1. Not cleaning up after yourself. Back home it might have been part of the routine to only clean your room once a month. In college, you’re sharing a room with someone else who might not appreciate that. If you aren’t at least doing a courtesy sweep of your side of the room two or three times a week, chances are it’s looking messy. Just remember to pick up dirty clothes and food containers. You don’t want your roomie’s friends coming in and thinking you’re a slob.
2. Junk Food. If there’s one thing you’re guaranteed to do in your room, it’s eat. Like most college students, you’re probably eating whatever’s fast and easy. Normally, you’d eat your cookies and donuts and no one would be the wiser. With a roommate that goes out the window. Those crumbs you’ve been kicking under the bed and the wrappers overflowing in your trash can? Yeah, she knows all about them. So try some fruit and a healthy meal every once in a while, if only to save face.
3. Not doing laundry. I bet in your head you’ve got a laundry schedule all thought out and planned. Then, life catches up. You’ve got tests and papers all week, and next thing you know you’re out of clothes. That overflowing pile of laundry in the corner or hanging out of your closet is pretty obvious to anyone in the room. Try studying while your laundry washes, or even take a shower while your stuff is in the dryer. That’ll cut down on time and keep that pile from growing.
4. Wearing dirty clothes. If that laundry isn’t getting done it can be tempting to put it off even longer and just re-wear those jeans, which is fine. Most people wear jeans two or three times before they’re considered dirty. However, it gets a little obvious, and a whole lot stinky, if you’re digging through the hamper for jeans from last week. Once you make the decision that something’s dirty, don’t take it back out. That way when you run out of clothes you’ll actually wash them instead of just spraying them with perfume or Febreze.
5. Lack of showering. You might think if you aren’t going to the gym and you aren’t sweating it’s okay to skip the daily shower. While normally a shower every other day is considered acceptable, if you’re waiting anywhere from three days to a week, your roomie has definitely noticed.
6. Watching TV until 4 a.m. You may think you’re only affecting your own sleep patterns, but odds are the volume on the TV or the light from your computer is keeping your roomie up too. Even if it wasn’t, it’s bad to get in the habit of falling asleep to a screen. So turn off the soaps and go to sleep at a reasonable time. Your test performance will thank you.