And now, as promised, an exploration in communal living that is my house:

Let's start with the inhabitants.

There's me, obviously- in my latest incarnation, I'm a slightly-reclusive workaholic who reads mountains of feminist and queer theory books and tries to maintain some semblance of a social life.

Patrick, whom you all know and love, is trying to relive last summer, which he views as some of the best months of his life. Unfortunately, he seems to be doomed to failure and instead manages a busy social life and disappears a lot.

Corey is fairly quiet, and is attempting to subsist by temping, which makes her schedule somewhat abnormal. She frequently comes up with elaborate plans for amusing herself with...

Becca, who was one of Corey's roommates last year. She's a vegan of the Susan Powter persuasion ("You need to look at everything you want to eat and ask yourself, 'Did it grow that way?' If not, DON't EAT IT!"), and works at a whole foods grocery. Becca is also very quiet, but prone to occasional freak-out episodes which, well, freak me out.

Krysti, who shares a room with Corey, is a canvasser (one of those annoying people who knock on your door and ask for money for their cause) for MPIRG and works from 2 til 10 or 11 pm, which means I see her next to never. All I can tell you is that of our housemates, Krysti probably has the junkiest taste in food- her cupboard contains, among other things, marshmallows, instant mashed potatoes, and a large bag of Starburst.

Ginnie is also a canvasser, but for a different organization. She does, however, work equally strange hours, so I rarely see her either. Ginnie is our house's resident hippie- I can't quite describe how, but it's evident in a sort of 'hippie aura'.

So, we're all a bunch of weirdos. Really, the latter four form the 'core' house group, if it can be called that. They have been friends for much longer, and Patrick and I tend to distance ourselves somewhat. We all just kind of go about our business- sometimes I don't see Krysti or Ginnie for days- without really getting too involved with each other. It's only when we're all forced to communicate and make a decision that things get slightly weird.

The rent, for instance, is due in a few days. Many of us have made observations to that effect, but no one has done much about it. So, since I'm just bumming around tonight, I decided that I'd take the initiative and have everyone make out their checks to me so I could write one to the landlord. Of course, half my housemates are convinced that we can each write separate personal checks as long as they total the rent. Err, I don't think so. If I were a landlord, would I want 6 checks? Tracking down how much was paid, if anyone was late, etc, would be a nightmare. So not only do I have to stay up late enough to get checks from all the late workers, but I have to convince them that writing me a check is actually necessary. Whoopee!

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