Roommate

Super Bowl weekend is never a big hit at the box office, but it probably will be particularly low-scoring for films this year. Two new movies ? the thriller "The Roommate" and "Sanctum," the 3-D underwater adventure produced by James Cameron ? are expected to have weak openings this weekend. "The Roommate," which stars "Gossip Girl" actress Leighton Meester, probably will be No. 1, but probably won't have an impressive premiere. According to people who have seen pre-release audience surveys, the college-set horror film should open with $12 million to $15 million in ticket sales, mostly to young women.

Question: I have rented a three-bedroom unit for two years. About eight months ago, I lost my job and could no longer pay my rent. Rather than be evicted, I found a roommate who now pays half the monthly rent. From the beginning, my roommate has written a separate check for his half of the monthly rent and I write my own check for the other half. I give both checks to the rental office, which is the place designated for payment in my rental agreement. When I took the two checks to the office last week, the new resident manager told me she would not accept the checks.

I went to see " The Social Network" this weekend as a sort of anthropological mission. I was hunting for something in the story of Facebook's beginnings to help me understand the latest tragedy linked to cyber-bullying: the suicide of a Rutgers University freshman after his roommate used a webcam to secretly capture his sexual encounter with a young man, and broadcast it on the Internet. Some are calling it a prank that went too far; others say it's a hate crime worthy of manslaughter charges.

Among the ranks of the nation's renters? Here are a few considerations: • You're a tenant. You have a dog or a cat. Those used to be mutually exclusive situations — that is, landlords were known for banishing pets from apartments. That began to change a few years ago when landlords caught on to the reality that pet ownership is huge in this country: Thirty-nine percent of U.S. households own at least one dog, and 33% own at least one cat, according to the Humane Society of the United States.

Peers can influence our behavior in positive and negative ways. A new study finds that female college freshmen who room with heavier women may gain less weight.   The study focused on 144 female college students who were randomly assigned roommates at the start of freshman year. They were asked their height and weight as well as what, if any, weight management activities they were involved with, such as being on a diet, exercising and using weight loss supplements. Researchers found that study participants who roomed with women who weighed more than average actually gained less weight during their freshman year than women who roomed with more slender gals.

A Camarillo woman was charged Monday in the slaying two years ago of an aspiring model who was found dead in her Santa Monica condo. L.A. County prosecutors formally charged Kelly Soo Park, 44, in the killing of 21-year-old Juliana Redding. Park's roommate, Ronnie Wayne Case, also was arrested by Santa Monica police detectives, but the district attorney's office declined Monday to charge the 34-year-old, pending further investigation. Authorities remained tightlipped about Park's connection to the slain model, or any potential motive, saying that detectives may still be tracking other suspects.

The woman in line ahead of me at the Trader Joe's in San Francisco was chatty and upbeat, loading up on healthful snacks for the long ride back to San Diego. She'd had a "wonderful day" picking up her son, a freshman, from the dorm at San Francisco State. I was buying a bottle of wine, which I considered opening in the parking lot before I headed back to the same dorm to join my own freshman child. A wonderful day? Maybe she had managed to snag a dolly or find a convenient parking space.

Fiona Kramer, looking fashionable in a little black dress, sized up her possible matches and told them why they ought to see themselves with her in the near future: two bedrooms, 1 1/2 baths, cute yard. Date, shmate. A good roommate can be hard to find, and that's the reason Kramer and a dozen others were chatting this month at a "speed roommating" event. It's like speed dating, except the point isn't romance. "It's smart to help split the expenses," said Kramer, who lives in Baltimore's Washington Hill neighborhood.

They weren't looking to make a political statement or to be pioneers of gender liberation. Each just wanted a familiar, decent roommate rather than a stranger after their original roommates left to study abroad. That's how Pitzer College sophomores Kayla Eland, female, and Lindon Pronto, male, began sharing a room this semester on Holden Hall's second floor. They are not a couple and neither is gay. They are just compatible roommates in a new, sometimes controversial, dormitory option known as gender-neutral housing that is gaining support at some colleges in California and across the nation.

Dear Amy: My two friends and I looked on Craigslist for a fourth roommate to share rent for the year at our house. We interviewed several people and settled on Jamie. Over time, it has become glaringly apparent that she must have some compulsive disorder because she does at least four loads of laundry a week. She runs the dishwasher daily, regardless of the load. Also, she keeps the thermostat at 78. We are concerned about energy costs. Jamie is extremely touchy, so how can we diplomatically but effectively broach the topic?