Don't ask your hostess to make your travel arrangements. That includes requests to check on a flight or call a taxi. I don't enjoy having my afternoon snooze in the hammock under the beech tree interrupted with some mundane question about whether or not Easy Jet flies at night.
Don't terrify the children or adults with tales that the house is haunted, as one guest did when she asked to be moved because ghosts were scratching their way out of graves underneath her bed. They may well have been but let's not frighten the others.
Don't stub your cigarettes out in the potted plants or drop them in the gravel driveway. Woebetide if I find a cigarette butt and I can trace it back to the smoker.
Don't go to the market and buy just enough food for yourself. A few years ago, a very well-known actress houseguest went shopping and came back with just enough bananas for herself and her boyfriend. Mon dieu! I don't expect much. A crate of peaches in France is ten euros. Spring for it. This isn't an episode of Survivor, France.
Don't treat a house like a hotel. I don't like walking into a room and finding an unmade bed. I once had a guest who never brought down her baby's dirty diapers. She just left them in a bin on the top floor. Also, don't dump your laundry in the laundry room. The only time that's okay is when you're literally on the way to the airport, at which point I think it's polite for the houseguest to rip the sheets off their beds themselves. I'll bend over backwards to share and entertain but it's a communal effort so please pitch in.
Don't ask me if there's something I want as a thank-you—think for yourself. It's not about spending money; it's about the input of time and cogitation to plan a cool gift. Yes, it's great to get a pair of Hermes numnahs for my horses but one of my sporadically unemployed friends helped my son with his college applications. Another bought a week's groceries for the house the day she was leaving. The creativity award goes to a friend who, poking fun at my constant yelling for people to come in for lunch, presented me with a loud horn.
