Wednesdays

Wednesday is my least favorite day of the week, next to Monday. Probably because Monday and Tuesday took forever and a half to get through, and yet the weekend is the same amount of time away.

It could also be due to the fact that Thursday is trash day, so on Wednesday nights I have to be the responsible (aka nagging bitch, according to the Sara(h)s) one and make sure everyone takes out the trash and the recycling.

Oddly enough, ever since Sarah and Jason got back together, she has been staying over at his place every Wednesday night, leaving the rest of us to empty her trash cans.

The best part is that I always find paper and water bottles mixed in with her trash–so much for being a conservationist.

Heroes & Villains

This weekend my roommates and I threw a Heroes & Villains themed party. It was a ton of fun moving all the furniture around, setting up drinks, and making a guest list. We all came up with really cute costumes and made sure that our guests came dressed up as well. With the typical iPod hooked up to a college student’s stereo system, we provided an awesome dance floor in the living room with easy access to red plastic cups  in the kitchen.

Unfortunately, after about 50 people showed up to our small place and overflowed into the yard, some neighbor called the police and our party was shut down barely after 1 AM. No one wanted to be around a busted party, so the crowd thinned out save our closer friends.

My group of friends and I were just hanging out in the kitchen when I heard someone retch on the other side. I turned around to see Sarah’s friend Paul heaving over our extra large trash bin, throwing up the extra shots Alan had convinced him to take.

“Hey, guys, why don’t you go hang out in the living room while I take care of him?” I suggested to the friends I had been chatting with.

I turned to Paul, “Let me get you some water, hon.”

Sarah walked into the kitchen with Jason (what the hell the kid was doing here after breaking up with her is another story) and asked rather rhetorically, “Are you okay, Paul?”

When he was unable to answer, she put a semi-sympathetic look on her face but correctly assessed the situation–someone else was handling it–so she left. 30 minutes later, Paul was only able to sit up with Alan’s support but still couldn’t open his eyes fully.

“Paul, you shouldn’t walk home tonight. I’m sure you can stay on our futon,” I offered. Victoria’s friend had donated a futon to our house, but it didn’t fit anywhere except Sarah’s over-sized room so we left it there for her to throw her massive warddrobe on.

“Sarah, would it be cool if Paul stayed on the futon in your room tonight? I don’t think he is okay to walk home….”

“Um, actually, Jason is going to stay over tonight so…” Sarah hesitated.

“What? Jason can stay over tomorrow night, can’t he? Paul is your friend and he can’t get home!”

“I’m sure he’s fine. He just needs to sober up some more,” she said dismissively.

” I know you want Jason to sleep here tonight but I think Paul needs it more. Otherwise I guess we can put him out on the couch,” I tried to convince her again.

“Yeah, put him on the couch or something,” Sarah huffed. “Well, if you don’t need anything, I’m going to bed.” She turned around and went into her room with Jason.

I couldn’t believe it. Paul is Sarah’s friend. Jason broke up with Sarah and is now back for booty. And she picked that little shit over her friend? Glad to know where her loyalties lie.

Gross-eries

B.C.E. (Before the Consumption of Everything in sight)

2: number of times a month we bought groceries before Hannah moved in

32: dollars the three of us contribute to the household food supply every two weeks

192: our normal food expenditures per month

Cue Hannah moving in

16: number of days Hannah has lived here

4: number of times Hannah has gone grocery shopping

163: total dollars spent on her shopping trips

40: how much she is charging each of us for “our portion” of the groceries

70: percent of the groceries that Hannah has consumed by herself

518: post-Hannah total food expenditures per month

I don’t know how else to put this, but Hannah’s eating habits are disgusting. It would be more acceptable (to an extent) if she didn’t expect us to fund her obesity.

Don’t get me wrong, our house isn’t full of super thin freaks–we just eat normal portions, and we try to keep the eating-the-frosting-straight-from-the-can to Grey’s Anatomy nights only.

You Can’t Have Your Cake and Eat It Too, But Apparently You Can Have Mine

I’ve come to realize that a lot of things I do in my free time serves to maintain my sanity and to keep as far away as possible from the Sara(h)s–working part-time, holding leadership positions in three clubs, hiding out at cafes, and building my culinary skills in the kitchen. My apartment’s kitchen is pretty amazing (by college student standards), and I make good use of it by cooking and baking for my friends and roommates.

Sarah and I had been searching for a glass cake stand to adorn our kitchen counter, and after searching everywhere, we found a great one that doubles as a punch bowl if you flip it upside-down (again, perfect for a college student). We really wanted to bake something to put on it, so on Thursday while everyone was gone, I baked a thick chocolate cake. I carefully placed it on the cake stand to cool, and I contentedly did some work in my room where I could smell its rich aroma.

Then the front door snapped open. Hannah’s heavy footsteps traced the kitchen until she reached the cake stand, and I heard her exclaim excitedly about how good it looked.

“Hey, Roommate, is it okay if I have a piece of the cake?” she called from the kitchen.

“Yeah, go ahead! I was just waiting to ice it, but it should still be good without it,” I called back.

A little while later, I walked out to check on the cake and was shocked–a full 1/4 of the cake was gone! I don’t know who considers 1/4 of a cake to be “a piece”. I didn’t want to confront Hannah after living with her for less than a week, so I just brushed it off. 3/4 of a cake was more than enough for me.

When Sarah got home, she took a little sliver off the cake. “Whoa, this is really good!” she proclaimed happily. No way. Did she just give me a compliment?

After class, work, and back-to-back meetings all day yesterday, I came home to find the cake stand empty, save a bunch of crumbs.

“Hey, Sarah, did you have any more of the cake after last night?” I asked her.

“No, I only had that tiny corner,” she responded earnestly.

I turned to Sara, “Did you get to have any?”

“Nope, I didn’t even see it,” Sara replied.

Just then, Hannah waltzed (I use this term lightly) into the kitchen.

“Oh, Roommate, your cake was so good that I finished it off–hope you don’t mind!” Hannah announced breezily.

What. the. hell. Not only did Hannah eat an entire cake by herself, she didn’t even bother to think about saving me a slice. Maybe she thought she was doing me a favor by leaving the dirty cake stand there so that I could get at the crumbs or something. Bitch.

I’m thinking a potential alliance with Hannah is probably not going to work out. And now I’m fuming.

Update: Fortunately (or unfortunately), I’m not alone–reader Amanda also lives with a Hannah.

At This Rate She’s Never Moving In

Here are the possible explanations for why Hannah still hasn’t shown up yet:

• On the drive here, her car got stuck in a ditch and the heavy furniture is inhibiting any movement
• She forgot that school starts in a few days
• She decided that our apartment isn’t good enough for her (hopefully it’s this one)
• It’s Shabbat… except that it has been a week
• She thinks that I have nothing better to do than twiddle my thumbs while I wait for her

I give up. If Hannah decides to come up and I’m not there to let her in, she’s just going to have to stand outside in the sun with all her shit until I’m done making her wait.

I’d Like This Week of My Life Back Please

If any of you have ever moved, you know how hectic it can get– furniture not fitting through doorways, clothes all over the place, appliances falling off shelves. Imagine half our house moving out. It was insane.

On top of all of that, Sarah went to Asia with her family so I’m doing all of this alone. I have no idea where she disappeared to all summer because she’s just taking MCAT classes at night. Either way, I had to somehow figure out how to let Hannah in (she has no key yet) even though I couldn’t be at home because of our project release at work. I managed to negotiate leaving work in the middle of the day to meet Hannah, and then I’d go back to work over time to meet our launch deadline.

Yesterday, I waited around for Hannah to arrive for hours. She was a no-show. Finally, I called her, and she said that she would move up sometime in the next week.

What. The. Hell. Hannah wanted us to pro-rate her rent for the days after the start of her lease that she couldn’t move in. So I had to rush around helping Victoria/Jules to move out, getting the room inspected by our landlord who lives two hours away, risking missing our launch deadline–only to be stood up by that bitch.

What was the point of making a huge deal out of not being able to move in at the very start of her lease and making me jump through hoops to accommodate her if she wasn’t going to fucking move in right away?!

It’s a Little One-Sided

It has been pretty great living with a roommate who doesn’t make me feel completely worthless. Jules and I have been spending a lot of time together after our work day is over, both at home and while going out.

Some of my good friends like to entertain at their apartment, so almost every weekend we trek over to their place and enjoy whatever silly theme they’ve come up with that time. So far this summer, we’ve been through a cocktail party and a “bro” party which involved a lot of Dave Matthews posters, N64, and a mad search for polo shirts for popped collars.

Then there are the more normal nights where we get ready to go out while dancing to Britney or Justin in our room. I’ve always wanted to have a sister to share clothes and go out with. Freshman year, the Sara(h)s and I used to do that. At least, we swapped shoes sometimes and Sara even gave me a pair of hers that she knew I coveted. And Sarah always had me do her makeup before going out.

Now, it’s just them coming to me when they need something from me (including waking me up to ask to borrow a skirt, despite knowing about my sleeping problems). But if I’m going on a date and my coat has a fat hole in it, I get a pretty resentful groan and a reluctant “Ergh… fine… I guess you can wear my coat”, which I don’t understand because I was taught always to take extra care of other people’s belongings–something the Sara(h)s never learned because my shoes will come back with scuff marks and holes. One time, Sara even admitted to me that she couldn’t stand when Sarah borrows her shoes because they are always ruined afterward.

I suppose I just can’t blame them for never having to take care of their things; afterall, they can just go buy $200 jeans when they want to whereas I have owned the same coat for six years (thus the huge hole in the pocket). Just like you can’t blame Paris Hilton for being spoiled.

New Lease

Since it is nearing the end of the school year, we are re-newing our lease with our landlord. I want to change roommates, but the apartment is too nice to let go of. When we first signed the lease, our landlord required a parent to be the master tenant since we are all students, and of course, my mom was the one that stepped up. I won’t lie–my mother did not want to at first, but I convinced her that it only made sense for the one parent in-state (even though my landlord accepts master tenants from outside the country) to be the one in communication with my landlord.

Neither of the Sara(h)s’ parents said a word but when they ran into my mom while we were moving in, they thanked her profusely for taking on the responsibility. Their gratitude seemed pretty insincere (surprise, surprise); instead, they seemed pretty happy not to be the ones responsible for any liabilities we as a household could incur.

Our lease originally started June 10, but since the Sara(h)s are from out of state, they wanted to store their things in the apartment as soon as the school term ended. In order to hold the apartment from the end of school until June 10, our landlord charged us the full month instead of the pro-rated rate.

Of course, Sarah’s cheap mother backs out and refuses to let Sarah “move in”, despite her things being in the apartment already, so instead of dropping the apartment my mom steps in and pays Sarah’s part of the rent. Obviously my mother could have said no, dropped the lease since the terms changed, and found me a different place. But she understood how difficult it was to find a place so close to campus that she paid my nurse-hating roommate’s rent in order for all of us to keep the apartment.

It’s been a year and I haven’t told either Sara or Sarah how my mom saved our butts out of respect for Sarah’s financial situation since her parents just moved across the country to be closer to her. But her complete lack of disrespect for my family and me really makes me want to call her out on it. I think I am a masochist for continuing to live with them.

Sharing is Caring

The usual protocol for moving into an apartment at our university is that everyone brings an appliance to share. You get to pick between these: telephone for the land line, microwave, television, and mini-fridge.

Before I met the Sara(h)s, we spoke online to divide up the appliances.

“We can’t bring anything because we’re flying in from out of state, and we won’t have any space to bring anything really big in our suitcases,” Sarah explained.

“And it’d be more trouble than it’s worth to try and ship appliances,” Sara added.

“I guess I can check to see if we have an old phone lying around,” Sarah offered.

“Yeah, and I’ll see if I can get a mini TV from my uncle who lives near the university,” Sara said.

So that left me with the most expensive appliances, the microwave and the mini-fridge. I figured they had a valid reason not to bring these items–who wants to check a mini-fridge onto a plane? So I went out and bought them for us.

On moving day, the Sara(h)s showed up with a mini-van each of their clothes. While we set up all of our things in the apartment, and Sara thanked me for bringing the major appliances. Then she told me that they had been staying with her wealthy uncle for the past week. Which, in my opinion, gives you more than enough time and space to pick something up other than an $8 telephone or a $20 TV. Seeing as I had spent $150 on the refrigerator and the microwave, I think I have the right to be pretty pissed that they lied to me so that they wouldn’t have to spend the most money. Not to mention all of the spice racks, silverware, pots and pans, dish towels, and rugs that I bought for us. Sara graciously brought a cookie sheet. Thanks for contributing, dear.

I’m taking everything with me when I move out.

I’m a Slave 4 U

Not to state the obvious, but Sara and Sarah are two people who are very difficult to get on your side.

Sarah, the pre-med, is easy to read. She openly talks about how great she is at biology, chemistry, taking standardized tests, and how steady her hands are. Her elitist and condescending air makes anyone uncomfortable at the thought of putting their life in her hands. But for some reason, I think the other roommate is more hazardous to one’s health.

Sara, the ambitious and cut-throat business major, masquerades under the image of the I-want-to-help-developing-nations political science student. She claims to want to use her business/management knowledge to help people, and yet her underlying ambition to climb the corporate ladder at a huge consulting firm shows through the people she surrounds herself with (Big Four interns, kids with powerful/rich/political ties, and other cut-throats).

When we first moved in together, I figured having two friends who had direction in their lives would be a good deal, seeing as I had very little idea about what I wanted to do in the long-run. I was pretty nervous about living with two girls who had known each other since 2nd grade, but I figured since we were all in the same situation, I’d try to be agreeable (despite the differences I noted upon first meeting) and make the best of it.

Apparently, to the Sara(h)s, “agreeable” equals “doormat”. We had to do our laundry the first weekend after move-in, but so did the rest of the apartment building. Since our building has three washing machines and two dryers to share between over 100 people, we had to monitor our loads so that other washers wouldn’t throw our clothes onto the floor. Of course, my roommates wanted to stay up in our apartment to watch the MTV Video Music Awards, so they left me with all their laundry in the basement while they were glued to the TV. After handing me at least eight pairs of jeans (between the two of them), Sara waltzed back up to the room and promised over her shoulder, “Don’t worry! I’ll be back in a few minutes to help you!”

An hour and a half later, after I had started two new loads and put the previous loads in the dryer, Sara still hadn’t returned. Unable to carry three baskets of laundry up by myself, I hastily acquainted myself with a rather good-looking fellow washer and got him to help me carry some a basket up to our apartment.

“Hey! Sorry about not coming back; I got a little distracted by the VMAs. Did you see Britney’s performance?” Sara asked.

“No, funnily enough, I didn’t see it,” I smiled through my teeth. “Anyway, Ryan’s just helping me carry up some of our laundry. Will one of you come down to take over soon?”

“Oh, yeah, don’t worry. The VMAs are over soon,” Sara responded.

Of course, even after the VMAs ended, none of them had showed up in the laundry room, leaving me to lug up their baskets alone.

Figures.