To ask for another annoying things about other peoples homes thread?

[balihai550]

This one two years ago made my christmas... can we have another? 🎄 🙏

My SIL has 30 year old dining chairs which came with plastic to cover the seats, the plastic has never been removed and makes a farting noise every time you sit down-just why?

I also hate those stupid LIVE, LOVE, LAUGH signs and also the COOK, SLEEP and EAT ones, why do people need instructions for their room use!

My MIL tried the no bin in the kitchen thing when she moved to her new house. She lives on her own so I suppose having a nasty carrier bag of rubbish sitting on the floor like some kind of student dive didn’t matter so much to her. We went straight out and bought her a proper pedal bin to sit in its place. Nothing further was said on that score.

She has the full complement of freezing rooms, threadbare towels, a dribbly shower so feeble the water is cold before it hits you, plus insists on locking all the doors and gates against the burglars she imagines lying in wait to steal her ancient video. DH hit the roof a few years back when he realised he couldn’t get out to get something from the car because she’d locked the door and hidden the key- no chance of quick escape in a fire that night!

What tips me over the edge though is that she had a salt dispenser installed on her pipes (she lives in a hard water area and is obsessed with limescale build up), thus rendering all taps but one unsuitable for drinking water.

Did she choose the kitchen tap as the designated drinking tap? Why no!

If you want some drinking water, or cooking water, you have to traipse into the utility room and get some from the sink there. Which is never cleaned, and looks like it’s been used to wash dirty paint brushes with white spirit, so covered in scale it is. Grim!

She bought a four bed house with the idea of family gatherings in mind. So ruinously uncomfortable it is, none of us go to stay if we can help it....

@Bluntness100

I thought this thread was going to be funny, but it's mostly quite judgey, even snobby

This. The tone of many posts is really unpleasant. It’s not remotely funny.

I’d agree with that. It’s become a platform for the ‘unapologetically judgemental’. Those who take pride in being arseholes about visitors, pets, window dressings, locations of amenities... 🙄

@Bluntness100

I thought this thread was going to be funny, but it's mostly quite judgey, even snobby

This. The tone of many posts is really unpleasant. It’s not remotely funny.

Agree!! Just people being judgmental.

I am guilty of a few things mentioned on this thread, and do you know what? I don't actually care! My house is for my family not guests. Stop being so bloody judgmental!

@Susanwouldntlikeit

Take a small rubber door wedge in your bag and jam it under from your side Fab idea!!!!!

Unless the door opens outwards like our downstairs loo.

Regarding bathroom locks... my father once managed to lock himself in the upstairs bathroom when visiting because for some unknown reason, the lock broke.

We managed to supply a rescue kit by going outside onto the footpath (bathroom was at the front of the house), and using the line prop, offer up a carrier bag containing a hammer and screwdriver via the window. He then hammered out the hinge pins of the door and regained his freedom.

He was the one who thought of removing the hinges, but later I bought a new lock and found out how to fit it myself. I learned a few useful things from that incident

Aren't there also locks with a slit you can put a screw driver in the other side to unlock? Not sure if possible for all doors

Yes - our doors are fitted with them. No need to worry about a child or sick adult getting stuck in the toilet, they can be opened easily with the edge of a ruler/knife etc in emergency.

I know many people with bathroom doors with no locks and the toilet is far from the door, so no chance of holding it shut. Just embarrassing for everybody.

@balihai550

My parents house has no lamps! Not one! The only lighting is exposed light bulbs which are so bright its like being on the surface of the sun.

I also hate the 'big light' situation

We don’t have locks on our bathroom doors - they weren’t there when we moved in and we’ve not had any reason to put them on but now I’m thinking we might add some!

My MIL is wonderful but she has very old fashioned taste. Nothing matches and is all just stuff she’s had since the dawn of time. Carpeted upstairs toilet which I cannot stand (how much pee is on there?!)

They used to have a carpeted bathroom too but put vinyl down a couple years ago.

Cold houses, grim.

Places that haven’t seen a duster in years so every surface has a grey tinge.

Almost as bad as no kitchen bin - tiny kitchen bin which fills up every 20 minutes.

Unless the door opens outwards like our downstairs loo.
Oh god, our downstairs loo opens outwards, doesn’t have a lock on the inside, but DOES on the outside because the house is wonky and the door swings outwards otherwise. Unfortunately we can’t let anyone use the hideous upstairs bathroom (fixer-upper and I would rather die than let people see it), so visitors and trades must use the creepy unlocked loo that we could, at any point, trap them inside.

This still isn’t as bad as no kitchen bin, though.

@StoneofDestiny

Aren't there also locks with a slit you can put a screw driver in the other side to unlock? Not sure if possible for all doors

Yes - our doors are fitted with them. No need to worry about a child or sick adult getting stuck in the toilet, they can be opened easily with the edge of a ruler/knife etc in emergency.

I know many people with bathroom doors with no locks and the toilet is far from the door, so no chance of holding it shut. Just embarrassing for everybody.

Unless you live in a mansion you are going notice if a guest has gone to the toilet surely ? If not then may I suggest a piece of wall art proclaiming 'sing, sing, shit' for your bathroom wall? No need for a lock then.

I've never heard of a "designated drinking tap" because in the UK tap water is safe to drink.
It doesn't really matter what people's taste is like as long as they make you feel welcome and comfy. Temperature is tricky, some people feel the heat more than others. As long as there's a lock on the loo door and decent towels, the rest is usually ok for a couple of days!

I think a lot of these things mentioned on here ensure that you don’t feel welcome and comfy though. It’s not just a taste thing. And extremes of temperature are not fun.

Thank you, I took your post too literally and it made me anxious!

@Whatsnewpussyhat so if someone in your family has used sanitary stuff, they have to bring it downstairs to the kitchen bin?
I HATE this. As a teen I'd have been mortified to have to do this, and why would you want it in your kitchen bin? Why not have a bathroom bin?

People not opening curtains in the day - my 14yo dd does this at the moment in her room and drives me crazy - but other homes I’ve been to where this is also the case.

Running out of toilet paper and none anywhere obvious in the room.

Temperature extremes.

Cats that are allowed in the guest bedroom. They make me wheezy and I’m always a little uncertain of cats that aren’t mine as they can be unpredictable.

Those who don't like front doors opening straight into a room and not a hallway might consider it's not always a lifestyle choice more a what you can afford choice!

Maireas she’s had a salt dispenser fitted to her water supply to soften the water that comes out of the taps (because of the limescale obsession).

All the water is potable but tastes of the added salt, except for the tap that dispenses unsoftened water.

A normal person would probably have made this tap the one in the kitchen, but MIL came up with some weird reason why it made more sense to traipse backwards and forwards to the utility to get a drink or cook.

It’s her house and ultimately she can do whatever she likes in it but nothing will persuade me that this isn’t bonkers.

@Whatsnewpussyhat

You see, I dont understand how some people dont need a bathroom bin

What do you do with:

- empty toiletry bottles
- used cotton buds
- used make up remover pads
- used dental floss / Ti-Pis
- used tissues
- empty loo rolls
- nail clippings

Well the empty loo rolls and bottles go downstairs and into the recycling.

No make up pads/any type of wipes

Why wouldn't you just flush nail clippings down the loo? I've also never known anyone who has a box of tissues in the bathroom. Only seen that in hotels. Aren't they flushable though? If I need to blow my nose while in the bathroom I just use loo roll

As I said before, we all simply take our rubbish downstairs. I cannot be arsed having to empty a bin.

Agree. I can't be bothered having another bin to empty. Just deal with packaging at the time it's opened and put it in the recycling.

My Parents never had a bin in the bathroom either and I wouldn't use a bin in a friends bathroom.

Yes, sorry, 1hamwich4, I can see why it's necessary because of the salt, but like you say - why isn't the kitchen tap the drinking tap? Does sound bonkers.

@dotty12345

Those who don't like front doors opening straight into a room and not a hallway might consider it's not always a lifestyle choice more a what you can afford choice!

Yeah, this annoyed me. There are rows and rows of Victorian workers' cottages in my town and they have living room, dining room, then kitchen going front to back. They happen to be the cheapest houses here. Our first house (90s) was the same. Sorry not everyone can afford a house on a plot big enough to waste space on a hallway

We don't have a bathroom binwe moved here when I was pregnant and I've had one period in 3 year and I use a cup

You put your used tampons in a cup?!

My parents house is hotter than the Sahara. At Christmas I have to plan my outfits for each day knowing the heating will be set to 25 degrees plus and then they will also light the fire!

MIL’s house is an ongoing issue and I may well start a thread on how to handle it. She’s a hoarder and there is just so much crap everywhere it’s utterly unsafe and filthy. I think she just likes buying stuff because even in the bathroom there’s 30 bottles of unnecessary shower gel on every surface. The cats climb all over the kitchen table, there’s a litter tray in the bathroom. So far I’ve managed to avoid ever eating or drinking there but I can’t get out of it forever. It’s odd because DP is the complete opposite and is obsessed with cleaning and tidying. However he absolutely adores MIL and would be mortified if I told him there’s no way I could ever eat anything in that house.

@Springfern she means a menstrual cup

I really don't get people not having bathroom/loo bins.

Is this the right time to remind people DO NOT FLUSH TAMPONS OR SANITARY TOWELS DOWN THE LOO.

I hate hot houses.
And sharing towels.
And being expected to use bedding that other visitors have slept in (MIL)
Most other things I can cope with.

Magnolia
How is that even a colour.

I'm an Army brat so our houses were painted either pale green or pale blue when the decorators came every 4th year or so.
Then we moved to a camp in the deepest countryside with only a few actual military there, and none of them had been married with a family. So they converted a rather lovely bungalow for us to live in (best house we ever had). When it was being decorated my dad was down there and called my mum to tell her which colour he'd picked "really great because not Army paint, we could choose what we liked so we're having magenta"

Mum nearly had a heart attack until he called back half an hour later and said "oh, sorry, it's magnolia"

When we got there and it was still being painted and the painter kept saying "maglia"

sorry, off topic there. I quite like Magnolia.

I'm also aghast at no bathroom bin
Not taking shoes off inside
and everything is too hot - urgh