 degrees outside and no A/C in the kitchen), while she, herself, retreats to the living room where A/C is on. Andrea won’t desert the kitchen table no matter what, so she has to simmer in her own sweat, while pretending she is not hot at all.
While my friend chills in the living room, her evil roommate changes the water running mode in the kitchen sink from stream to soft flow (water running like from the shower head). Anna doesn’t know how to switch it back to normal when she starts the water running to wash the dishes after herself. So Andrea smirks quietly while she is struggling with the kitchen faucet. The two exchange an eyeroll and a sigh without looking at each other.
My friend is done with her breakfast, dressed and ready to leave for work, but before, she wants to use the bathroom, so she starts walking there, only to be cut off by her roommate, who comes out of the kitchen and starts walking in front of her leisurely, with theatrical yawns, and slams the door behind herself in Anna’s face. Anna leaves the apartment slamming the front door behind her and dumps the water bottle she just finished into the basket attached to the front of Andrea’s bike, parked by the house.
I just had a conversation with one of my friends who asked me (yet again), whether I am happy living with a roommate, and that made me think. Why is sharing an apartment something so controversial that you almost feel embarrassed telling it to other people. Maybe something is wrong and I have to change my life, get myself a separate apartment and “grow up already”? But then I analyzed my feelings and came to a conclusion that I am perfectly happy with my present situation, and feel really comfortable and not at all depressed having to share an apartment with Marina. In fact I am happy to have her living with me and really hope that we’ll stay in touch, after each of us get’s her own nest. And that realization lead to the following thoughts formed in my head:
It is good to live with roommates when:
You are in college or a college grad settling in a big city.
You need to save money for a greater purposes
You are going through financially turbulent times
You feel like you want to have (a) roommate(s)
It is not good to live with roommates when:
You can not afford your own place and are not doing anything to change this situation
You hate your roommate(s)
You don’t feel comfortable in your apartment and prefer to go out rather than stay in the apartment
You are in a bad relationships with your roommate(s)
Things that your roommate is for you:
Your buddy, your style advisor, your confidante (to a certain degree), your drinking companion (on occasion), but most important, your roommate is rightful and respected member of your household.
Things that your roommate isn’t for you:
Your roommate is NOT your: babysitter, housekeeper, bank, psychiatrist, parent, teacher, boss, cry-shoulder or legal guardian.
Fighting, passive aggressive behaviour, pressure, silent treatment, abuse (like exessive drinking or partying in the apartment).
And now, after checking all the above points I realized that not only I am happy living with my roommates, but also, I feel that I am doing a good thing for myself, because I am doing it fot greater person (I really hope to buy a2-family house for rent in the nearest future), I am really comfortable with my roommates and I am pleased to know that we are both mature adults and are solving our problems in a rational adult way. And I actually do feel myself a grown up now.
There are two ways of solving problems, adult way and childish way, it is ngotiable which way is better but from I’ve learned so far, acting like a child does not help you when you are having problems with your roommate. I didn’t even realize untill recently how irrational and unreasonable my behaviour is sometimes (especially when I am under pressure) so now I want to share my thoughts with you, in case you are having the same problem.
Trash situation
Problem: My roommate and I agreed on taking turns putting the trash out, and we decided that it should be done as soon as the garbage bag is full. But as we are both hard working young adults with personal life and after-work time interests and activities, it happened quite a few times that garbage stayed in our kitchen for days, (in fact, I wanted to write “weeks” but I felt too embarrassed to admit it), untill the stench from it reached its unbreathable maximum. Then someone, whoever turn it was at the moment would finally put it out. We both felt guilty about it and tried to make sure it is not happening, but… you know… it didn’t always work. My roommate was doing better than me though, so she started making comments about me being careless, which made me slightly irritated.
Solution
Childish Way (what I did): I’ve waited patiently for a few days untill she was finally the one who forgot to take the trash out, and when the trash bags started looking/smelling gross again I filmed it with my phone, dressing the video with a few sarcastic comments, and sent it out to her.
Adult way: Apologize and move on, making an effort to be more mindful about the trash situation.
Midnight clash
Problem: My friend and his roommate Dea have different daily schedules, so he comes home late at night while she leaves for work really early in the morning. He makes noise, occasionally, that wakes her up, because he just doesn’t pay attention to how heavy his walking is, and how loud he slams the kitchen cabinets and fridge doors.
Solution:
Childish way: One night he woke her up, Dea appeared in the kitchen wearing the “devil’s face” (my friends literate expression) stomped to the bathroom without a single word, not even “hi”, and then went back to her room slamming the door behind her with the loud Bang! Next morning she tried to make as much noise as possible resetting the microwave three times (microwave buttons make this heart wrenching beep sound) and making herself three smoothies in the bullet blender.
Adult way: Leave a note in the kitchen letting my friend know that he wakes her up with detailed explanation of what exactly he does that makes so much noise. (Yes, this is how my friend is, you have to break your issue into elementary particles and give it all to him one micro particle at a time, but once he got it, you’ll never have to get back to it again).
Money matters
Problem: My friend and her roommate Laura went to Benjamin Moore to get painting supplies for their upcoming living room makeover, and the total cost of it ended up being more then Laura could afford.
Childish way: Once they were done shoppping and back home Laura had resentfully confronted my friend about the final bill coming up to $120.00 (split between two of them) talking about how she now has to cut her lunch money for the whole week untill her next paycheck.
Adult way: Let my friend know, that you are on a (tight) budget upfront and either postpone the makeover till the next paycheck, or come up with cheaper choice of supplies.
The baking pans that made Tanisha famous.
Problem: Tanisha Thomas the Bad Girls Club Season 2 star got frustrated with three of her roommates partying in the house till dawn while she and other girls tried to sleep.
Tanisha’s Way: What would be the better way of addressing the issue than walking around the house at the break of dawn next morning and banging two alluminum oven trays against each other to wake up everyone in the house (including those who didn’t get to sleep last night because of partying roommates)? That’s right, walking around, banging those trays AND chanting “I DIDN’T GET NO F*CKING SLEEP CAUSE’A Y’ALL!! Y’ALL NOT GON GET NO SLEEP CAUSE’A ME!!!”.
Adult way: I, seriously, can not think of any better way to deal with this problem. Am I wrong or you can call it a-street-smart-way of dealing with an issue? And even though this episode aired around eight years ago I guess it will never get old for me.
Afterword
Perfect roommates don’t exist y’all, so we all have to be a little bit more accepting and easy going letting our inner child out somewhere else rather than inside the apartment that we share with another individual who also has an inner child trapped inside him/her.
What would you do if you wake up in the middle of the street? Literally, in the middle of the street while laying down in your bed. You would probably wonder how you got there? Well, your dorm roommates pulled a prank on you and carried your bed outside while you were sleeping in it.. Haha…NOT funny.
While pranks are fun to watch, I assume, the prank victims are hardly amused by it, and the people who post prank videos on youtube never tell how the prank victims retaliate. So if you decided to pull one on your roommie I suggest you calculate the possible consiquences very well before doing it.
Anyway, pranks are a part of fun you have, when you are young and free, and live with the roommates so here are some pretty neat and light prank ideas for you.
1. From me to you.
2.Do you think your roommate is trying to tell you something?
3.Have you seen the scissors?
4.Classics of prank (works best with drunk roommates)
5.And whatever this is
6.Another funny thing that went viral
7. Patch Adams’ style
8. And here you can actually see, what one of the prank victims thinks of it. Whoever made this hole obviously did not think that getting someone trapped in the bathroom is funny.
So I have moved to Tampa, Florida and shared an apartment with a college friend of mine whos name was Mary.
Few weeks later her boyfriend, Michael, has come to visit her from Ohio and decided to stay for good (as he was currently out of job). I wasn’t too happy about it, but since we lived in a 2 bedroom/2 bathroom apartment I thought it couldn’t be too bad. But I was wrong. Here are the main issues I had with them:
-When Michael moved in, bills went up due to exessive cooking (he liked to cook), but were still divided by two, not by three of us. However, Michael had a full say in all house related issues and, of course, whenever the argument was present Mary always picked his side.
-I became a minority when it came up to any kind of decisions about our living space.
-I felt like a third wheel everytime all three of us hung out in a living area.
-Everytime I needed to use our washer there was another Mike and Mary’s load of laundry spinning in there.
-It was NOT fun to hang out together because everytime it ended with them fighthing.
-Few times I was awaken in the middle of the night by their screams when they went through another argument.
-It might sound crazy, but I felt like Michael was sort of… Competing with me for Mary’s attention and sometimes pushed his weight around just to test his power.
It wasn’t bad all the time though, and those things were not a big deal for me at first, but still, I got slightly irritated each time we had a “Michael and Mary” situation and soon enough the tension, that was gradually building up, resulted in fighting from all three sides. So over time we almost stopped talking to one another, and everytime all three of us were present in the same room heavy silence hung over the place. This was no roommate paradise.
Long story short: Michael broke up with Mary and moved out and so did I. As of today I do not talk to either one of them and I would rather live in a windowless basement (also I hope I will never have to face this choice) then share an apartment with another couple. No matter how sweet and laid back they are.
I do agree that a lot of it was my own fault as I didn’t stand my ground at the beginning and let them take over the decision making, but it is kind of hard to change the situation on the go. So if you consider sharing an apartment with a couple, you should know what you are getting yourself into. And maybe workout a strategy and discuss all the possible issues before you move in together (Here, I did it, I gave you a how to advice).
s for their upcoming living room makeover, and the total cost of it ended up being more then Laura could afford.
Roommates Blog 