Before college, you stalk the school your heart is set on for months on end.

You google the library and the residence halls and the fitness center all the time in your anticipation to finally be a full-time student. The first step is your acceptance letter, then comes enrollment, then the dreaded wait for move-in day. In that time period, while you're waiting on the end of your senior year to end and summer to begin, you begin to fantasize and picture what it will be like to live independently in a dorm.

You may even write out a list of to-dos that, I'm sorry to say, may not actually be accomplished. This may not pertain to everyone, but my expectations were a little far-fetched from the reality that was soon to come.

1. A Forever spotless room

Not saying that your room will be messy all the time, but it does NOT stay spotless. Unless it is a brand spanking new facility, your dorm room will have lots of spots and scuffs from previous residents and will never actually be clean before you move in.

You may clean your room every day the first week but that will soon come to an end. Your desk will be cluttered a little with reading assignments and post-its and your bed might not be made every single day like you had hoped; however, as long as your dorm doesn't look like something off of TLC's "Hoarding: Buried Alive", you should be okay and it won't be the end of the world if you don't wipe your desk down with disinfectant every time a crumb touches it.

2. Avoiding elevators

This one is different for every person but I know that when I first moved in, I vowed to always take the stairs because I wanted to be fit and healthy all the time, every second. What I didn't realize was that with sports workouts coming up, taking the stairs was going to seem like a hard feat after already doing tons of stair workouts most mornings at 6 a.m. with the team. A lot of people do in fact avoid the elevator in my dorm but the lift will become very tempting at some point no matter who you are.

3. Harris Teeter Tuesdays

For some odd reason, I got it into my head that I would be going every week to the grocery store downtown. I even set aside a weekly budget. Things happen, though, and you'll need that money for other miscellaneous things along the way such as batteries and toiletries. It's still always nice to get a membership and a student discount for your local store for when the time arises that you do get to go.

4. Communal bathrooms

I understand that these are completely unpredictable and something that is pondered about the most during those few months leading up to college.

Don't have extremely high expectations but don't have extremely low ones either. I can tell you firsthand that there are pros and cons to every communal bath situation. For my roommate and I, it seems like we are some of the only people with decency when it comes to ours. They aren't as crowded as I thought and the showers are never hogged for us since there are two bathrooms on our floor for ten rooms to share, but they still can get very nasty very fast.

Someone comes in to clean them every day, but they don't always have time to deep clean the showers and they don't come in at all on the weekends. I'll spare you the details, but flushing is apparently a virtue in this day and age for some.

5. RAs

Everyone expects their RA to be their best friend, an older sister, or even something like Coco Wexler off of "Zoey 101". To be honest, RA's will either be a good friend or your worst enemy. But it's not just your RA you have to worry about, it's other floors' RA's, too. Because most of them will work at the front desk, you'll probably get to know them all within the first couple of weeks. Good luck.

6. Pests

Pests aren't a massive problem, so I don't mean to scare you; however, it's typically something that you don't tend to think about before college because...its pests. We had a problem with people putting outside food trash in the bathroom trash can which made the smell(our room is right across from the bathroom) and a few bugs make their way to our doorway.

By bugs I mean cockroaches and if you live in the South like I do, you know that we have Carolina cockroaches. They fly and they're big and they're disgusting. The problem was soon fixed with a complaint over the phone, but we will always remember the dreaded day of when a Carolina Roach latched onto my shoe...and wouldn't let go...

7. Fire alarms

Yeah, you've heard the stories of the fire alarm going off in all hours of the night, but have you ever heard of it going off twice in one night? It happens! We've only had one fire alarm go off for my dorm once, but the residence hall nearby had one at 1 AM and a second at 4 AM and they still had to go to class at 8 AM the next day. Brutal.

8. Quiet nights

The girls next door will keep you up a LOT with their booming laughter and thunderous wall hitting. Sometimes it may be at even 3 AM. Don't underestimate the noise power of teenage girls(and boys).

9. Getting comfortable

You usually don't think about how quickly you'll get used to the dorm life. Once your family leaves and you've said all your goodbyes, you may be a bit sad, but the first night when your roommate simply asks,"Dinner?" it'll be the first step to growing accustomed to your new, independent dorm life. You'll learn to love it.