Two questions and an apology

[toothycat]

So in the wrong order - many apologies to anyone who tried to contact me or thought I was around last week. I assumed 3G would work throughout Britain - a few weak spots are understandable, but I mean, come on, I could connect to the internet through my little 'Three' dongle in Italy! But apparently, there is no Three 3G north of the Peak District, and so I inadvertently had almost a week away from the internet. Oops ^^;; It was quite nice, in the end.

My first question is related to the holiday (which was wonderful, by the way). We followed what we've done three times before; we drive in what looks like an interesting direction, pick what looks like a nice place and a nice hotel/B&B, and ask if they have room. Now, these places almost always have signs out the front saying 'vacancies', and what are those for if not for people who are looking for a room that night? But almost everywhere we went, we got some really funny looks for doing that. Is it really so unusual and unexpected? They asked us in one place to pay up front, like they thought we might sleep and run, as it were (!)
They were all lovely places to stay, by the way, despite the funny looks :)

Secondly, how is it best to deal with upset? I prefer not to say anything, because I find that if someone I know has upset me, usually I'll calm down in a few hours and then I'll regret whatever it was I said in the heat of the moment. If it's someone I know, they almost certainly don't mean to be hurtful, so I find it easiest simply not to say anything until I get a bit more perspective on it all (this is one reason why this LJ sees very little use ;). Mr toothycat, on the other hand, would rather let people know he is upset because then, he says, they know not to do it again. This also makes sense to me. Perhaps a combination would be better, where I could compose a thoughtful reply when calm, explaining what went wrong and why it upset me. But then, putting that much effort on behalf of something that I usually end up feeling is really quite minor seems a bit pointless.

EDIT: I should clarify, this isn't linked to anything in particular so please don't think it's you who've upset me (whoever 'you' are ;).

Finally, argh, back to cycling-commuting tomorrow. I have 14 pages to tone and a cover to prepare this week if I want a comic out for Expo. There isn't enough time in the day ;_;

Comments

how is it best to deal with upset?

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

*hugs* Good question. It seems it may be very context dependent: sometimes what I need is someone to desist from a specific behaviour, and then, assuming it's easy and reasonable for them to do so, I can directly ask (or ask later if I'm not sure I can raise it in a reasonable manner). Other times I know objectively that whatever annoyed me is probably not actually the real issue, I just need to know the other person didn't mean it, in which case I might say something like that, just jump straight to "can I have a hug" or whatever emotionally-bonding thing is appropriate for that person.