When I moved into my apartment one of my big reservations was the kitchen. It was old and grungy. Even the deepest cleaning would still leave inpenetrable filth. My landlady has been amenable to making improvements, though, so bit by bit the situation has been ameliorated. We have a new refrigerator and a new oven, she has engaged someone to retile the floor, and she's letting us repaint. So today one of my roommates and I made our first pass on changing the aesthetics of the place by painting the walls blue.
On the whole I suppose this is a decent place to live, but I still have a few issues. One is that I live with three other girls, but I only have a decent relationship with one (the one who's painting with me). The others aren't horrible, and now that we all have cable and internet in our own rooms, and completely different schedules, we can go a long time without actually seeing each other... But their standards of cleanliness and mine are not sufficiently equal and this is driving me nuts. Granted it took a LONG time to learn how to keep my living space tidy. I still have more to master, and a lot of laziness to overcome. But really. Globs of toothpaste left in the sink? Did you not NOTICE??? If the garbage can is full, can you not take it out? Crumbs on the table, dishes piled in the sink... do you think your mother lives here? Would it kill you to actually clean once in a while?
And the alarm. Oy, the alarm. One of the roommates has an alarm clock that doesn't beep, it doesn't play music... it crows. And she doesn't always hear it. It just crows and crows and crows... Today (Saturday!) it woke me up at 6am. Other days it goes off when I'm awake but studying. It is very hard to read court cases with a "cock-a-doodle-doo!" grating in the background. Even with the doors closed, it's a sound that can't be shut out. Music could maybe even blend into the background, but a screeching rooster penetrates everything.