Apartment living rules

1. If someone calls while you are on the phone, do not answer the call waiting signals, after all your conversation to your boyfriend's, cousin's, sister's, ex-best friend's, father-in-law's, stepson is probably too important to be interrupted.

2. Of course there is no need to record any messages on a piece of paper.

a. you would have to actually walk towards the kitchen to get to the pad of paper which requires that you write down a name and check off a few boxes

b. but more importantly, all roommates have mental telepathy and are aware that if you tell the party on the phone that he/she will be called back at the callee's first free moment, the callee will telepathically be aware of this

3. Don't buy anything for the apartment, use and abuse other roommates items until they are destroyed and wait for them to buy a new one (case example: the spatula).

4. Feel free to leave any and all dirty dishes wherever you please, certainly one of your roommates has taken classes in house-cleaning 101 and will clean up after you. Just because you are big enough to make a mess shouldn't obligate you to be big enough to clean it up.

5. If you wake up at 6:45 am and need to take a shower, be sure to lock the bathroom door! Your roommates should be able and considerate enough to drive to the nearest gas station to use the toilet. Also, make sure that you take a 40 minute shower--it really stinks when a roommate leaves for work early and you have to take the bus.

6. Leave all electrical appliances, especially the lights on at all times--we are paying for the apartment, and there is no need to conserve energy--let other less important people do that.

7. If you need to use the phone late at night and it is in your roommates room, be sure to wake them up when you go to remove it. It's important that they know you are going to make a phone call to your dog!

8. Make sure that when you answer the phone you are as rude as possible to whoever is calling so that they won't call back and bother you again--how dare they interrupt whatever it is that you are not doing!

9. Never, ever, ever, ever empty the trash--if your roommate won't do it, just let the apartment stink. You were not born a garbage man, so why lower yourself to that level especially when you are a princess?

10. If your roommate has a car and drives to work, feel free to ride with her, but don't bother to offer her any money for gas. This is the 90's and gas is free for all Summer Interns.

11. Make sure that you leave as much hair as possible on the bathroom sinks and in the shower. Don't clean out your brush over the trash can, of course your roommates want to look at pieces of your broken hair each and everytime they go to the bathroom.

12. Don't ever throw out any of your food that may be moldy because it was buried behind all the stuff that is piled in the refrigerator. Mold is a beautiful thing and everyone likes to watch it develop through its stages.

13. Feel free to eat any food that is located in the kitchen. Whether it be in your cabinet or not, it is free for the taking. Even if its not open, your roommates shop for the entire apartment, not themselves. Oh, and if your roommate questions you about missing food, pretend you know nothing about it--you can always blame it on the cookie monster.

14. If one of your roommates has fish, and she doesn't ask you to feed them when she leaves town--then don't bother wasting your time feeding them. They're only fish, and they probably won't need to eat anyway.

15. If you feel like listening to some music and you don't have a cd player or stereo, simply remove your roommate's from her room. She won't mind if you leave it, or any of her cd's, on the floor. After all, if it is not yours, why should you have to put it away??!!??

16. Make some soup whenever you want, and be sure to leave it in your roommates pot in the refrigerator for a week or two, if need be. She probably doesn't want to use her pot anyway.

17. If your roommate buys a 12 pack of chicken legs and you feel like cooking for someone else--you should definitely take your roommates chicken and cook it. Oh, and be sure that you tell the dinner guest that it is your food.

18. If a neighbor (of course a friendly one) comes over and wants some spaghetti sauce and you don't have any to give them, feel free to go into a roommates cabinet and give away theirs. They can always go to the grocery store and buy some more for themselves. Oh, and don't tell them that you've given it away either until the ever so friendly neigbor brings back a few drops of it and thanks you for giving it to them.

19. If your roommate is kind enough to take you to New York with her because she knows that you have never been there, be sure to do the following:

a. insult your roommate's friend who shows the 2 of you around the city

b. don't say thank you for anything and act as bored as possible

c. be sure to tell everyone you see when you get back what a rotten time that you had.