If you live in a house with other people, and are planning to have guests stay with you for over a week, here are some things to remember:

1.  Let you roommates know that you will have visitors.  It’s super not-fun to be surprised by a woman and her 7-year-old, neither of whom I know, when blearily stumbling out of my room in the morning to get some tea.

2.  Introduce your visitors to your roommates.  10 days into the visit, I shouldn’t still be wondering about their names.

3.  Set some ground-rules with housemates about having a child in the house.  Especially if that child is going to wake up at quarter to six in the morning with you and run around the house screaming like a banshee for 4 hours.

4.  When you and your guests prepare food, please please please do your own washing up.  Not only is it unfair to expect the housecleaner to be responsible for twice as many dishes, but it’s rude to leave two sinkloads of dirty dishes and pans just lying around, especially in a house where there is already a serious lack of cutlery and plates.

5.  When you have multiple visitors for over a week, prepare in advance by offering to pay a little extra for electricity and water, since you’re multiplying the occupants of the house.  Especially when you know that these things are expensive to begin with.

Again, no particular reason that I’m posting this…..