the smoking gun is so keen on, you know, the master/slave/husband/wife prenups/nutjob contracts that are just painful to read, I'm trying to draw up a S.O.P. for living together: a contractual document that prescribes transgressions, penalties and regulates our interactions in spaces like the refridgerator, the bathroom, use of closet space, parking and when it is or is not appropriate to make tuna sandwiches? Mind you, unlike those above, tabloid examples, this is a totally non-sexual/romantic cohabitation built on mutual respect and utter physical-antipathy.
If you could do this, what would you add? What would you forbid? Is this a fool's errand? Or knight errancy of the highest order?
meredith [email] said at 12:11 PM 05-02-2006: Shoes in the bathtub for one night is fine. Shoes in the bathtub for over a day should definitely be avoided.
Unless you like to wear your shoes in the bathtub. In that case, simply hang them up by the laces out of the way when you are done.
brandon [email] said at 12:15 PM 05-02-2006: Gotcha. Laxatives. I like to be regular. I like everyone else in the house to be regular, too. Should there be a disclaimer , or, like fluoridation and the water supplly, the less the public knows the better?
max [email] said at 12:21 PM 05-02-2006: I warned both of my roommates when they moved in that if they leave leftover mexican food in the fridge, I will eat it.
art [email] said at 4:11 PM 05-02-2006: I think they are okay as long as there aint no celery or onions in them. Tuna should be crunchy free. Now egg salad sandwiches - those stink up the joint and should never be forced upon a roommate. neither should potted meat product.
brandon [email] said at 4:26 PM 05-02-2006: Speaking of potted meat. I made that spam-casserole mentioned here a while back. Not recommended and definitely stinky. So that's a huge 'no'.
She's a vegetarian - though not vegan or even militantly veg, so I'm going to learn to cook more healtilyer.
But, tuna-salad. It's a texture. The celery and stuff in a tuna matrix brings to mind particles of gristle or bones, I can't eat the stuff.
marcia [email] said at 5:47 PM 05-02-2006: when we were in tennessee with my dad, he would buy cans and cans of pork brains...and eat them straight out of the can. i think that's the main reason he would take us to tennessee every summer--so he could eat his pork brains without my mom being able to stop him. what memories...no wonder his heart is so bad now!
brandon [email] said at 4:13 PM 05-02-2006: Are you kidding? I'm a tunafish fiend. What is it that has turned people against the tunnyfish? I love it more than bbq-flavor vienna sausage.
meredith [email] said at 7:01 PM 05-02-2006: Do you remember that gelatinous green substance with weird colored dots in it that you made in my cassarol dish that one time? What was that? I've always wondered. You never ate it, you just stuck your hand in it for a minute right before you threw it out so that I could pack the dish.
john [email] said at 11:08 AM 05-03-2006: Well, they sort of collect pubes and dirt and act as a breeding ground for mildew and fungi. Just feels gross to step on them, especially when you share the shower with roommates.
myriam [email] said at 12:33 PM 05-03-2006: They're disgusting. They collect all your nasty dirty water running off your body and let it sit and pool and collect and ferment and form gestation grounds for millions of yeasty little one-celled beings. There's a reason God made bathtubs out of porcelain, my friend.
john [email] said at 1:33 PM 05-03-2006: Bathroom cleaners work fine, if you want to scrub the bath mat and remove hair from it after each time your roommate showers. Who has time for that? In my case, I have two disgusting roommates, one of which found an old, stained, yellow crusty bath mat from a previous tennant down in the basement, and she decided to put it in our shower one day. It's sickening. I refuse to stand on it while I shower, so I removed it one day. Three weeks later, another random, used, nasty bath mat acquired from a yard sale or something, showed up in the shower again. So, I just keep taking them out.
myriam [email] said at 3:29 PM 05-03-2006: Those get dirt and gunk caked onto them--I'm sure if you've Comet-ed really hard you've probably noticed. A fun game is to do half the tub and then stop and look at the comparison with the rest. Ha! This is how I spend my Saturdays! I actually have the remnants of those in my bathtub now and have been trying to scrub them away for the last 2 years. They NEVER come off. We will have dirty little dots at the bottom of our tub forever. Makes me sad because I love to take baths but I can't bring myself to put my ass and my special bits in direct contact with those grody mongerers of disease.
brandon [email] said at 3:34 PM 05-03-2006: If you're that worried. Soak the tub in a bleach solution for 12 hours before you bathe. Drain the tub before entering, as those special bits and bleach don't really mix well. Bonus: Your Roommate falls in and dies. Or accidentally drops a block of frozen ammonia in it, and dies.
josh [email] said at 3:38 PM 05-03-2006: I think you are a bit too scared of germs. The human immune system is a powerful thing. Have you ever swam in a stream or lake? I would guarantee you came in contact with far more "disease" than in your bathtub... yet you are still quite alive.
myriam [email] said at 8:56 AM 05-04-2006: ha ha, don't worry, I'm not. I know you don't know me that well, so I guess, just trust me. I'm one of the least germphobic people I know. My mom grew up in a third world country and raised me to cut mold off bread and cheese and eat it, fry greenish sandwich meat to make it edible again, etc. etc. But if I have a choice to install something that collects scum in my shower or not, I'm going to choose the latter. Knowing that germs aren't going to kill you doesn't mean you need to live in filth.
melissa said at 4:58 PM 05-03-2006: get a glass scraper. its a lil razor blade designed to get stickers & paint off glass & other surfaces. only problem is it might scratch your tub & leave gray scratches plus those grippy things are really hard to take off even with the scraper. but its either scrape or wait for them to die. & the ones my parents had in their tub didn't wear off for ten years
john [email] said at 12:03 AM 05-03-2006: That bath mat made a return to the shower right after you left Myriam. I keep taking it back out everytime it gets put back in. Someone just doesn't get it.
kevin [email] said at 5:45 PM 05-03-2006: i got some roofing tar stuff that was on my shoes stuck onto the carpet. someone told me to spray wd40 on to the carpet, wait a bit and the tar would then would lift off all easy like, and damn it really did!
so just spray some wd40 on it. the answer for everything!
Oona said at 4:09 PM 05-03-2006: How about one of those perpetual cleaning gizmos on the market! It just constantly sprays your shower area with cleaner. Round and round. I'd don't know if I'd buy it, I'm just saying....
