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

[balihai550]

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

#learning to dance in the rain etc

@Rocococo

This thread has reminded me that on MN there's nothing more contentious than shoes on / shoes off.

I can't work out whether the split is generational/geographic/ cultural/socio economic or what.

A lot of mumsnetters say it is a class thing. I wouldn't know.

We live in a part of Yorkshire where it rains a lot, so keeping wet and muddy shoes on in someone's house would be the height of bad manners. I don't wear shoes in the house because I prefer to wear slippers. I don't ask people to take their shoes off, but everyone does anyway.

I always ask people if they want me to remove shoes as most people I know have carpets.

re: heating. if i’m feeling particularly hedonistic i whack it all the way up to 17c for an hour. i can see daylight round my front door (yes, i have a curtain) and i have a 3m squared single-glazed front window so really i’m just heating outside.

bottom line is i can’t afford to have my heating on. i just layer up and i own a LOT of blankets. the joys of low-cost housing.

my dad, god rest his soul, would have the telly on sky sports constantly during family christmases. if people tried to have a conversation he just turned it up, and then often left the room but would bellow if anyone dared turn it down a notch. also everyone had to go to bed at the same time, 11pm latest even on christmas day.

i do miss those gatherings though. the bar was always open and we had some spectacular arguments over board games (during which the quality street tin was allowed out but a sharp eye was kept on it and once everyone had eaten 2 it was whisked away again).

i know someone whose fridge is like some dreadful biohazard found after a protracted apocalyptic event. oozing things. green things. uncovered meat and cheese. and all like jenga so attempting to take out a cold drink would result in an avalanche of munge.

and my ex MIL who believed a pantry did the same as a fridge, despite it not having a door and being next to the cooker. i do not miss those days.

People who didn't have a toilet seat on the toilet, ever. You had to hover or sit on the actual white porcelain rim of the loo if you had to go. And never any toilet paper. And always leavings in the loo. :-(

@sima74

Absolutely carcinogenic My cousin was obsessed with these, especially plug ins- she passed away with leukaemia last year, also a friend of mine who is also has them on full blast in her home developed cancer as did her youngest child. I am surprised they don’t come with a warning- in my mind they are worse than smoking and alcohol.

Did you seriously just blame someone for giving her child cancer with plug in air freshener??

@Completelyfrozen

The cat litter tray right next to the chair and when the cat has a poo, no one makes a move to clean it up, so whoever is sitting in this chair has a choice of either inhaling the warm noxious cat shit aroma or asking them to clean it, which is met with derision and cries of "It's enclosed so we dont need to clean up more than once a day!" before reluctantly cleaning offending shit. This for 4 cats!

Not only are they not cleaning that box nearly enough, for four cats they should, ideally, have five boxes. One for each cat, plus one. I find it amazing that their remarkably patient cats aren't pooing in the chair!!!

Dirty hand towels that haven't been changed since last time I went there 🤮

I've enjoyed this thread. Thanks everyone, even the judgy people, as it made me ponder what people might not like about staying here . These are :

• shower fan that comes on with light - won't be altering this
• shoes off to go upstairs - we don't ask visitors to do this, but most seem to do so because we do it. We very foolishly put in a cream stairs and landing carpet!
• Temperature might be a bit cooler during the day and a bit warmer at night than most people are used to. Will bear this in mind if we are ever able to have visitors again!

My gripes are :

-Plug in air fresheners - give me migraine and make me feel sick

• garish overhead lights - just unpleasant
• old fashioned low energy lights. Another migraine inducer
• unclean tiolets. Obviously.

Lots of comments about glasses being too small. I grew up in a house with tiny glasses, but did not retain this habit as an adult. When df comes to visit and I offer him a drink, he freaks out about how much I’ve given him “Woah, not that much!” if I pour more than an inch.

I’ve had a acquire a special small glass and small coffee cup just for him, and instruct Dh never to fill either more than half way.

Note to self: buy bathroom bin ASAP! 😂😁

@ChonkyLamp

Stuff which broke YEARS ago and nobody has ever bothered to fix it.

Yes, sorry, that door doesn't open properly, you need to heave it upwards and to the left and then wiggle through the gap. No, the dishwasher doesn't work, we use it for storing jam in. I know it's a pedal bin, but the pedal's broken, so just lift up the lid with your hand every time. No, that window doesn't close (WTF?!). The ceiling lightbulb has gone, but if you walk across the room in the dark and trip over the hostess trolley then you'll find a table lamp on your left which will give you a mild electric shock. The toilet DOES flush, you just have to pump the lever up and down eight times, take the lid off the cistern, twiddle the blue thing, stand on one leg and whistle "Auld Lang Syne" first.

Meanwhile the garden is pristine, with a green velvet lawn and a hedge that's cut with a set square.

GET A FUCKING HANDYMAN IN

I see you have met my mother

I'm doing a list for myself now
Bathroom has (not cracked!) bar soap, liquid soap, clean dry towels/bath mat, bin, loo brush, poo pourri spray, loo rolls and a lock (that can be opened with a coin from the outside). I don't care if you put stuff in the bin, and there's spare tampons etc in there
Lamps in the living room and heating on or off depending what you want plus copious clean blankets
You can have squash, cans of pop, tea of any kind from normal to herbal to treacle sponge flavour, instant coffee, decaf coffee, proper coffee (from a clever dripper) and big glasses for water
I try and aim for clean but not so people are worried about picking stuff up/nosying/dropping anything

Downsides
There is a cat, however his litter tray is clean and being black he mostly goes unnoticed unless he takes a liking to you and then will sleep on your lap

@Daphnise

People trying to make others take shoes off when they arrive at their house as guests.

If people don't take their shoes off before entering my house, they simply don't come in.
But this is a cultural thing from my point of view, so most people respect it.

Glass chopping boards I'm sorry but why would you insist on chopping an onion with a steel knife on glass...the sound it makes is sickening!

People use glass chopping boards? Are they mad? Do they spend all their spare time resharpening knives?

My mother does have large glass boards either side of the hob but nothing is chopped on them, they protect the worktop from hot pans.

Most of mine are pet related (sorry)

Cats on kitchen worktops, cats/dogs on sofas, the smell of pet food in the kitchen, dirty pet food bowls, cats on beds, pets licking plates... All grim.

Log burners with door shut - too hot.
Heating on full - too hot.
No mirror in guest bedroom.
Dirty/ no hand towel in bathroom.

We have one loo and two bathrooms without locks, if the door's shut, someone's in there! I hope people don't find it too stressful! On the plus side, the house is always clean and tidy, plenty of bins, lamps, etc.

Why no locks Bridget?

When our house was built all the loo/bathroom doors had locks on them.

I can see sales of rubber door wedges going up after this thread.

I simply can’t ‘go’ unless the door is locked, even when I’m on my own. It’s like a mental block

We took the lock off our downstairs loo after two incidents of guests getting locked in. We've never replaced it but never have so many in the house at once that we don't know where anyone is. If in doubt, we ask 'anyone in there?' before going in. It's small enough to grab the door handle if you needed to. I don't think anyone has been traumatised by it. (Liquid soap and clean hand towel always.)

Upholstered dining chairs with round handles (often hanging from a lion's mouth) on the back. WTF is that about? My 7yo DD said "they're not doors!"

Those bloody awful Christmas door bows.

Guest rooms that are a dumping ground for shit furniture and random shite that the occupants aren't sure what to do with. I'm sick of sleeping in amongst broken printers, copies of Office 95, 15 years worth of of 'Your PC', a 'bending from the weight' teak effect bookshelf of VHS tapes, several baskets of curtain fabric that might 'come in handy' since 1982 but are still waiting for their moment, non-functioning lamps, a pedal motion sewing machine, an oxidised mirror and a pile of plastic children's toys yellowed with age. Fine if these things were going to to be used or fixed but DH and I have been together for 22 years and they haven't even been moved.

Despite all this DH and I have to sleep in kiddie sized single beds with only the big light to lull us to sleep. And there's no hairdryer..

@CounsellorTroi

We don't have a bathroom bin blush we moved here when I was pregnant and I've had one period in 3 year and I use a cup. Other than pregnancy tests whats to throw away? Will get a bin for guests (that will go unused for months at a time)

Packaging - from toothpaste, soap etc. Cotton wool. Used razor blades. Toilet roll cores. Empty deodorant roll ons. Loads of stuff.

Most packaging is recyclable and goes in the recycling, not the bin. Ditto for toilet roll cores.

Not everyone uses cotton wool - we use washable terry pads instead. And not everyone uses disposable razors or razor blades.

Just because some people are happy with disposable everything and not recycling, doesn't mean we all are.

(I do have a bathroom bin though, for guests if nothing else.)

@DDIJ
My mum has no ice and you are not allowed to chill any other drink than wine. No water allowed on the table. If they were entertaining any teetoal guests would be allowed one wine glass of lukewarm tap water for the entire meal. On informal occasions you just have to hope you don't choke.

How do you mean not allowed? Does she refuse if you ask for more? Why??