What sort of things might a visitor do in your house that you absolutely cannot cover with the mantle of hospitality?
For me, it is buttering a slice of bread and then wiping the surplus of butter, with crumbs and traces of condiment, on the rim of the butter container.
Ugh-yuck-what-were-you-thinking-I’m jumping up and getting a papertowel NOW to wipe the edge clean and I don’t care it you are embarassed by it- you just don’t DO that.
Insisting that an empty yoghurt pot be kept on the kitchen counter to put used teabags in.
Picking up the china coasters, using them as a lid on a cup of tea.
Getting a plate from the good china set out and using it to put leftovers on in the fridge.
Jumping into the only shower in the house at “rush hour” when every-one else is leaving for work but you are staying home all day.
Putting your box of teabags on top of the neat row of canisters.
Pointedly using up the last eggs after you have been asked not to because Wednesdays are Egg and Cress Sandwich Day.
Leaving your two cups, teapot, spoon and two melamine coasters (which your hosts have bought you to prevent the china ones from being broken) out on the benchtops, in every-one else’s way.
Putting a piece of folded up toilet paper under the soap. Using the soap/tp combo for a couple of days until it turns into a gelatinous mess and bits of shredded tp coat the sink.
taking a shower and leaving the faucet in the “shower on position”, so that the next person (usually me) that turns on the water gets soaked with cold water from the shower head. ARRRRRRRRGH!
I don’t like it when people bring their large dogs without asking first. I love dogs but I have 4 cats and a blind and deaf cocker spaniel and it always results in noisy animal drama and stressed out pets.
Rude refusals of food or drink. It’s one thing to say “no, thanks! I’m not really hungry/thirsty.” It’s entirely another to sneer and say “uh, no” in that tone that implies that nothing I could possibly provide would satisfy you.
What’s with the TP/soap thing? Never heard of it. Is it a UK thing? (I am guessing that the OP is English/Irish/Scotch/Welch.
While I am at it: What is the proper way to refer to someone whose county of origin is one of the above but you are not sure which one? I have never known and it makes me uncomfortable as all get out.
Whoops. What if the OP is from NZ or Australia or something? Who calls the tops of tables ‘benchtops?’ I am getting very embarrassed over here. Time for my mint-flavored shoes.
Filing a claim on my homeowners insurance because you strained your back opening a window, when your own health insurance covers 100% of your chiropractic without even a co-pay. Yeah Mom, I’m looking at you!
Stretching out full-length on the couch, leaving others to sit on the floor. Okay, I know they’re kids and sitting on the floor won’t hurt them, but everybody had to walk around the floor sitters.
Moving from the guest bedroom to sleep on the couch so you could watch TV until 3 a.m., and then whining when we asked you to please get off the freakin’ couch in the morning. And you were in your underwear! Thank heaven for Febreeze.
If you nitpick, get it right! The United Kingdom is not the same as Great Britain. Anyway, a good few Irish residing in Northern Ireland (and elsewhere ) would quibble about your assertion of their Britishness. Soul Brother Number Two was on the right lines, even if the spelling of ‘Scottish’ and ‘Welsh’ wasn’t quite there…
Edit: never heard of the paper-under-soap thing myself, anyway.
) would quibble about your assertion of their Britishness. Soul Brother Number Two was on the right lines, even if the spelling of ‘Scottish’ and ‘Welsh’ wasn’t quite there…