Reading my Sun-Times today and found out that the University of Chicago is now allowing men and women to room together in its dormitories, a new policy that 50 students will take advantage of, so to speak.

I’m trying to imagine what my father’s reaction would have been if I wanted to room with a boy in my college dorm.

I’m wondering how it would have gone if he had let me.

In all likelihood, it would have been no big deal, though at some point I imagine it would get tiring having to bring all of your clothes to the bathroom every time you wanted to change – which is how one girl interviewed said she was going to work it — and you’d just tell your roommate to turn around.

Then, pretty soon it would get tiring having to tell your roommate to turn around and you’d just change clothes in front of him.

Eventually, you’d start living like a regular married couple, walking around in your less-than-gorgeous underwear, nagging each other to make the beds and pretty soon you’d have a bunch of 20-year-old kids vowing never to get married at all.

The girl interviewed said she had a boyfriend, so no one had to worry that her roommate situation was “a romantic thing.” But then again, there is no fooling-around box to check if you want to room with the opposite sex at the U. of C.  If you want to room with your boyfriend or girlfriend, they can’t exactly legislate that.

If this is a shock to anyone, then they never went to college.

My roommate my sophomore year in college had a boyfriend whom she lived with – in their hometown 20 minutes away from campus. In other words, I didn’t really have a roommate, which worked out nicely for me until my roommate’s mother decided to catch her in this little scheme by calling every morning at 6 a.m. to speak to her.

Telling her that her daughter was at the library didn’t work so well. And she didn’t buy the shower excuse after the fourth or fifth time either. The goofy thing – which even at 19, I understood – was that of course the mother knew exactly what was going on and it really wasn’t necessary to wake me up every morning at 6 to prove it.

I remember when my sister Susie went to college, they were not only not allowed to have boys in their rooms, but they couldn’t have men in the building unless they signed in with the house mother.

“It could have been a dad, it didn’t matter,” Susie recalled. “But she’d call over the loudspeaker, ‘Man in the house, and we’d have to close our doors or cover ourselves up or something. “

Like all the women in my family, my sister tends to exaggerate, so it’s quite possible that the part about covering up and closing their doors was thrown in to make the story better.  She was madly in love with Marty Biviano at the time, so she can be excused for not remembering every detail clearly except that she had to stop making out with Marty and go back in the dorm in time for the 10 p.m. curfew each night. That, she remembered.

I also remember my sister, 12 years older than me, being horrified to learn that our parents allowed me to have a boy – a longtime buddy – in my bedroom in high school, where we watched M*A*S*H reruns and ate popcorn and my parents would usually fall asleep before he went home.

I’m not sure it was because my father had somehow mellowed since Susie was a teenager. I just don’t think, given my desire to play basketball and watch Bears games, that my father thought of me as a future woman at that stage.

Unfortunately, this stereotype followed me into adulthood.

Once, when I was working at my first newspaper job out of college, I was asked by my boss to share a hotel room with a male sportswriter on our staff to save money on a trip to cover a college bowl game. I was maybe 24, 25 years old, the guy happened to be about my age and I didn’t want to say no to my boss.

Of course, my colleague, a real wise guy, got a kick out of seeing my expression when I woke up the next morning to find his shorts and t-shirt on the floor between our two beds.

“Sorry, I can’t sleep with clothes on,” he said with a mischievous grin while still under the covers.

“No problem,” I said, tossing his clothes into the hall, “and you won’t mind if I straighten up a little.”

The U. of C. girl might want to keep that in mind if her roommate tries any funny stuff.

You would think that in all my years of covering sports that I would have run into more than one notable sibling rivalry. If I did, it couldn’t have been all that notable since I don’t remember it. Only one stood out and still endures and that’s Venus and Serena Williams, who will meet Saturday for the fourth time in a Wimbledon final.

It used to be a joke, Williams vs. Williams, and one I couldn’t defend.

Here’s the first half of a column I wrote in July of 2000:

Someday they may learn how to hide their tears. Eventually they will surely downplay their emotions, possibly even resent the implication that emotions are involved. But forever it will taint their rivalry. No matter how hard they try it will infiltrate the competition, eat away at their concentration and ultimately affect their performance. And there’s not a thing Venus or Serena Williams can do about it. It is their curse as women, as sisters. The dynamic was exposed last week perhaps as never before. But never before have the Williams sisters, or any other sisters, met in an arena as large as the Wimbledon semifinals, where one inalienable fact became painfully obvious: Women are different. Yeah, yeah, big revelation there. Next we’ll be telling you that charbroiled hot dogs taste better than the boiled kind. But it’s not easy to acknowledge. Suggesting women are unlike men in any athletic competition has the potential to strip away what it took Title IX more than 25 years to achieve. It is tempting to be disappointed, maybe even angry. To look at the head-to-head series between Venus and Serena, and especially at their lackluster match last week, and wish they could somehow put aside the sister thing, to rise above what their hearts are telling them. To act, well, like men. That is what we’re talking about here, because it would be different if they were brothers. As different as parents telling their little boys to “shake hands and make up” while telling their little girls to “play nice,” the implication being that boys can still be friends after a battle but that it’s best for girls to avoid the battle in the first place. I went on to offer examples of brothers who competed against one another and wanted nothing more than to bash each other’s brains in, content and perfectly able to separate their competition on the field of play with their relationship off of it.

But not sisters.

Maggie Maleeva told me that she found it excruciating to compete against her older sister Katerina on the women’s tour.

“The way we were educated at home was to always help each other,” Maggie said, “and it was very sad when one of us lost. It just didn’t feel right to be competing.”

For years, the Williams’ competition was anything but, the sisters turning in horrendous performances against one another and once getting booed off the court in Indian Wells, Calif., after Venus withdrew with a suspicious injury.

They were accused of fixing their matches depending on which sister needed the victory more. And all through it, they looked as if they would rather be having their cartilage removed than playing against one another.

In their defense, the Williams’ were no Maleeva’s and have been dominating the sport at the highest level for more than a decade now. There simply is no precedent – for brothers or sisters – at this level of competition.

And I am happy to report that I was wrong. The Williams’ have risen above the sister thing.

In a 2008 Tier II event, they took their match to a third-set tiebreaker for the first time – perhaps because it was a Tier II event — before Serena won. But their next match was their third Wimbledon final and it was arguably the best Williams vs. Williams match ever with Venus prevailing in two sets.

Serena came back and won in two tiebreakers in the U.S. Open final last year and then Venus answered in a three-set win at the year-ending Sony Ericsson Championships. This year, they split again with two more thrilling matches in Dubai and Key Biscayne.

Their overall series record is 10-10. And while they remain each other’s biggest supporters, they have also figured out how to put that aside when they are on the court.

For the eighth time in 10 years Saturday, a Williams’ sister will be the Wimbledon champ. Venus, who has won there five times, will be trying to become the first woman to win three straight Wimbledon titles since Steffi Graf did it from 1991-’93.

Serena, a two-time Wimbledon champion, once again proved her unparalleled determination on  Thursday, when she came back from match point down at 4-5 in the third set against Russian Elena Dementieva, to win in the longest women’s semifinal in history.

Some point to the Williams’ continuing domination as Exhibit A in what’s wrong with the women’s game. But one day they will also be recognized as two of the best players the game has ever seen.

They just happen to be sisters.

We’ve been talking a lot about dogs in our house lately.

Our 11-year-old son Alec wants one and wants one badly, so much so that I’d like to get him one just to see the look of utter joy on his face. Then I’d like to put both the dog and Alec into a time machine and transport them back to before they met so they’d never know the difference.

We’re not dog-haters or anything. I grew up with a very nice little mutt named Hondo, who “sang” along to the Carpenter’s song “Close to You” whenever I played it on the piano. Or was it when I sang the song so loudly and played the piano so badly that she howled in pain? Either way, it was really cute.

My parents didn’t want a dog either. They had had one when my brothers and sister were little and the story goes that it snapped at me when they brought me home from the hospital and my mother ordered it out of the house. My brother Richard still thinks Pepper went to live on a farm. And all of my siblings still resent me a little to this day.

But when I was eight and out of immediate danger apparently, my brothers wore down our mother and  brought a new puppy home and named her Hondo, which was the nickname of Boston Celtics great John Havlicek, I imagine because Bulls guard Jerry Sloan wasn’t a good dog name. Our father was not pleased and our mother still wasn’t thrilled, so we had one of those dogs who was not allowed to go upstairs, on furniture, in certain rooms, on certain rugs or really, to act like a dog in any way.

She went out by herself, “did her business,” as my dad used to say, and returned home like the day laborer she was.  I think she carried a lunch box and thermos. Of course in those days, no one cared if you didn’t keep your dog on a leash or didn’t pick up after her “business.” Or if they cared, no one said anything and Hondo was very happy making her way – no pun intended – through the alleys of our neighborhood.

My father wouldn’t admit it, but he grew to really love Hondo. When she was sick, he gave her Campbell’s chicken noodle soup like she was one of us. My mom co-existed peacefully with Hondo as long as she stayed in her own area. Except once a year, on the Fourth of July while we were all out of the house, Hondo would become very nervous at the sound of fireworks, sneak upstairs, go into my parents’ bedroom – no doubt looking to be comforted – and throw up in my mother’s knitting basket.

When Hondo passed away, we were all very sad. I was away at college when it happened and my mother, afraid of how I would take the news, elected not to tell me on the phone. Instead, when I came home a week later, she cushioned the blow by running down the driveway shouting, “HONDO’S DEAD.”

This could be why I was not in so much of a hurry to get a dog as an adult.

The official reason is that I’m allergic. And I am. Really. My husband, who never had a dog and is not allergic, thinks a dog would be a major inconvenience and we would never be able to leave the house again, ever.

Together, we agree that at least one adult in the house should be really committed and fully prepared for a dog before bringing it into the family, even though people have babies all the time without adhering to this rule. For his part, Alec calls up puppy websites every day, makes us look at them and occasionally prints out their photos for mounting around the house.

For a long time, none of this was an issue because we were those people everyone wonders about with kids who were afraid of dogs. Our children would cower in our front yard or at people’s houses when dogs were present and the owners would always give us suspicious, slightly dirty looks as if to say, “What kind of filthy lies could you have possibly told your children about animals that would make them so afraid?”

OK, I’ll tell you what we did.

Once, when Amanda was two, an unleashed dog (I know, just like Hondo) ran up to her, knocked her down and when she jumped up screaming, chased her through the park with me in close pursuit. OK, so the dog was roughly the size of one of her shoes and could not have inflicted much damage. But Amanda did not know that. And the worst part was when I caught up to them and the dog was on top of her (OK, kissing her) and she was hysterical, the owner lectured me on how I should not allow her to be so scared of dogs.

Good thing I’m so polite by nature or I may have said something I’d later regret about her and her out-of-control Chihuahua.

Alec may have gotten knocked down once or twice too. It’s hard to remember the second-child stories. Or maybe he just saw Amanda flinch and run whenever a dog was present and was unduly influenced. Whatever the case, both children were deathly afraid and anti-dog until fairly recently, when a former friend got a Shih-poo for her kids.

If the name Shih-poo wasn’t bad enough, the dog happened to be cute and, just our luck, loved Alec and Alec loved her. The former friend encouraged this relationship and what’s worse, calls and persuades us to buy a dog with a ridiculous name as well.

So now we talk about dogs a lot. And look at their pictures.

And maybe some day, we’ll even visit Alec’s dog at his house.

I would have written sooner, but I was busy watching the 102nd hour of continuous live coverage on the death of Michael Jackson.

I am now taking meals in front of CNN and am thinking of installing a TV in the shower so I can still maintain some semblance of personal hygiene while all of this is playing out.

I am not proud of this facet of my personality. But I figure if I wasn’t addicted to lurid and gross over-exposure of news events, it might be something even worse, like mah jong.

I believe it all began with the 1991 trial of William Kennedy Smith. I was fortunate to have been miserably sick with a long flu of some kind during that one, which allowed me a convenient excuse if anyone asked why an otherwise normal woman would find this so compelling.

I’m not sure what my excuse was during the Menendez brothers’ murder trial  in ’93, but I know I was pregnant during the O.J. Simpson trial in ’95.

I was also gainfully employed during these years, so it wasn’t like I could watch all the time, but I think that’s actually what got me hooked.  With the advent of televised trials and continuous coverage of events like these really heating up, that was the intent. Keep repeating the same news loop over and over, but with EXCLUSIVE and BREAKING NEWS over the headlines, so that your viewers always felt in danger of missing something if they walked away or turned the TV off.

As a seasoned, veteran journalist by that time, I fell for all of it and still do.

As my husband Rick reminded me last night when he walked into the bedroom, saw me still glued to the Michael Jackson coverage and asked sarcastically, “Is he still dead?” I have a problem. Of course, I don’t see it that way.

When Princess Diana was killed in 1997, yes, I did watch the coverage into the wee hours of the morning, the next day, the day after and the day after that. But I loved Princess Diana. When I covered Wimbledon through much of the 1980’s and most of the 90’s, the press section was situated next to the Royal Box, so we would get an up-close view of Diana and sometimes even the kids.

Often, a match would be in a fifth-set tiebreaker or Boris Becker would dive across the court with a shot for the ages, and I would have to ask what happened because I was watching Diana adjust her binoculars.  

It sounds a lot more disturbing than it really is and trust me, I was the source to go to for any breaking Diana news at the time.

And just so I don’t sound like I am simply obsessed with celebrity deaths, I was also addicted to the 1987 continuing coverage of little Jessica McClure, when she fell down a well in Midland, Texas, and that had a good ending.

I should also point out here, just for clarification, that I do not slow down and rubber-neck when I pass accidents on the side of a highway.  I am also disgusted at the practice of gathering in person on the scene of tragedies, like those who stood around the outside of the hospital where Michael Jackson died or actually got in their cars and drove to his rented mansion. You’ve seen these people, the ones standing behind police barricades at midnight with small children clinging to their legs.

“I thought it was important for her to see history,” said one woman the other night, pointing to her dazed and half-asleep child holding a “We Love Michael” sign.

Now, that’s sick.

Me? I kept watching last night because they promised BREAKING NEWS and I always trust Anderson Cooper, even when he knows there is not going to be any actual breaking news but still another interview with Deepak Chopra, who, I swear, at one point was live on two cable shows at the same time.  

I also kept watching because every time they’d play a snippet of a Michael Jackson performance, I somehow held out hope that they would return from commercial and just run a full-blown concert, beginning with the Jackson 5 days.

Eventually, I gave up and my son and I put in the Michael Jackson History on Film Vol. II DVD the kids loved  when they were little, and then Alec slipped out of the room and I found him watching some You Tube performances of the Jackson 5.

And finally, something beat out the continuous live coverage.

If I was a Cubs fan, I might not feel this way. And if I was a man, I know I would not feel this way.  But as a woman and an impartial observer, I was fascinated by the confrontation between Cubs manager Lou Piniella and his “star” rightfielder Milton Bradley this weekend.

I put star in quote marks because Bradley has not played this season like someone paid $30 million for three years is expected to perform. The Cubs knew they were taking a chance in signing him because Bradley, for all of his wondrous talents, has a long history of acting like a deranged two-year-old in need of a nap.

But the part that really interested me was how much the two men acted like women this weekend – or at least like women are often stereotyped.

I will not stereotype because I learned in journalism school that this is not a good thing to do. And also because it wouldn’t be nearly as much fun as what I am going to do instead, and that’s to project how I and most women I know would act if we were in the same situation.

The problem started when Bradley, after flying out against the Sox on Friday (the day after being benched for poor performance in Detroit), threw his helmet in the dugout and smashed the water cooler.

OK, this part is a little hard for me to envision for myself or any woman I know since women, as a general rule, do not resort to smashing and throwing. For example, when I strike out repeatedly in softball, I usually come into the dugout and apologize to all of my teammates for being so bad, and if no one consoles me, I will start making excuses like the pitcher is putting too much spin on the ball or I can’t find a bat that isn’t way too heavy. Suffice to say, I do much more talking than smashing.

Next, Piniella ordered Bradley to take off his uniform and leave the ballpark, after which Piniella said Bradley mumbled something under his breath.  That’s when Piniella followed Bradley into the clubhouse and yelled at him, “You’re not a player, you’re a piece of s—.”

Piniella was angry not just because Bradley has not been hitting this season, but because he’s a monumental pain, getting ejected and suspended for arguing in his first Wrigley Field at-bat; complaining that umpires pick on him; continuing his reputation for nursing seemingly minor injuries; and flinging helmets when things don’t go his way.

I am not going to say women do not say things we wish we hadn’t. I’m guessing there are even women in management positions who have resorted to cursing at an employee who has been as big an annoyance as Bradley has. I think, again not to stereotype, that most of us would be a little more clever than Piniella in his choice of words, but that’s being nit-picky.

One of the things that set Lou off was that someone – and he accused clubhouse workers at Sox Park – gossiped to the media about his verbal assault.

I suspect it was Bradley who blabbed to one too many people about what Lou said, and that’s what got back to a Sun-Times reporter. But this would not happen to most women. Why? Because we have all learned that when saying anything gossip-worthy in a public place – good or bad and no matter how far from your home base – you always take a long look around first, lower your voice and use made-up names.

Before Friday’s game, Bradley told Tribune reporter Paul Sullivan that he was not bonding with his teammates.

“I had a good rapport with [fired hitting coach Gerald Perry],” Bradley said.” I trusted Gerald and I could talk to him, and he’s gone. I think I clicked with [ex-Cub outfielder Joey] Gathright and he’s gone. So you just kind of feel like you’re on an island, and trying to stay afloat.

“The teammates, they’re there and they say all the right things, but it’s just [small talk]. . .

“I’m really not a guy who’s seeking any attention. I’m not seeking to be noticed . . . I just want to be part of a group and fit in and just love and be loved. That’s the basis of what I am . . . Maybe years ago I might have thought I wanted all this, but I really don’t want all the attention.”

OK, first let me just say that if a woman in a prominent position making $30 million said something like this publicly, she would be ridiculed in every newspaper, Internet blog and People Magazine for weeks, perhaps months. Let me also say that if Bradley was a woman, most women I know would consider her one of those whiny, needy, extremely annoying types that make you change aisles when you see her heading your way behind a grocery cart.

Bradley’s teammate, Derrek Lee, called Bradley at home that night after the fight with Piniella, reassured him that all of his teammates liked him and urged him to come early to the game the next day and not to sulk.  

If he was a woman, Lee would be heading up the most troublesome committee on the PTA, the kind of woman I could never be because I lack the patience. I would be much more likely to hurl expletives, a la Piniella, than to call Bradley and reassure him after that display.

The next day, Piniella apologized to Bradley for cursing at him, and told reporters he felt badly all evening.

“We won a ballgame yesterday and I didn’t enjoy the win at all,” Lou said. “I had dinner with my wife last night. It was on my mind all night. . . . It really took the joy out of winning a baseball game.”

This would be about the point where, if I was playing the Lou part, my husband would tell me to forget about it, that everything would be fine. In other words – he would be completely irritated that I would dwell on a silly argument all night and allow it to ruin dinner. 

Piniella took Bradley into his office where Bradley said the two “shed some tears.”

“He didn’t feel good about the situation and neither did I,” Bradley said. “We had a heartfelt talk and we’re both the better for it.”

And finally, a female moment I can relate to.