December 18, 2008

Clueless in Philadelphia

Everyone is pretty clueless when first moving away from home -- I had my own crisis of personal care products. But my husband's first roommate was at the extreme of annoyingly clueless, and not just because he played Nirvana's Nevermind so much as to make my husband hate Nirvana forever.

Neither was (or is) particularly neat, and the tiny kitchen was often overrun with dirty dishes. One night there was an awful stench, so awful it could be smelled in the living room. We wanted to cook, so we tackled the job of cleaning up a week's worth of takeout containers, dishes and pans.

First we tackled the obvious: the trash and dishes. Still the same stench. We cleaned out the fridge: still stinky! We cleaned the stove and counters: still stinky. We pulled the small floor cabinet away from the wall to check for dead mice: no mice, still stinky.

We looked at each other. What could it be? One of us tentatively suggested, "maybe it's the garbage disposal?"

"He must know how to run the disposal."

"He doesn't know how to wash dishes."

My husband used a spoon to gently prod into the (not running) garbage disposal and found all sorts of half decomposing kitchen garbage. Reluctantly, we turned on the disposal, and a stench so powerful it could have developed language skills enveloped us, then thankfully dissipated as the garbage went into the Philly sewers.

What surprises have your roommates left you?