CHRISTINA TAYLOR / Scroll
Apartment obsessions with The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter and other random fads create unique living conditions for students at BYU-Idaho. Lighting boxers on fire in the microwave and stealing shower curtains are some pranks various apartment complexes have been involved in.

Thought your roommates were crazy?

Think again — stories of the strange

Tina Dean DEA05004@BYUI.EDU Scroll Staff

Some apartments have an interesting mix of personalities, from Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stouts who will not take the garbage out, to white rabbits who can’t seem to make it home on time for curfew. Six different people living together for over three months equals quite a few interesting stories.

Brian Anderson, a resident assistant and junior from Wilmington, Ohio, said, “When you put 50 18-year-old guys together in small living quarters, you’re bound to have chaos.”

“Chaos” would well describe one apartment that Anderson knew. This apartment was obsessed with The Lord of the Rings and hundreds of stacked Mountain Dew cans occupied virtually every flat surface, representing entire cities from the movies.

“And then, of course, you have those towers of pizza boxes used to build walls,” Anderson said.

Joseph Cunningham, a junior from Three Lakes, Wis., has encountered chaotic experiences of his own during his time as an RA.

Cunningham will never forget the time someone left popcorn in the microwave and accidentally locked himself outside the apartment; a hole was burned through the bag while the popcorn cooked for 10 minutes, smoked for even longer and left an impermeable smell for what seemed like forever.

The microwave stories don’t end there. Another RA related a story in which a student entered his friends’ room and put his boxers in the microwave, assuming they would take them out; they did, but not before the boxers had caught on fire.

It’s when roommates connive together that things can get out of hand. For example, floor A of an apartment complex was in a constant state of war with floor C as each took turns playing pranks on the other.

One night, floor A “borrowed” all of the shower curtains from floor C, and in an attempt to cover their tracks, took their own shower curtains as well. However, they did not plan on floor C waking up early. Upon discovering the missing shower curtains, they quietly borrowed floor B’s.

In the end, simple deductive reasoning led the RAs to the floor responsible for the conspiracy.

But no matter what kind of scheme you have up your sleeve, one is bound to get suspicious, said RA Perry Palmer, a freshman from Granby, Mo.

Especially if you leave a note like the one he received one evening:

“Dear RA, do not come into our apartment unless we let you in.”