Piss, pubes and pants

Haven't written a guest house related post for a while and today I have been "inspired" by the loveliness that surrounds me!

Being a guest house owner isn't quite as glamorous as many people seem to think.  Oddly we don't start work at 8am and finish at 9am and then sit around working out how to spend our millions, although I would have millions if I'd had a quid for every guest over the last ten years that has asked me "what have you got planned for the rest of the day, now that breakfast is over?".  One or two have made that mistake when I wasn't having a good day and been forced to listen to the litany of tasks I had planned.  Oops.

Being a guest house owner does give  you a real insight into peoples lives, often much more of one than you'd care to have.  Take for example one of our regulars who stays four nights a week.  He comes down for breakfast and chats away to me in sure and certain knowledge that within the hour I will be cleaning his toilet.  I can tell you that this man pisses like an incontinent goat whilst scratching his bollocks; I know this because the rim of his toilet is splattered with old piss and liberally scattered with hundreds of pubes.  Seriously that is way more information than anyone needs to have, but I have to have it so I thought it only right I share.  I do not understand this.  I would not be able to look someone in the eye if I knew that they knew that I was a filthy bastard, but he has no problem with it at all.  Amazing.

Then this afternoon a new guest arrived.  As he was heading back out to his car he spotted our laundry room and wondered if perhaps I might be able to do a load of washing for him, life has been chaotic lately and he was en route to Paris so if I could just do a load of laundry for him that would be a big help.  I was sort of inclined to point out that oddly enough my life was pretty hectic and the mere fact that he had arrived to check in an hour before the earliest check in time, right in the middle of my working day, had made it yet more hectic, without having to stop and do a load of washing for him, but I didn't.  And so I found myself 5 minutes after meeting this man filling a washing machine with his dirty underwear and socks and wondering what other walk of life would find you manhandling someones used y-fronts as part of your job.  Obviously anyone medical I guess, god love them.  I am not a caring sort and yes, I did just hear you all say "no shit Sherlock" in response to that startling revelation, so I never had any intention of getting up close and personal with the nether regions, their out pourings, off droppings or outer garments of the great British public and yet here I am doing just that.  Funny how things work out.

Here's a little list of the things that I can assure you if you do in a guest house, B&B (what is the difference, I have no idea) hotel, motel or Holiday Inn you WILL be judged:
1. Not using the toilet brush. Do you leave it like that at home?  Oh and if you keep flushing that will eventually go away, so please don't leave it for me to discover when I lift the lid on your toilet.
2. Blowing your nose on the paper napkin you were given at breakfast.
3. Leaving the paper napkin you just blew your nose onto on your side plate next to your toast crust and marmalade. Even typing it makes me gag.  One of our other regulars does this frequently. There is a special place in Hell for him.
4. Park like a twat. Look around you.  Are there white lines?  Here's a plan - use them as a guide and attempt to park between two of them.  
5. Ring at 10pm on a Sunday night to make a booking.  For November.  Or any date that is more than 12 hours away. 
6.  Try to book a room to use with a prostitute for two hours in the afternoon in a local B&B.  Go to the Travelodge, they don't give a shit why you want the room.

That's a little starter, I am sure given more time I could come up with a hundred more minor violations which would be hanging offences if I had  my way, as I said, I'm not big on caring. Do you have a similar list of things that the people you come into contact with via your work do that makes you want to kill?  I bet you do!  Don't hold back, tell me all about them please.

Negativity

Had mentioned to OH was blogging about the guest house and how my next post, a letter in response to a horrid review on a travel review site, was writing itself in my head, couple of hours later and in the midst of our daily row he pointed out that I needed to get my head in order and should stop being so bitter about the guest house.  Had a meltdown, deleted several partially written posts and cancelled my twitter account.  Then realised that perhaps where I had gone wrong was not actually writing the blog posts, which could be viewed as cathartic, but by telling HIM I was writing them. So shhh! here's that letter I mentioned!

Dear couple from Horsham,

Thank you for your recent review of our guest house in which you expressed consternation at the fact that the duvet cover in  your room did not match the curtains, which has apparently had a dreadful affect on your aesthetic sensibilities and completely ruined your 4 night stay in West Yorkshire.

I notice that you have reviewed 5 guest houses in West Yorkshire, all of which, with one notable exception, you have found wanting.  May I respectfully suggest that perhaps you holiday only in West Sussex and allow the hard working hoteliers of Halifax and Huddersfield to go about their business without having to invest undue amounts of time in matching their soft furnishings.  The guest house that you have reviewed in glowing terms, going so far as to compliment on the owner on her "tasteful eye for decor" (she was no doubt thrilled to be praised by such an arbiter of good taste) has 3 suites which cost £110 a night.  The other four accommodations which you found "tired" and "mismatched" charge an average of £70 a night, some like ourselves at £55 per night, charge much less.  Therefore might I also suggest that you align your expectation with the amount you are prepared to spend.  If I was charging £110 a night you can be assured that my fripperies would be both tasteful and matching, in fact for that money you could probably email me in advance and request the exact shade of chintz you would prefer.

In your review you made no mention that for the duration of your stay you were untroubled by our 2 dogs, having mentioned when booking that your husband had had an "unfortunate" experience last year with a dog in a guest house, you didn't elucidate but having met you I can quite imagine how he might have been led astray.

I would recommend in future that when you are booking holiday accommodation that you provide your hosts with a list of acceptable colour schemes for their interior decor.   You might also suggest they employ the services of an expert in Feng Shui prior to your arrival, lord only knows what sort of review you might write were your chakras to be misalinged by the unfortunate postioning of a mirror.

Yours

Tasteless guest house owner.

The offending room!