Love this thread! Thanks for starting it.
My sophomore year, I roomed with a friend and was very excited about it. We coordinated so that we had matching bedspreads, etc.
Unfortunately, my friend neglected to tell me that she had a boyfriend in the Navy whom she'd drive 3 hours to pick up whenever he had weekend shore leave (which seemed like it was every weekend) -- and it never occurred to her that I might be extremely uncomfortable with him staying in the room with us. She never even asked me about it. I found out that this was the arrangement when I was awakened one night by their "fooling around" noises. :P
Another friend let me stay with her when the boyfriend came to town. Bless her for that.
I was pretty annoyed by the whole situation, and my roomie didn't seem to get it when I would try to explain that her arrangement made me really uncomfortable and that my privacy was invaded whenever the boyfriend stayed over.
The final straw came at the end of a long weekend. I had been backpacking with some friends and hadn't showered in three days. I was hot and sweaty and sticky, and all I wanted was a hot shower and to crash out for a while. However, when I entered my dorm room, I saw the boyfriend and some old shirtless guy with a chest tattoo lounging on our sofa, watching TV -- and my roomie was nowhere in sight.
I asked where she was. "Oh, she's downstairs doing our laundry."
I said that I had just come in from backpacking and wanted to shower (we had an attached bath). "Oh, go right ahead! We don't mind."
EXCUSE ME???
I ended up going to my other friend's room to shower, and the next day, I went to Student Life to put in for a room transfer at the semester.
After that, I roomed with sisters. It made all the difference in the world.
