Waitaminnit - doesn’t Hawaii have those honking giant centipedes? The kind that give even me (not normally afraid of any bugs) the screaming DTs?
Ah, yes, I thought I had bookmarked the critter.
Tuck a few of these babies in between the sheets of your guest beds. I bet the guests will hightail it to the B&B toot sweet.
I’m guessing that after two days, these two rather-well-off women and their 5 kids will realise that the accomodations are not up to their standards, and bugger off…you may not see them much for the rest of their vacation, and possibly never after that.
From your OP, I’d say you’ve grown apart in the past few decades. IMO, someone you’ve hardly spoken to, and seen only 4 times in the past 27 years isn’t a good enough friend to keep close to your heart, let alone in your home for more than a week.
That said, good luck! I don’t envy your position.
I had (notice the past tense) whom I had kept in Email contact with since High School. We had met occasionally, here and there, but by no means could it be called an ongoing friendshipo.
He emailed me and told me he was coming to town. I repleied saying "Great, lets have a steak at the local “high class” steak house and catch up on old times, my treat!.
1)He showed up with 5 other people, none of which I knew.
2)He sat on the other end of the table, allowing for NO “old times talk”.
3) His friends rang up a $600 bill before tip/tax.
4) One of his friends hit me up for cab faire as “He was too drunk to drive” (after drinks I paid for)
5) I paid it, rest tab + cab fair ($820 inc tax)
6) he didn’;t botrher to call or make any contact during his visit.
Instant former friend
(BTW we were very close in High school, and he never behaved like this in his younger yrs)
Regards
FML
Gotta love the SDMB … everyone’s comments are worthwhile. Full Metal Lotus, that is QUITE a tale.
The latest news since I first posted is that I have checked around at the places to stay around here … as I suspected, it is way too late to make a reservation anywhere. Meanwhile, roomie’s flights have gotten screwed up so she doesn’t get here until tomorrow.
Originally posted by teela brown:
Yep, we got those! I have killed a few all by myself, which I think is worth 5 or 6 points toward adulthood and away from girly-girl helplessness. The B&Bs have 'em too, though.
**ivylass **(and others), I probably haven’t characterized my friendship with “Jennifer” very well. The friendship will survive, I have no doubt. (For one thing, the LAST time I saw her she managed to pull a different, but similarly eye-rolling, stunt, and I managed to shrug it off.) Why? Well, we are probably closer than I’ve made it sound. We have one of those friendships where we can pick up right where we left off, even without much communication in-between times. My remark that we don’t know much about each others’ lives was more to indicate that she probably doesn’t have a good feel for what our living conditions are like here, and so had nothing to go on except my comments about “I think you’d be more comfortable in a hotel.” We have shared A LOT of experiences and were bridesmaids at each others’ weddings. So in a funny way, we are close.
Also, when she is here I am certain she’ll not only be the same incredibly funny, lively, intelligent person she has always been (including on those 4 occasions I’ve seen her since 1980!) but she’ll also be a considerate friend – as long as I’m in her general vicinity. She is to friendship as Ronald Reagan was to compassion: they always said that although Reagan didn’t have a clue how cruel his public policies were to a lot of poor people, if he ever heard the details of one sad case, he was filled with honest concern and caring. “Jennifer” is sort of that way – she’ll be a great friend while she’s here!
This whole cheap thing is wierd, I must admit. She isn’t a cheap person. But they’re only getting one rental vehicle for the 7 of them (I suggested 2, so they would have more freedom to each “do their own thing” if family interests and priorities diverged). Maybe her friend is cheap. Also, as someone suggested, she may not properly understand just how basic our accommodations are; the last time she visited, it was at my over-the-top mansion in Jakarta (part of my husband’s benefit package, not something we had to pay for ourselves).
I’ll let you all know how it ends up.
Wow, FML, not only would I have canned the friendship over that, but I would not have paid the bill, either. I have a cheap streak, and something like that would certainly set it off (not that not wanting to pay for a nice dinner for five strangers is cheap, mind you). I think I would have taken “friend” aside when they got there and spelled it out for him; “The invitation for free dinner was for YOU. Your friends will all be paying their own bills. If you told them it was going to be free, I guess you have to tell them differently now.”
In FML’s situation, I would have definitely made it clear to the server, when orders were being taken, that “These two orders (indicating yourself and the ‘friend’) will be on the same check.”
You live in Cairo, right?
“Jennifer, I’m so sorry, but I just found out my kids came all the way from Cairo and managed to bring head lice along. And those damn Cairene head lice are really hard to eliminate. They’re resistant to everything and I spent 5 months trying to get rid of them already and I thought I had and damn I was wrong and hi it’s great to see you - uh where did you go?”
In other words, use blatant lies to convince them they don’t want to come within 30 feet of you!
Of course, I see they have no accommodations available anywhere near you.
Oaho’s nice too.
why yes as a matter of fact we are dealing with a little head lice infestation on one of the kids right now, why do you ask?
Your kid may like to go visit a friend for a while. He won’t have the irratating kids picking on him and one less person is taking up space. I bailed out one time when like 20 relatives moved in during a power outage ice storm for two days. I stayed with a cousin that had a wood stove and we ice skated the whole weekend. I would have gone nuts at home. Our family already was seven persons, so add twenty in a small house.
You were the person asking for how to feed this crew earlier, weren’t you?
