By Nora Clancy

Elissa Mallory ’07, Guy Schaffer ’07, and Ann Zander ’07 share a cozy pet-filled bungalow on Hague Avenue. Zander and Schaffer, Fresh Concepts veterans who are “always on” are the most entertaining roommates Mallory has ever had. In between caring for their various pets the three roommates chatted about Mallory’s Texan neighbor, discussed Modigliani’s nudes, and worked on a name for the next addition to their household. Do you have a name for your house?

Ann & Guy: The Zaffery.
Guy: I came up with that.
Elissa: It comes from our last names: Zander, Schaffer, and Mallory.
Ann: Especially if our house had a hookah lounge in the attic, I feel like it would be perfect. Then everybody would get to walk through Guy’s room to get to the lounge.
Guy: I kind of like it. I like being exposed like that.

Do you have nicknames for each other?

Elissa: Sometimes we call Ann “Fatty McFat Fat.”
Ann: It’s true. Although now we have a cat named Fatty, which makes it confusing.

Do you have any other animals?

Elissa: We have Fatty the cat. Her real name is Rachel. I did not name her, I thought that was a stupid name for a cat, so we started calling her Fatty, which is much better.
Guy: She’s getting skinnier though.
Elissa: We have a dog named Lola, and Ann has two rats named Gypsy and Poopsie.
Ann: Elissa found the rats on Craigslist for me. This woman had taken them from these kids she had nannied for who named them Gypsy and Poopsie. But then apparently they didn’t pay attention to them.
Guy: Gypsy is a little offensive, though.
Ann: Is she?
Guy: No the name. The politically correct term is Roma.
Ann: Roma and Poopsie!

Do you have plans to get more pets?
Guy: I want to get a lizard. I might name it Pastiche.
Ann: What does that even mean? Like Pistache? Pistachio?
Guy: I think Pastiche is something else.
Ann: Maybe you should name it Pistache.
Guy: That could be fun. Do they make pistachio colored lizards?

How did you guys come to be roommates?

Ann: Guy’s like the glue.
Guy: Yeah, I like to think the G on my door stands for “glue” and not “Guy.”

Ann: Freshman year, Guy lived exactly two floors below me in Dupre.
Guy: On the same floor as Elissa.
Elissa: We were friends because we met in the laundry room. And how were you guys friends?
Guy & Ann: Fresh Concepts, that’s how we met. But then we realized that we both used those side stairs in Dupre that most people don’t use. You know.
Guy: They’re great stairs.

What is that grey thing on your table?

Ann: We are trying to grow a brain in a beaker. We are in the process of it. Guy got a care package from his parents with cookies and a growing brain.
Elissa: It is growing in a “Perfection Urine Specimen” bottle that I got from my dead neighbor’s house. We have many things that came from my dead neighbor’s house.
Guy: Who was your neighbor’s friend?
Elissa: My dead neighbor was good friends with Tennessee Williams. He once had dinner with Capote and rubbed elbows with the Rockefellers in New York when he was young. He lived across the street from us and when he died [last March] he left my parents everything.

Why did he leave you everything?

Elissa: Basically we were the only people who managed not to piss him off. He was a weird, weird man. In one of his suit pockets we found two hundred dollar bills and a diamond ring. That had just been in his closet for like, 50 years.

Who got to keep the ring?

Elissa: We sold it. We sold all his stuff.
Guy: I thought I was gonna get some of it!
Elissa: Didn’t I bring you some ties?
Guy: No!

Did you get anything else besides the urine bottle?

Elissa: I got books, a painting he did and two other paintings. One of them is a sketch by the guy who wrote “Silence of the Lambs.”

How do you like to spend time together?

Guy: We love arts and crafts.
Elissa: We just had a big arts and crafts party. We have a craft buffet.
Guy: If you look anywhere in this room you will see crafts.
Ann: I think there are three different sock puppets in here.

What happens at an arts and crafts party?

Elissa: We just have all sorts of crazy things that you can make crafts out of, and you get really drunk and make crafts with your friends. But be careful with scissors and glue guns and things like that.

What kinds of craft tools do you have?

Ann: Scissors, tape, glitter, glue guns, crayons.

Elissa: We also have scrap fabric, mylar, and magnetic tape.
Guy: We’ve got these little finger condoms.
Ann: At Art Scraps they’re called “finger gloves” but they look like condoms. They sell them by bag-fulls.
Guy: Art Scraps is an important place.

What do you make?

Ann: I made a rat carrier for my pet rats. I haven’t used it yet but I sewed a rat carrier that night.
Elissa: I made that carpet sculpture monster. We also have a button maker. So we make a lot of buttons.

On a given day what will you most likely be doing?

Ann: Probably eating.
Elissa: We cook a lot.
Guy: We’re good cooks.

What is your house specialty?

Elissa: Ann makes Cameroonian omlettes.
Guy: Yeah, those are nice.
Ann: It’s mostly made with bullion cubes. In Cameroon they are called Maggi Cubes.
Guy: Cubes of Magic!
Ann: You think it says Maggic at first and you’re like, “magic!” but then it’s not. It has a picture of whatever animal’s face it’s supposed to taste like on the package. Like cow or pig or chicken.
Guy: Really? I was expecting like, African animals like Gazelle or Tiger.
Ann: We call it “cube.” The omlettes are just like egg and “cube” and onion and garlic.
The thing that’s awesome is I can flip omlettes just by using the pan and the action of my wrist.
Guy: What’s the secret?
Ann: I think the secret is just…doing it. Just like, going for it.
Guy: Believing in yourself?
Ann: If you hesitate that’s when it will only go halfway. If you’re like “I’m just gonna throw it forward and see what happens,” it lands in the pan every time. Except when you’re making it like, with seven eggs. Then some of it goes behind the stove.

Tell me about this altered Modigliani poster on your wall.

Ann: The poster is my favorite craft. It’s Guy’s woman that used to be naked. He dressed her and made her into an androgenous being.
Guy: I call it “Reclining Dude.” The construction paper is actually not part of the painting. It’s putting the ‘mo back in digliani.

How do you sum up your house?

Guy: If you are going to come away from our house with any salient points, it’s animals and crafts.