Rob

I’ve written about the advantages of moving in with my girlfriend Lena recently, but I failed to mention that we also live with a couple of extra roommates, Matt and Kathleen. Kathleen is 25, only a couple of years older than me and Lena, and works as a manager at a restaurant in town. Matt is 31 and is one of the top chefs at a different restaurant nearby. While it might seem like an inconvenient situation for a couple to share an apartment with two other people, it's actually worked out much better than expected - just like moving in with Lena!

First of all, having two roommates that work in the restaurant industry means that our schedules rarely line up. As a result, we usually only see each other two or three times a week for brief periods, which means that we never feel like we're on top of each other in the apartment.

While we all appreciate the way our schedules allow us all to have free reign of the apartment at different times, it also makes it difficult for us to hang out and bond like regular roommates. Even when we make plans to see each other, there's usually some sort of last-minute restaurant emergency that keeps either Matt or Kathleen away for the night. However, we managed to line up our work schedules this week so we could all sit down to the first roommate dinner in the apartment.

Considering that Matt is a chef at one of the fanciest restaurants in town, it was only natural that he cook up something extra delicious for dinner. I came home from work to the intoxicating aromas of fresh stuffing, roasting pork, buttery potatoes, and all manner of herbs and spices. When Lena and Kathleen arrived, we sat down at the table together for the first time, popped a bottle of wine and let the evening take us where it may.

Several servings and glasses of wine later, we were all swapping stories about our families, childhoods, annoying jobs we had worked and plans for the future. The wine had made us a little sleepy, but we didn't want to cut the night short, so we threw on the Keurig® brewer and brewed some strong coffee to keep us going.

Before long we were talking and drinking coffee well into the evening. The hot beverages got us in the mood for some dessert, so we finished up the evening heading to the local ice cream shop for some after dinner treats. I really hope that we can find time in our busy schedules to make roommate dinner night a regular tradition.