Sunday, May 3, 2009

Roommates

Webster's online dictionary defines a roommate as "One of two or more persons sharing the same room or living quarters - also called roomie." This is important because this post is centered around roommates, and it's important that everyone knows what one is. Many people have "roomies" at some point in their life. I currently have three. We get along well, and rarely have any problems...until this last week.

Look at this place. It's not an ordinary house, made of cement and wood. No, this house is made from the stuff that dreams are made of.

My roommates and I, along with some friends, have been considering leaving our apartment and renting a house. We found one we really liked...but didn't get it. Something about working through a realtor, who was working through a listing agent, who was working with the owner. Also, it is possible the owner was looking to rent to a family, not a bunch of college guys. I guess it's also possible I shouldn't have stood outside the owner's bedroom window at night, softly chanting "rent us the house...rent us the house...also, install a pool, with a high dive coming off the roof...". So, with that dream gone, I looked for another house. A friend of mine sent me a link to a beautiful, 7 bedroom house, with 6200 square feet of goodness. A little on the pricey side, but with that kind of square footage, we could have fit like 20 guys in there. A great idea, right? I thought so. Sadly none of my roommates seemed to catch the dream. Despite my bringing it up every 4 minutes for 6 days straight (yes that includes all night long too), they refused to budge on the idea. They tore my dream house apart, one dream brick at a time.

Two out of three roommates agree: Raccoons living on your balcony is not a good thing. Well, two out of three roommates are wrong!

If that were the only offense, I could have forgiven them...well...technically I probably still wouldn't have gotten over it any time soon, but might have some day in the distant future forgiven them. But that same day, more excitement entered my life that I tried to share with my roommates, only to be met with cold eyes, doubtful shakes of the head, and one yelling at me to get out of his room, he didn't want to rent that stupid house. I had woken up that morning to a crash from somewhere in the apartment (or just outside the apartment, as it would turn out). I went out, prepared to fall down and play dead if I saw a robber. But instead of a suspicious looking character putting our TV in a large bag, I saw that, somehow, two raccoons had gotten onto our third floor balcony. Exciting, right? Who doesn't want raccoons for pets? I'm not sure if we're allowed to have cats or dogs, but I'm certain there aren't any rules against raccoons. And think of the benefits. We wouldn't have to take our trash all the way to the dumpster any more, we could just throw it on the balcony and the raccoons would eat it. I'm pretty sure there was no downside to this. Yet, disappointingly, only one roommate seemed excited about the prospect of raccoons living on our balcony. In the end it didn't matter much. As mysteriously as they appeared in the morning, they disappeared in the night, leaving no trace...nor dead raccoon bodies on the ground from a three story plunge.

3 comments:

Amy said...

I'm sorry your roommates couldn't catch either of your visions. I personally think raccoons are great pets. We even had one when I was a kid. We found him outside, abandoned by his mother, and put him in a box, and named him Mr. Dickens, and gave him way more love and attention than his negligent mother did. But sadly, the state of California sides with your roommates and we had to give him up to the Humane Society after a week or so. I later dreamed that I went to the Humane Society which, in my dream, was a lovely place with a lush, indoor forest, and I saw Mr. Dickens (now grown) and talked to him and he told me how happy he was in his new home. I didn't wake up reassured because I suspected the Humane Society wasn't nearly as nice a place as I'd dreamed, and more than suspected that raccoons don't actually talk. But it was nice while it lasted. By which I am referring to both the raccoon pet and the dream.

Wow, this may be the longest blog comment anyone's post has ever inspired from me.

Brian said...

I believed in the house dream as well. Sigh.

You should watch the Little House on the Prairie episode where Laura finds a raccoon and thinks it would be a fun pet, so she keeps it in the barn, but then it bites her and it might have rabies, so Michael Landon has to shoot it and finds out that Laura's going to be okay (this was a very traumatic event in my childhood). That will teach you to have a pet raccoon.

Kristin McElderry said...

I am pro-raccoon and pro-house. Gosh- I think my vote should have counted!!