What happens when a 25yo lady moves in with 19 & 21yo dudes she met on Craigslist? ...confusion, mostly.
Stoppergate 2012
Dudemate C has a bad habit. Well, several bad habits, but we’ll focus on just one for the moment. One that just had me go to the Resident Services Office and put in an emergency maintenance request for no reason.
This, my friends, is a plastic sink stopper:
Fairly easy to use, for most folks. Push it down so it covers the drain and creates a seal, button side up for your removal ease. Kind of seems like a no brainer, right?
Not for Roommate C. Whenever Roommate C uses the stopper, he puts it in upside down. Most of the time, I (and Roommate S) just have to pry it back out with a knife. Annoying, but no real harm done - especially since he doesn’t do serious dishes or anything else that requires filling up the sink very often.
This afternoon, I walked into the kitchen to get a glass of water and found an inch of standing water in the sink. When turning on the garbage disposal produced a grinding noise and no reduction in the standing water, I tried sticking a knife down the drain to see if something was lodged there. The results were inconclusive and Roommate S told me the disposal was broken, so I went down to the RSO to request emergency maintenance on our (2 week old) garbage disposal. On my way back, Roommate S ran into me to say he fixed it. Because nothing was broken. The sink plug was pushed all the way into the top part of the garbage disposal, upside down.
I just….I honestly don’t understand. And now the RSO staff must think we’re fucking idiots, what with our “broken” disposals and inability to properly use sink stoppers.
Addendum
I’ve also taken the remotes for my tv and cable box into my room. Because I’d feel like a dick asking Dudemate S to pitch in for cable since I had to help him pay his rent last month (he did pay me back on time per our agreement, but still), but I also refuse to silently rage about and let him get away with watching my cable for free. I don’t even care if it’s passive aggressive - I don’t have to be paranoid anymore.
Anonymous asked:
I think you need to update the blog with the rest of the story of how you confront these issues, since I'm all angry on your behalf but I don't get any closure. Tell of the comeuppance, please!
Oh ho. Tumblr is bad at telling me I have messages on my secondary blogs.
Hello! Unfortunately, because I hate confrontation and because these things often seem silly on their own when they happen, I often just vent them here and am done with it. Or I politely air them in a group sit down, things change for a while, then go back to normal. The boys are not very good with follow-through. Or seeing things with their eyes. Like messes. But there’s only a month left on our lease.
HOWEVER, I do have an amusing follow-up to the gin debacle. I put the 3/4 empty bottle on the counter with a note: “Whoever drank it needs to replace it. NOT COOL.” The next morning, the bottle had disappeared. About a day later, an unopened bottle of gin appeared on my side of the top of the fridge (because we’re classy). ….but that other bottle of gin remained disappeared. I guess I still came out a 1/4 bottle of gin ahead, but I find it very amusing.
(also, the steamer never got used as a strainer again. Notes ftw?)
This is Dudemate C’s ridiculous 12 cup coffee maker only he uses. I moved it while trying to clean up our current fruit fly invasion and found larvae under it. Out of curiosity, I opened it up. What you can’t see are all the floating fly carcasses.
Suspicions Confirmed (Again)!
Remember how I had convinced myself that the cable box must be re-setting to channel 2, because the guys wouldn’t be big enough dicks to pull out of paying for cable but watch it anyway? Guess whose roommate was watching football on her tv in the living room, even though he doesn’t pay any of the $100+ bill! THIS GAL.
I couldn’t be sure the boys drank my Jameson when I found it empty atop the fridge, but I know for damn sure this was full to the gent’s shoulder when I left for the weekend.
Things Apparently Not Worth Sharing, in Rough Chronological Order
- That you are a smoker
- That you plan to smoke pot at our apartment
- That someone’s lost his job
- That you were short on rent
- That you’re having guests (who will earn us a noise violation warning)
- That a new job has been found
- That you sold the painting you were going to put up in the kitchen
- That someone’s lost his job
- That you’re selling the absurdly large tv in your room and reclaiming the living room one that I don’t have a replacement for (until the week you want to do so)
- That you’ll be late with your share of utilities
- That you’re exchanging one of the beds (a futon) in your room for the couch in the living room
- That you’ve definitely decided not to chip in for cable (until you ask me to pay the full amount)
- That you’ll be late with your share of the utilities again
- That you’ll be late with your rent (again)
- That you’ll be sleeping on the futon in the living room every night
- That you’re using the cable you’re not paying for to watch The Fight, even though I can hear it in your room
Dudemate S has taken to sleeping in the living room again. When we first moved in, he didn’t have a bed so I understood. Tip-toed around in the mornings getting ready, because I knew he didn’t have to get up for work until later than I did. Now, I don’t understand.
They switched out the living room couch for the futon that was Dudemate S’s bed in their room…with no explanation. Fine, whatever. I noticed that he slept on it instead of in their room a couple of times. A little weird but, still, fine. Now Dudemate S sleeps on the futon in the living room every night, which means he’s there when I am getting ready/making my breakfast. The futon is usually made up by the time I get home from work, but now it looks like even that little bit of common courtesy has been dispensed with.
….and still no explanation has been given.
Cleaning follow-up
The boys started cleaning up the clusterfuck that is our kitchen yesterday, which is great. A few notes from that:
- Turns out that Dudemate C’s family had bi-monthly cleaners come through all growing up. EXPLAINS A LOT.
- It’s no wonder there have been a lot of flies around our sink lately. I found a chunk of omelet under the dirty dishes and there is something legitimately putrid stuck to the sink.
- Dudemate C filled up one side of the sink to soak the crusted-over burners in (then left them overnight…for an unknown reason). After Dudemate S took care of the burners, I went to unplug and drain the sink, only to find that Dudemate C had put the drain plug in upside down and there was nothing to grasp onto. It took Dudemate S and I five minutes and some spoons to pry it loose.
