to be MORTIFIED?

[Jix]

On holiday in a rented cottage and as we were there for 2 weeks we had the sheets changed in the middle. All good and fine. Until a few days later the owner approaches me with the washed sheets and asks me what I think the STAINS on one of them might be?????
She says she wants to know so that she can know which stain remover to use!!!

They were small blobs of browny red and were obviously blood.
Arrrgh !!!

I just muttered ignorance and wished the floor would open up and swallow me up.

She definitely knew what it was and knew it was me and I think wanted to charge me. And we still haven't had the deposit back so who knows, maybe she still will.

Is she BU for showing a guest stained sheets or am I for being so upset about it???

Please please also tell me some holiday horror stories of your own so i can ( hopefully) realise im not on my own!

Omg there are some brilliant turns of phrase on this thread!!

Op the landlady was being a bitch- and an incomptent bitch. if you Don't know how to get messed up sheets clean you shouldn't be in the business of hospitality.

Op don't worry, i massacred some welsh hotel sheets last year despite swaddling self concurrently in every sanitary material known to woman in the western and occidental worlds. I realised my peri menopausal mishap at 2am, dh had to sleep on the floor for 2 hours whilst I washed and dried the sheet in the bathroom whilst probably waking all hotel neighbours. These things happen. Bleach easily sorts it but it is difficult to access bleach pre- check out in the middle of the night. And bugger me if I was going to confess with my breakfast order to aled jone's sweet younger cousin that I had messed the sheets and how much did I owe?

You should have told her it was poo stains and that you'd shit the bed! That would have flummoxed her.

My boss used to rent holiday cottages and I can remember her saying that accidents like this happened and she would never withold a deposit or mention it.

Jesus! The amount these people charge! How rude of her! (And MrsDeVere, as someone born in North Devon, I am aghast and at the way your OH was treated in Combe Martin!)

I have accidentally left the odd menstrual stain on hotel bed sheets- I would be mortified if pulled up on it! As others have said - stain remover, bio powder and a hot wash - it's not rocket science!

It seems a petty thing to bring up, but also not something to get upset about.

DD (2) frequently has nosebleeds at night. Could you not just have said that happened to one of the children? And that you'd brought them in to your bed to comfort them because they were upset by it? Blood seems to come out pretty easily with washing up liquid and cold water round her.

I'm going through the menopause, i frequently wake up in what looks like a scene from the Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

I think that was nasty of her imagine putting it in your face like that she must get dirty linen back no wonder you are feeling like you are, saying that I would have probably tried to get a laundrette and washed them but still what a weird woman ,

Rude, and a really unnecessary thing to say. Poor you!

My cure for stained sheets (& other items) is soaking in cold water as soon as you possible can, then normal wash with usual washing powder/whatever. If you wash/soak in warm/hot it denatures the protein, setting the stain. Or thats what my Home Economics flatmates told me when we were all students. Has always worked for me - also good for getting foody stains especially tomato-based out of clothes.

She's bang out of order, she's not going to be very popular if that's how she's going to act. Imagine being asked the same if you'd stopped in a hotel, it would never happen!

They're supposed to act with discretion, she should have just washed the sheets instead of making you feel embarrassed.

What did she think it was?

YANBU to think she shouldn't have mentioned it. These things must happen all the time in hotels etc., and should be covered by the (normally very large) hire cost, or the deposit if not. I wouldn't be "mortified" though. Periods are something to be proud of and not to be embarrassed about, IMO. And accidents happen.

My worst period accident was at a school thing for one of my daughters I started and dint realise until i stood up and looked at the grey plastic seat and i was in the middle of the row

Poor you OP, you most certainly are not BU - as many other posters have said, what a crazy-mad landlady to expect forensics on the stain!

Oh, am also now fearing the menopause, given the tales of floods of biblical proportions further up this thread!

Cold water and salt was all you needed to tell her!!

I feel for you OP. I'd find it hard to shake off such an encounter, but you should try. The landlady was being nasty and passive-aggressive IMHO.

She shouldn't be in the hospitality trade if she's that anal - my goodness she mustn't be able to sleep at night for fear of damage to her property if she's that uptight!

As a teenager I once had an accident whilst staying at a friends. I was so mortified I took the sheet off the bed and tried to spot clean it in the basin. Unfortunately not only did I remove the stain but also most of the dye! I was then faced with a wet dusky pink sheet with a light pink patch in the middle! Awful.

Gift wrap a block of vanish and add a cheery note saying, "so you don't literally have to wave people's dirty laundry at them over breakfast".

Some people leave wine, but that will be a gift that keeps on giving for you

TheCraicDealer actually has the correct response!!

My Dad has a holiday let. He is absolutely bonkers. But he'd never stoop quite so low! An amount of accidental damage occasionally is inevitable; if it's what a normal person would expect to sometimes happen then it's fair enough.

She sounds vile! I can't believe a woman would do that to another woman! She should be mortified, not you!

YANBU, she sounds so horrible, rude and unprofessional. I would have been cringing at this too, doesn't mean you are a prude or anything!

She does sound vile. Here's another embarassing holiday story if it helps - when on holiday with DH when he was DP or even DBF and we were in the throes of young love, I had horrible skin that I was highly sensitive about. Somehow I managed to bleach the pillow cases in streaks with the horrible extra strong prescription acne cream I was using. The shame. (but the ancient hippie who owned the apartment didn't wave them in front of me - I would have died on the spot)

We rented a holiday house for the first time this year.
Half way through the week the owner put a note through the door saying, "Sorry, I forgot to say, just pop the keys through the letterbox when you leave."
Unlike you, I suspect, we'd love to go back next year.

Wow, what a nightmare! Sheets must need replacing all the time, YANBU to be mortified but please do tell it straight on Trip Advisor. We're in a holiday cottage this week, been here before, the owners are so lovely and I cannot imagine having that conversation with them if we stained a sheet, chipped a mug, etc.

I can't believe she asked you what the stain was!! I was going to say she should just suck it up, but that would be going a bit far. She needs to change her washing powder.

Mhmm, you could do a Trip Advisor review, but that might add to your embarrassment. Although, at least you know nasty landlady couldn't write a witty retort, what with her cloven hooves and all.