Good Guest/Bad Guest

[Claire]

OK, I think those of us with some patina on us have hosted people, be it for an hour, or a few, or a week or two or ... well.

Give advice to those who are younger than us, and also (much more fun) horror stories of guests from hades. But even better, what do some guests do that truly win your hearts and make you want them back again.

 

[Claire]

What made me think of starting this line is I have an elderly friend who's daughter lives in France. She doesn't stay with us, her mom still lives in the family home, but she always shows up at my house when I invite her with some goodies from France, pate in the forefront, because she knows how much I love it.

A friend from Colorado always shows up with many jars of home-canned preserves.

Longer-termed guests who show up prepared to take over my kitchen and make us a meal. My sisters made us breakfast the last time they came, a friend who introduced us to fish tacos when no one west of the Mississippi had heard of them, a friend who always cooks a dinner for us when she visits, and those who insist on taking us out to dinner at least once during their stay.

People who appreciate the beauty of what we are showing them. I've lived a lot of places and when I show a visitor something I think is just spectacular, I wonder why we're friends or even related.

 

[PrincessFiona60]

Good Guest - keep themselves picked up and don't think I am the maid.

 

[Hoot]

I reckon the worst guest I ever had the misfortune to encounter was during a visit from one of Mrs Hoot's sisters..She has six sisters. They had made plans to visit but a few days before they were drove from PA, Hurricane Isabel blew through here. We were without power...that lasted for eight days. We told 'em they best postpone their trip till better times....Oh nooooo...We are coming anyway...Hmmm
When they arrived, all they wanted to do was drink and party as if they were in a resort. We had trees down, no power, it was hot and muggy. First night, Dave (Mrs Hoot's sister's husband) was drunk and shouting about the heat. I tried to get the drunken fool to understand that there was no power, but he was beyond rational thought. I came within a hair's breadth of throwing him down the stairs.
After it was over....I told Dave that there would be a very narrow set of circumstances under which there would be future visits. He will mind his manners or I will kick his whatsname.....or he will HAVE to kick mine.
Well....He finally gave up drinkin', although it was not a voluntary act. His liver is failing. But, you know, since he stopped drinkin', he is a completely different person. I wish I had met him as he is now than as he was.
OK, enuff unpleasantness....Back to the original programming.

 

[taxlady]

Most of my guests have been normal, reasonable guests. Family have been better behaved as guests than when I visit them.

I had one guest, back in the '70s. She wasn't too bright and had no common sense.

One day she had to throw up. Did she go into the bathroom? No. She went out onto my back gallery and vomited over the railing, into my downstairs neighbour's immaculate yard, narrowly missing their laundry.

One day, while she was at work at a bar, a Chinese lady showed up, looking for her. She was probably in her 50s and didn't speak much English, but was very upset, so we invited her in and gave her some tea. She said that Tusan (her understanding of the name Susan) was trying to steal her husband and kept repeating that her husband was a very bad man.

It wasn't clear if the husband was a bad man for going out with a young woman or if really was a bad person. We were worried.

We told this to Susan when she got home. She thought we were making it up because we were racist and hated Chinese. Um, no, have you looked at me? I looked very Asian at the time, a bit less so as I get older.

It happened again. We told the Chinese lady where Susan worked. Again, Susan didn't believe us.

When the Chinese lady showed up at the bar where Susan worked and dragged her poor husband out by the ear, Susan finally believed us.

 

[Steve Kroll]

Most of my guests have been normal, reasonable guests. Family have been better behaved as guests than when I visit them.

Same here. No problems with family at all.

The only problem I ever had with house guests was when I lived in Las Vegas, where I spent several years. Since LV is such a hot tourist attraction, I would occasionally have "friends" - well, more what I would call acquaintances - show up on the door step or call a few days ahead, and say "We're coming to Las Vegas for a week. Would you mind if we stayed with you?"

Most of the time I would just state that it wasn't convenient (and it really wasn't, since I went to school during the day, worked nights, and slept weird hours), so I usually just recommended some inexpensive lodging options and then arrange to spend a little time with them.

The few times I did have guests, things always seemed to go south. They would overstay their welcome, or noisily return home in the middle of the night and wake me up, or break things in my condo. One "guest" dumped an ashtray down the garbage disposal, which then proceeded to clog the drain.

So I tend to be a little pickier about house guests these days. Or at least I try to be. Coincidentally, our daughter is having a couple of her college friends (a boy and a girl) come to visit and stay with us this next week. I don't anticipate they will be too much trouble, but we'll see.

 

[chopper]

My mom used to sit down the night before going back home and write a note about how much fun we had together during her visit. She would leave it on the bed so I would find it after they left. Then when she returned home she sent a thank you note. It really made us want to have her back again and again.