"Whose turn is it to do the dishes?"

"Whose turn is it to do the dishes?!" is a quote I often find myself screaming throughout my house. When the two new guys, Markie Mark and Kaveman, first moved in I noticed that they would help B-Fresh and I with dishes all the time. They would consistently rinse their plates off and put them in our dishwasher. However, after about a month of them living with us they started to become very lazy.

Our very first fight as new roommates came around a little after the second month of them being here. It was over the dishes. I remember it so vividly. I had not been home for about 3 days. As I walk through the door, I am instantly smacked in the face with an utterly disgusting smell combination of raw chicken juice and old milk. It was gut-wrenching, I have worked in the service industry ever since my first job and I have never smelled anything so potent before. I was gagging as I walked up the stairs and into our kitchen. Every single dish that was in our house was in some way stacked in this heap of rot where I thought our sink should be.

After realizing where the unbearable smell was coming from, I tried gathering all 3 of my roommates together so we could get these dishes clean. Both Markie Mark and Kaveman refused to help B-Fresh and I do the dishes because they were both in the middle of playing an online video game. I asked them to come help us when they were done and they both agreed to after acting extremely irritated that I asked them to help with the dishes.

After about 35 minutes, B-Fresh and I had finished all the dishes, between the two of us. We went and asked the other two why they didn't help and both said "they forgot about it". This has happened to B-Fresh and I more than once. Every time we would try and get help from one of them, they would act as if they had no contribution to the giant pile of dishes. Their most famous line though is "that isn't mine".

 Our solution to the problem was the picture you see below. I am always having to remind Markie Mark and Kaveman to put their dishes in the dishwasher because they "forget" to do so. Instead of trying to constantly remind the two to put their dishes away, I just made it so they couldn't use the "I forgot" excuse. I have this reminder on our fridge so they can't even make food without being reminded to put their dishes away.

Photo taken by me

The lesson to learn here is: Be patient with others, especially someone you live with. Small things such as doing dishes is no reason to get in arguments and possible fights with your roommate. 

Here's a link to a site in which others with roommates have posted notes that they leave for their roommates Passive-Aggressive notes