I Need a Reality Show to Help Me Pick a Roommate

So I will soon be welcoming a new roommate to my home, and I’m really quite excited because she seems terrific.  She’s my age, a triathlete, teacher, and most importantly she’s an eater.  This is very important for a baker.

I met her through one of those internet roommate websites, which is basically online dating for renters.  Very similar crowd actually, and it is interesting how you have to weed through people the same way.  The new roommate and I met for lunch a few weeks back and it – no crap – felt like a first date.  I told her this, she laughed, and two weeks later she’s moving in.  We move fast...what can I say?

The whole roommate selection process has really taught me a lot about my own judgment and perception, and I’ve come up with a short list of phrases that now make me run screaming for the hills when I hear them come out of a potential renter’s mouth.  In no particular order (they all send up equally large red flags of panic and alarm):

1.     “I’m very mature for my age.”

Translation: I date older men because they make more money.

What it means for you: Drama, in spades.  Prepare yourself with an anti-drama bomb shelter, if possible.  Canned goods, toilet paper, bottled water, US Weekly, etc.

2.     “I pretty much live on Match.com.”

Translation: I pretty much live on Match.com (this is scary enough as is and requires no translation).

What it means for you: Go ahead and up your bandwidth now.  She will prowl the Internet at all hours in search of her prey.  Once she nabs one, she will disappear for days on end.  And just as you are on the phone with the police filing a missing persons report, she will stumble in the door, bloated and hangover-puffy, looking like Frankenstein’s Bride doing the walk of shame right into your living room.  She will then proceed to cry for eight days straight because she’s lost the love of her life.  Repeat cycle.

3.     “My last roommate and I were, like, total besties.”

Translation: My last roommate threw me pity parties all the time and took my trash out for me.

What it means for you: If you were hoping this person would actually be good company, adjust fire and reconsider your assumptions.  You may occasionally go to IHOP for some pancakes, but only so you can listen to her gush about how her Boyfriend of the Week is so perfect “it’s just, like, scary,” or watch her sob uncontrollably into her Viva la French Toast because she can’t understand why he just didn’t call her back or why he had his ‘sister’ call to say he was dead.  (By the way, no lie.  That really happened.  More later…).

4.     “I was SO born to live the upper class life.”

Translation: I am a gold digger with no intention of working and my degree is only for make-believe and pretend.

What it means for you: Thankfully, not much.  But it’s a pity to watch.  She will, however, scoff regularly at your middle-class upbringing and frequently comment on how normal things like cotton sheets and oatmeal for breakfast just aren’t her “thing.”

5.     “I was SO born to be a mommy.”

Translation: I have only one standard for my baby-daddy: six figure salary.

What it means for you: Be wary of this one.  It would be smart to add a clause in your rental contract that if she breaks her lease early due to unplanned pregnancy, she owes the remainder of the rent or at least has to sit there and listen to you say “I totally predicted this!” for like an hour straight.  Watch the trash (since you’ll likely be taking it out anyway) for used pregnancy tests, and if you happen to meet any of the Match.com Men, you may want to casually slip him a note reminding him to “double up.”  Also, consider posting her picture in the local hospital’s maternity ward to ward off any potential baby snatching.

6.     “Gosh, I wish I had someone to help me move my stuff.”

Translation: Gosh, I’m way too lazy to do manual labor.

What it means for you: If you’re smart, nothing.  Or almost nothing.  You have no obligation to help, so my suggestion would be not to.  This does, however, force her into a position where she either has to get up off her ass and move things herself or hop onto Match.com and drudge up some semi-muscly dope willing to move her crap for her.  Hide your valuables; you don’t know what kind of miscreant she’ll force into slave labor.

7.     “I have chronic migraines, and IBS, and PMS, and I’m predisposed to cancer and Crohn’s and…”

Translation: I will harness all available pity so that I never have to work.  But I can totally go watch the rerelease of ‘Titanic’ in 3D because it’s my faaaaaavorite movie, like, ever.

What it means for you: Use a portion of her rent to invest in a good pair of noise cancelling headphones that can drown out the bitching and be prepared to never have help emptying the dishwasher.   Hide your prescription medications, and occasionally inspect her living space for indications it’s being used as a meth lab.

There are, of course, so many more.  But these are the ones I’m most familiar with, having come from my previous roommate, Tracie.  More on her to come, because frankly she’s the stuff Lifetime Movie Network dramas are made of. 

Here’s hoping (and praying!) my new roommate is as great as she seems!