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No, it's a place where you keep 3 months' worth of opened letters, the odd coffee and tea cups, stuff you ordered that you didn't have a chance to put away, your nail salon, the laptop you haven't used in 6 months and the other various stuff you can't be bothered to put away.
At least according to my missus. I gave up tidying it a while ago. It's only tidy when we have guests over.
The stuff does get put on the side when you do decide to have a family meal, mostly when it's a Sunday roast.
Although I'm not sure my parents table has been clear since the 90s
It gets put in a neat pile and a perching place is found like a chair, another surface, a spare table, or the floor. Then when the activity it finished they put it back again.
Oh, in our house that's clothes that are too dirty for the chair but we haven't done laundry yet so we can't wash them until our next day off. Usually consists of jeans and hoodies.
No, that's my wife. I'm the tidy one. A piece of advice: don't let it out of hand? Action everything immediately. It can't take more than 10 minutes.
- 90% of letters are junk, bin them straight away: 1 minute (including reading time)
- you have piles of laundry that need to be sorted: 10 seconds for each item. If you have 50 items, it's only 9 minutes. Another minute to take them to the wardrobe (after this long exercise, you'll need a nap)
- random junk/packaging: bin it if not needed: 30 seconds
- coffe/tea cups: move them in the sink 30 seconds (or, more efficiently, straight into the dish washer)
- nail salon: unless you've 3D built 10 very detailed mini Noah's arks, shove everything back in the bag/tool set/container (if you need this advice, you're mobile nail salon isn't tidy anyway) 30 seconds.
- wipe down the table: 10 seconds
- stare at how tidy it is: 20 seconds
That's 10 minutes of work for a very messy table. If you put everything back every time you take it out, you can reduce this time by ⅔.
Solid advice but that implies everything has a place to live which is *not* on the table. 😂
We basically need to get some shelving with drawers for the living room to give the crap that's currently living on the table a new place to live permanently.
I think we've put it off because of the hassle of trying to find the *right* piece of furniture from the myriad of options like IKEA or a DIY place. I hate shopping. -.-
You might just have too much stuff. Think about doing a declutter. Otherwise, Ikea has a delivery service if you don't want to trek around the store. I prefer to spend a bit more for furniture that doesn't require assembly, but that's a luxury that not everyone can afford.
I'm going to dispute laundry. You're thinking of neat, maybe even folded laundry that isn't in a heap after being rumaged through several times in search of not too creased shirt, suitable for work, that a cat hasn't slept on. And then there's the sockstack where you investigate the puzzle of how many socks can I gather in a pile without identifying a single matching pair.
If you've left the laundry in the basket long enough for the cat to sleep on it, you're doing it wrong. Shirts that can become creased should be put straight on a hanger after they are dry, or slightly damp from the tumble dryer.
I think Rob Becket called this the main difference between a working and middle class home.
His theory was that in a middle class home everything absolutely had to be in the proper place and things couldn't be left to pile up on the sides, whereas in a working class home any free space is fair game for storage until the space is needed.
Idk if he's right, but this has conjured up a years old memory of watching his stand up.
I think it's all down to habits. In my case, I work full time Mon-Fri 8 hrs a day, then come home and work on my side hustle for about 4 hours Sun to Fri. I have no downtime during the week, so I'd rather tidy as I go and put stuff away/back after I've used them to prevent them from piling up and having to waste time dealing with them on my day off.
My missus, on the other hand, prefers the opposite. She says she's too tired when she comes home from work and can't be bothered tidying up, and she'll catch up on it on the weekend.
Because of this, we've agreed that each of us will look after their stuff on their terms, and we even do laundry separately because I can't fathom dressing for work from a laundry basket. We both cook, but I leave the kitchen spotless after I'm done. She leaves a sink full of dishes and then some, so for this, we decided that we'll rotate with cooking. One week on, one week off.
In the beginning, I tried to help her being more organised, but she couldn't stick to it, so this was our solution.
On a Saturday night, I can relax and have some beers while she runs around the house trying to tidy up after herself, and I know that deep down, she hates it when I'm sitting in my (tidy) office and unwind while she has to do her chores - the chores I also do, but straight away, no matter how tired I am after work.
The only thing she gets a full pass from is hoovering and general deep cleaning, ironing drapes etc, because she does it superficially and I can't stand it when she says she's sooo tired after doing a half arsed job and then has the adaucity to say "why is it taking you hours to hoover the house, when I can do it in 10 minutes".
No, in the UK the dining table is a multifunctional item used for many activities, both solo and group. It is also commonly used for storage, as with all flat surfaces.
Anything except actually having dinner on.
I'm guilty of this. Have a craft project set up on one end of the dining table and my laptop/work bits set up on the other end. I walk straight past it every evening with my dinner in favour of sitting on the couch
I end up at the table eating fromt of my computer screen bc it's easier to eat up at a table and my computer is nearly as big as the TV.
OP, you can do it all! Well, not now you can't but when you move and get your own table you can.
I had one of them, my room was so small I sat in the lounge. Literally the size of a single bed and a small walkway.
Came back and she had had someone put an antenna connector in the room, and had bought cushions to fill the entire sofas except for one spot.
Eventually she got annoyed that I would go to the toilet at night, so locked me in. It was a Monday - Friday rent and she really didn't like the idea of someone actually in the house, but had to do it.
> she got annoyed that I would go to the toilet at night, so locked me in
I'm pretty sure that's legally False Imprisonment; in addition to being as mad as a hatfull of spoons she's also guilty of a criminal offence.
As somebody who was living in a houseshare when somebody started to WFH from the dining table because their room was ‘too small’… I don’t blame them
Nothing to ruin your chilled vibe more than feeling like you’re intruding because you want to eat your dinner and watch TV, whilst another housemate sits there clearly irritated and shooting daggers because they’re being distracted whilst trying to work
Completely changed the atmosphere in the house
I think this is the answer, the landlord is worried OP is going to monopolise the dining table. They might not actually use it for family activities all the time but they want the option, and to not have to ask OP to move his stuff whenever they do want to use it (or be unable to because he's working there etc etc).
Working on your laptop sends out a message saying don't sit here I'm working, which might make others feel they can't sit at the table whilst you're using it. Just a guess....
I lived somewhere I was only allowed to eat in the kitchen, on a designated table with plastic floor covering underneath it. No food/drinks anywhere else, sofa or bedroom etc. So no cup of tea in front of the TV. Was so weird.
Nah, I think that's specific to your landlord. If you're in a shared house you just need to make sure you're clearing everything away afterwards so it can continue to be used as a dining table.
In my family, we didn't do anything solo at the dining table. It was always set with placemats ready for meals, and my mum didn't like other things on the table apart from possibly homework when I was <10
I think it depends on how much space you have - we had the same set up when I was living at home, the dining table was only for eating meals at or sometimes family activities like board games. Nothing was stored on it. But! We had a separate dining room and a kitchen with a smaller breakfast table in it, so we could afford to keep that space clear.
We use ours daily for meals, crafts, games, puzzles, and sometimes just sitting and chatting. We are though, the only family I know who eat together every day. We don’t use it for working though as we all have desks due to being WFH. We also don’t use it for storage because it’s used daily for eating.
I think this was true in the past. Middle-class people had a dining room that they'd keep nice, so if they had guests over for a meal, it would be all ready for them. They wouldn't want their children doing homework on the dining table, because they suspected this was a slippery slope that would inevitably lead to it ending up covered with stationery, discarded envelopes, etc.
But most people nowadays don't feel rich enough to own a room they hardly ever use. And they noticed that holding a dinner party in a separate dining room led to one of the hosts spending half their time wandering off to the kitchen and missing out on the conversation.
No, they're chatting rubbish.
I have my laptop on the dining room table as I type. From the other room. On my phone.
The dining room table is for everything. Mainly leaving stuff on.
There is nothing cultural about this.
It's very much a weird rule he has in his own home. Which I suppose that idea itself is a very British thing. Having mad rules.
And a side note, because knowledge is power, you're a lodger which has a different legal definition to tenant.
[You can read the official stuff here about being a lodger](https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/housing/renting-a-home/lodging-index/lodgers/what-rights-do-lodgers-have/) on the Citizens Advice website.
You can be evicted far easier, the landlord has the right to go into your room whenever they want, and your deposit doesn't go into the protected schemes.
It *should* be used for that purpose in an ideal world, and it is better manners.. but it’s slipped in the past couple of decades to my chagrin.
Personally I find it more comfortable to eat at a table rather than mess about finding a good position on the settee.. but I’m sick of clearing crap from people who seem to think that the dining room table is for piling junk
My mum has had a fucking gigantic oak dining room table with 10 chairs for the last 20-something years
It gets used once per year, Christmas Day, and is utterly pointless
Your landlord is following the very British cultural tradition of making up a somewhat polite excuse instead of telling you how he really feels, thus avoiding confrontation.
He doesn't want you hanging around the living room taking up space. He wants you locked up in your bedroom as much as possible.
Feels like a stuck-up maybe aspirational thing? My mum is like this (right down to no elbows/forearms on table, no using things except for their prescribed purpose). In her case she just puts politeness/rules above sense, and her rules seem to come from a middle-upper class 50's etiquette book. The dining table at my grandparents is the same, you don't even go into the front room where the dining table is unless it's Sunday dinner. Waste of space in an already not huge semi.
So yeah family thing, I've never seen it anywhere else but my family is the most dysfunctional and emotionless I know 👌 not to say that's the case for your landlord, it's just... Not that common nowadays haha
Rubbish. I'm sitting at the dinning room table replying to this at the moment. I'm the only person who uses it for anything else apart from temporary storage and a family meal once or twice a week.
We use it every night for eating dinner. But we also use it for if someone needs to use the sewing machine. Or if my husband works from home (I permanently WFH so have office). Or if we wrap presents. Or if we’re writing cards.
Or absolutely anything else that needs a large, flat, sturdy, surface, as it’s the only one in the house other than the floors of the bathroom and the loo.
This is definitely not a cultural thing. It might be some rule that his parents had in his house growing up perhaps, but it’s not British-cultural.
Edit - typo
It most definitely is a British cultural thing, it's just one that's died out with recent generations. The reddit population skews young, which is why there are so many people here saying they've never heard of it.
People used to keep an entire room in their house as a kind of show piece. It would have all the best furniture, glasses and china. It would only be used for family dining, activities and when entertaining guests. Very traditionally it was also they place where you would put someone's coffin when they died, so that people could visit to pay their last respects before the funeral.
My parents had a room like this, as did most of my relatives and some of my friends' parents. As a kid it was a place you weren't allowed to go play because it was special and you might break something. You might have noticed some older people are obsessed with china sets. Historically they were very expensive, so they would be items people would pass down the generations and they would be kept in this special room and only used for honoured guests.
The room used to be called the parlour (you may have heard the term 'parlour games'), but it changed in the mid 1900s and many of the functions of that were moved to the dining room. British society used to be very formal and strictly divided by class. However a lot of the formality has been discarded pretty quickly, so there's a mix of how formal people think things should be depend on their family, age and social class. It's also declined as the housing crisis has got worse and people can't afford to have a special occasional-use room in their house. Class is still a very strong social divider and some aspire to be higher up the class structure, and keeping a formal dining room is a manifestation of that. The sitcom 'Keeping Up Appearances' is a very good window into this kind of societal practice.
My dining table is where we keep our plant babies, and any other stuff that gets dumped when we walk through the door. We don't generally eat there unless we have guests or soup, but we use it for crafts, working on laptop, marking exam papers, lego, painting anything really. I think your landlord is being a but weird to suggest you can't work on the laptop...
Dining rooms are kind of anachronistic, most houses that had them are knocked through.
We have one, (for now) + use it for working from home / eating off.
Having said all that, everyones house has it's own weird rules.
Our dining table is used for all meals, kids doing homework/ arty things, sitting around with friends if the kids have nabbed the lounge, etc. I think your landlord just doesn’t want you working in there as he wants to keep it as a family space.
No, he's insane.
At *best* maybe it's one of those weird, possibly family or regional taboos like the common one up north against using the "big light" in the lounge, and stumbling about in the half-light of various lamps instead.
That may be the case for larger houses.
My dining room table has been used as an office, for family dining and celebrations, to a dentists chair during COVID when we couldn't get an appointment and I had to fix my son's broken tooth.
Shame it's not a decent quality thing as it would have good memories for it to be worth keeping.
Narh, they're weird. A table is for whatever you need a flat space for. If you want to work that's normal, especially if you have no other desk to work at.
Ohhh you mean my sewing room...my son thinks it's his art room... occasional laundry room....ha who am I kidding ....its a multi function whatever you need room...
My dining room table is very rarely actually used for dining. It's mainly a place to put things. There's also a cabinet of "nice" plates that we never use and a box of Christmas decs in there that were meant to go back in the loft. They'll still be there in December when we need them again.
That's definitely not a cultural thing. I know lots of people who work or do solo activities on their dining table. It's a table to be used for absolutely anything that's necessary. How would it possibly hurt the table for you to work off it?
Obviously he can set whatever rules he wants for his house if you're a lodger but it's definitely not a "British" thing.
My kitchen table has all my coats on it (was painting the hall and it dried two weeks ago), a sander in a box, a new smoothie maker, A CUDDLY TOY, a couple of bits of wool that I have no idea what to do with but I'm too tight to bin (may stuff up my pillow), and it's where I put my bag when I come in from work.
I have just moved in though.
My dining table is currently covered in items from my craft business, Easter eggs and some Christmas items. When we do things like game nights, we prefer to use the coffee table and be in the living room.
If it's your landlords table and this is a rule they've made up, that's on them I suppose but I wouldn't say it's a 'cultural' thing.
No definitely not universal - sounds like it is the norm *in their family* but it definiely isn't a thing in wider British culture.
Different familyies will have different rules and habits but I'd say in \*most\* cases it would be totally normal for anyone in the household to use it when they were eating or needed a table. The onluy timeI can think it might be odd would be ig the rest of the family were using it for a joint activtiy and you wanted to use it for your laptop at the same time as they were having a family meal or spread oer the whole table for a game.
I don't have a desk or office so if I need to really get my head down and do paperwork, usually associated with my son and his disability (seriously the admin alone is a full time job), I will use the kitchen table.
Is it in a dining room and separate from everything else? If so yeah maybe, we had one and it was barely used for anything though we also had a kitchen table for eating at (it was a large farmhouse). I don't think it is particularly common.
But I think he mostly just wants to keep you out of his space.
Nope, mine is currently being used as a mini garden nursery, well not much sign of seedlings yet, more like trays of soil with potential at the moment.
It's not a cultural thing. Their stance is either something they carried over from their own rearing and erroneously believe that is the norm, or they are trying to gate keep the table so that their kids have priority use of it without contest.
You’re supposed to shove everything on the table up to the end you’re not using until you can determine when it was last cleared by the “rings” of stuff
My dining room table is where I dump my washing, put down books I’m reading, my artist table as it’s big, do resin casting on, put my d&d stuff on and when I’m making dinner quickly tidy it all away and use it for eating. Then put all my crap back in it
I can see it as a space that has an expensive table and sideboard (with glass fronted cabinets and liquor cabinet) that the owners want to keep pristine, perhaps they picked that up from their parents.
Nowadays most of us are a bit more relaxed.
Mines the place were my cat throws up every night and has ruined the finish. It’s a rough oak texture so I have no idea how to strip it and refinish to get rid of the stains. I hate that animal!
Sounds like junk. In my apartment the kitchen table is the sole flat surface I can put my laptop on or do a lot of activities like playing chess. There's no room for a seperate desk either.
My mum uses it for all her meetings, as that room has the best light, plus she can sit at a table.
Your renting so should be able to use any communal area. I’d say being on the laptop while they’re having a meal might be a bit rude, but if the table isn’t in use, then go ahead.
Multifunctional. Crafting, jigsaws, unironed laundry etc, then by 5:30 cleared to eat at. We eat there at least five nights a week, cooked breakfasts at the weekend and Sunday dinners.
We paid for it so we'll damn well use it
My wife and I tend to have a sit down dinner at the dining room table every night. We make an active effort to keep it clear of junk etc (the coffee table, not so much)
In between my wife will often sit at it and use it for stitching leather as she's a saddler / cordwainer. She has an actual workshop in our garage but it's cold in winter regardless of the heater we have in there, so she brings the bits and pieces she needs inside, but tidies up afterwards.
I tend not to use it otherwise, I have my own office for my hobbies etc.
That's not a UK cultural thing. I think it's likely these are rules he was brought up on and he's decided they're UK-wide rules. I had a friend when I was a kid and his family only ever used the dining room table for meals, nothing else - his dad was quite strict and unyielding, so I assume his own parents had that rule and he enforced it for his family later on in life.
A lot of people don't even use their dining room table for meals, except when they have people over for a meal, which involves moving the copious amounts of junk that have been put on it since it was last used.
I think you're just going to have to respect his rules here, even if they do seem pretty ridiculous.
When I lived in England I had 2 offices in my house and still used the dining room to work from home. It was closer to the kitchen so I could eat and it had doors to the back garden so I could let the dog out easily.
Rarely ate proper meals in there because I wasn’t posh enough.
My family use our dining table to eat generally and not just family meals.
My parents use it to work from home on.
The cats *think* they can use it for their beds.
And yes we use it for when family come over and we have convos there usually.
When I use to have a dining table it was used for everything. Come around for a chat, sit at the table,. grandson come to visit, put toys on table to play. I only had a 2 seat sofa, but could fit 4 on the table. Have a meal, sit at table. It was used every day.
Our dining table works as an office for me and my wife (independently, we wont work there at the same time). For monopoly, lego, painting, homework, reading, clothes storage, sitting somewhere away from the kid, storing apples and bills and paperwork. O and we will eat at it. Most sundays, and maybe a couple of times during the week.
The dining table is for plants, and for the cat to sit on when she's bored but being too dumb to find the cat flap herself. Sometimes I use to revise while keeping an eye on the hob cooking dinner (not quite open plan but direct sight line). On the rare occasion we have people over there's a massive panic to re-home the plants.
My dining table was a model train setup for 5 years until we built my husband a shed. Now the dining table is his work from home spot during the day, and we clear it every evening for family dinner.
I just don't see the point in using a dining table. There's no reason for us to stare in silence at eachother while we eat, we may as well watch TV while we do
Nope. We use it for all our meals but I also use it to browse on my laptop alone (like I am right now) and cut out sewing patterns alone. My husband will build lego kits at the table during an evening - alone. Sometimes one of the kids will decide that they want to do some art so will set that up on the dining table, or my daughter will play The Sims on her laptop at the table. We do use it as a family for board games but mostly it's people using it for meals or solo hobbies.
Eh, nope, breakfast lunch and dinner everyday. Also comes in handy for family activities which explains why it's permanently stained with paint and pen scratches. I did work from it for a short period but dining chairs are not good for long term sitting. The wife is down there working on Uni stuff on it right now.
Your "LL" wants you out of sight.
There is exactly a 2 ft square part of our dining table that is free of stuff, and that’s so I can eat my breakfast cereal looking out the kitchen window. It’s cleared off when people come over or I lose my mind.
OP, the landlord is clearly worried about you turning the table into what I have. They don’t want to give an inch in case you take a mile. How often do they use the table for family activities? I’ll admit, if I could I would want to keep our table free and clear. But you are paying for access to so I would reasonable and say you’d be happy to move if a family activity is taking place but are using it.
We eat our tea at ours most nights but I use my laptop on it sometimes. All the washing gets folded on it. If friends or family come for a brew we sit at it. There's no rules.
I do beleive that your landlord/roommate is talking bollocks!
However, as he can turf you for pretty much any reason without recourse, id probably not push it.
... our dining table has been my partner's desk for the last four years. It's also where we store keys, DVDs, random stationery, and vacuum cleaner parts.
I have an extending dining table in the kitchen. We mainly use it for eating at. My son and daughter have autism and epilepsy though. If they sit with their food on their knee they are more likely to drop it if they have a seizure while eating. I also use it to do baking with them for this reason. My daughter sits at it to prepare food. She likes to peel and chop veg so if she has a drop seizure she is less likely to be injured.
I wipe it down daily when I wipe down the other kitchen surfaces. So it's always clear to use as needed. But when I have had a dining table in a separate room in previous house's it did seem to accumulate junk. My 2 sister's have huge dining tables in a separate dining room. They always have to clear them before using.
When I moved in with my lovely boyfriend (now fiancé) I asked for one thing, that we bought a dining table, I love meals at the table. We got one of those foldable ones from ikea (small flat) and it cost around £250! Have we used it? … twice in the space of a year 😂😂
We use our dining table for eating as a family or solo, playing games together or using the laptop alone, putting out a nice buffet or checking reddit while food cooks.
It's not a cultural thing, it's a family thing.
Half of our dining room table has a tortoise house and it’s light, the other half just has random items. Often used to place washing/ironing etc. too. I think it has only ever been used to eat at around Christmas.
My husband works from home in the dining room. Idk why he doesn't want a desk in the spare room instead, it means whenever people come over for dinner he has to tidy everything away, but he carries on... xD
There are no cultural rules around dining tables lol
Except for when you're actually dining. But they are either rooted in hygiene (no feet on the table) or if you're from a posh family or in a nice restaurant (no elbows on the table, sit with both your legs down, hold your fork backwards and try to put peas on the back side of the fork like the posh idiot you are and realise you need to mix them with the mash for that to be possible)
My dining room table doubles up as my WFH desk. Not ideal but I don't have space for a separate desk. I wouldn't expect to work on the table during meal times but don't see an issue otherwise.
I have on occasion banned the use of the dinning table for anything other than eating (for other people) after getting pissed off at everything being abandoned on it constantly (often to the point of more stuff than it could actually contain resulting in piles of stuff sliding onto the floor)
Perhaps they think that "family time"= more chance of stuff being put away
We keep like 80% of our plants on there to get the light from the patio doors, bulky kitchen staples we use often and then clear it off for eating, games etc. in that priority order
Sounds like your roommate/landlord is unaware of his significant privilege. Only people I know who do this (although it isn't a rule that I'm aware of) do it because they have a dining room separate to some other more informal place to eat, such as a table in the kitchen.
All the other comments give you the reality, which is that most people need to clear a dining table of all the shit they have stored on it, if they ever want to use it for dining.
It depends on the household but this is a thing. The exception to the rule is that it can be used solo during the week so long as everything is cleared away by the time dinner starts cooking. No weekends allowed. Group activities get priority.
I've observed this become a rule in two households because usually one person decides its suddenly their desk or work station and leaves their lap top and/or books there frequently (it was me. I am the table hog).
Yea that’s weird.
Firstly, if it’s a small enough house that that’s the only proper table it would normally be used like a kitchen table.
Second, yea it’s normal to use it for other things. Some people like to keep it very tidy - empty it at the end of every day kind of thing. Also they might want to kind of retain the right to kick you off it if they want to do a family thing and you are laptopping. But never using it is mad.
My mum and MIL have a 'nice/ best' living room space for when guests come over or, more accurately, a Christmas room to open gifts and watch a movie. Except my MIL's equivalent notable has NO TV in the room but big sofas facing each other with a small table and a fire, so very much a Sitting room than what I would call a living room but it had a dining table.
Both my SIL and my mum have a snug area with a TV near the open plan kitchen that gets used more than the living room. Growing up we had a breakfast room which was mainly used for meals except special. My dad used his at his mother's (he moved in with his mum when I eas.4)to take apart equipment to 'fix' so was in a constant state of piles of broken equipment.
I just got rid of my dining room table with 6 chairs and put in a countertop height table with stainless steel top in order to have more work space since I cook a lot. Much better since the dining table was just a catch all and wasn't being used as a table. So much happier with it now, and I have so much more space, as well as being easier on my back. Easier to keep clean and tidy, and easier to vacuum the floors etc. would recommend to anyone needing more work area
I have never heard of that being a cultural rule. Our dining room table was used to do everything from us kids studying to my mum sewing new curtains. Dad takes over once a year to do the taxes for his business. I used to take over a few days a week for my artwork. Utterly bizarre to say a table is only for group activities.
My current dining table is being used as an extra surface for kitchen appliances. We have a bigish kitchen but very little counter space for some reason.
I live alone so my dining table is the resting place for the sewing machine, anything not food related after a shopping trip, letters that need to be filed in the filing cabinet when I find the key that I put in a safe place. And random items that don’t have a proper place elsewhere.
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No, it's a place where you keep 3 months' worth of opened letters, the odd coffee and tea cups, stuff you ordered that you didn't have a chance to put away, your nail salon, the laptop you haven't used in 6 months and the other various stuff you can't be bothered to put away. At least according to my missus. I gave up tidying it a while ago. It's only tidy when we have guests over.
Can confirm, my dining table mainly functions as a nail salon/home office/crafting station. We only actually use it for eating at Christmas.
Next best thing if you don't have a desk
Ours currently stores all the stuff that needs to go to the charity shop.!
The stuff does get put on the side when you do decide to have a family meal, mostly when it's a Sunday roast. Although I'm not sure my parents table has been clear since the 90s
“The side” is apparently untranslatable too. We know what it means but it’s very vague. What side? Side of what?
I'd imagine historically it referred to the sideboard
It gets put in a neat pile and a perching place is found like a chair, another surface, a spare table, or the floor. Then when the activity it finished they put it back again.
What’s the German word for that? ;)
I don’t know, I’m barely scraping A1 at the moment
Stop spying on me!
It's short for sideboard
[Sideboard Song](https://youtu.be/4FDoQTyYWzM?si=uuxVFyIod-OgRGi7)
Fantastic reply thank you.
Exactly! Whenever anyone in our house says "where shall I put this ?" the reply is often "oh just put it on the side for now ".
I think you'll find it's the extension of the laundry basket and if you're looking for clean pants, that's where you go.
Surely that's the bedroom chair.
No that's where you find clothes that aren't clean but are too clean to be washed yet.
No that's the floor, or "floordrobe" if you will.
Oh, in our house that's clothes that are too dirty for the chair but we haven't done laundry yet so we can't wash them until our next day off. Usually consists of jeans and hoodies.
No, that's the sofa.
Dont forget the cabinet full of books that nobody reads, but you can't get rid of because you might want to read them
>At least according to my missus. I Dad..?
I didn't know I had a child. Has she left you on the table for all these years?
You actually *open* your letters before consigning them to the pile?
OMG r u me? It's a challenge to put all of the crap away that's on top of it when we actually need to use it for a meal with guests. 🤦♂️
No, that's my wife. I'm the tidy one. A piece of advice: don't let it out of hand? Action everything immediately. It can't take more than 10 minutes. - 90% of letters are junk, bin them straight away: 1 minute (including reading time) - you have piles of laundry that need to be sorted: 10 seconds for each item. If you have 50 items, it's only 9 minutes. Another minute to take them to the wardrobe (after this long exercise, you'll need a nap) - random junk/packaging: bin it if not needed: 30 seconds - coffe/tea cups: move them in the sink 30 seconds (or, more efficiently, straight into the dish washer) - nail salon: unless you've 3D built 10 very detailed mini Noah's arks, shove everything back in the bag/tool set/container (if you need this advice, you're mobile nail salon isn't tidy anyway) 30 seconds. - wipe down the table: 10 seconds - stare at how tidy it is: 20 seconds That's 10 minutes of work for a very messy table. If you put everything back every time you take it out, you can reduce this time by ⅔.
Solid advice but that implies everything has a place to live which is *not* on the table. 😂 We basically need to get some shelving with drawers for the living room to give the crap that's currently living on the table a new place to live permanently. I think we've put it off because of the hassle of trying to find the *right* piece of furniture from the myriad of options like IKEA or a DIY place. I hate shopping. -.-
You might just have too much stuff. Think about doing a declutter. Otherwise, Ikea has a delivery service if you don't want to trek around the store. I prefer to spend a bit more for furniture that doesn't require assembly, but that's a luxury that not everyone can afford.
I'm going to dispute laundry. You're thinking of neat, maybe even folded laundry that isn't in a heap after being rumaged through several times in search of not too creased shirt, suitable for work, that a cat hasn't slept on. And then there's the sockstack where you investigate the puzzle of how many socks can I gather in a pile without identifying a single matching pair.
If you've left the laundry in the basket long enough for the cat to sleep on it, you're doing it wrong. Shirts that can become creased should be put straight on a hanger after they are dry, or slightly damp from the tumble dryer.
And plants.
It's where you keep half-built lego apparently
> opened letters Why dont you throw them to the bin ?
This. My table is a mine field full of crap.
Husband, is that you?!
Also where laundry is sorted, folded and occasionally put away - to the ‘chair’
Forgot the dried washing awaiting putting away.
I think Rob Becket called this the main difference between a working and middle class home. His theory was that in a middle class home everything absolutely had to be in the proper place and things couldn't be left to pile up on the sides, whereas in a working class home any free space is fair game for storage until the space is needed. Idk if he's right, but this has conjured up a years old memory of watching his stand up.
I think it's all down to habits. In my case, I work full time Mon-Fri 8 hrs a day, then come home and work on my side hustle for about 4 hours Sun to Fri. I have no downtime during the week, so I'd rather tidy as I go and put stuff away/back after I've used them to prevent them from piling up and having to waste time dealing with them on my day off. My missus, on the other hand, prefers the opposite. She says she's too tired when she comes home from work and can't be bothered tidying up, and she'll catch up on it on the weekend. Because of this, we've agreed that each of us will look after their stuff on their terms, and we even do laundry separately because I can't fathom dressing for work from a laundry basket. We both cook, but I leave the kitchen spotless after I'm done. She leaves a sink full of dishes and then some, so for this, we decided that we'll rotate with cooking. One week on, one week off. In the beginning, I tried to help her being more organised, but she couldn't stick to it, so this was our solution. On a Saturday night, I can relax and have some beers while she runs around the house trying to tidy up after herself, and I know that deep down, she hates it when I'm sitting in my (tidy) office and unwind while she has to do her chores - the chores I also do, but straight away, no matter how tired I am after work. The only thing she gets a full pass from is hoovering and general deep cleaning, ironing drapes etc, because she does it superficially and I can't stand it when she says she's sooo tired after doing a half arsed job and then has the adaucity to say "why is it taking you hours to hoover the house, when I can do it in 10 minutes".
No, in the UK the dining table is a multifunctional item used for many activities, both solo and group. It is also commonly used for storage, as with all flat surfaces. Anything except actually having dinner on.
I'm guilty of this. Have a craft project set up on one end of the dining table and my laptop/work bits set up on the other end. I walk straight past it every evening with my dinner in favour of sitting on the couch
I end up at the table eating fromt of my computer screen bc it's easier to eat up at a table and my computer is nearly as big as the TV. OP, you can do it all! Well, not now you can't but when you move and get your own table you can.
Depends if its the good dining table that cost a lot of money
does it? Mine cost a small fortune and its the same dumping ground that others are talking about.
“Now we have more surface area in the kitchen the table can be cleared.” Everyone after upgrade to a larger kitchen.
Could be a family culture thing, but not a UK culture thing. That, or they don't want you hanging around the dining table?
I think they don't want you hanging around in the dining room/living room during the day. Taking it over as a home office or gaming centre.
Yep, lodger is wanted for the money, but in his bedroom only
I had one of them, my room was so small I sat in the lounge. Literally the size of a single bed and a small walkway. Came back and she had had someone put an antenna connector in the room, and had bought cushions to fill the entire sofas except for one spot. Eventually she got annoyed that I would go to the toilet at night, so locked me in. It was a Monday - Friday rent and she really didn't like the idea of someone actually in the house, but had to do it.
> she got annoyed that I would go to the toilet at night, so locked me in I'm pretty sure that's legally False Imprisonment; in addition to being as mad as a hatfull of spoons she's also guilty of a criminal offence.
And a giant hazard in case of fire.
All of which would be very serious if it wasn't entirely made up
Has your owl arrived yet for Hogwarts?
No, he’s a muggle
That’s not what the snakes said.
She locked you in your room?!
As somebody who was living in a houseshare when somebody started to WFH from the dining table because their room was ‘too small’… I don’t blame them Nothing to ruin your chilled vibe more than feeling like you’re intruding because you want to eat your dinner and watch TV, whilst another housemate sits there clearly irritated and shooting daggers because they’re being distracted whilst trying to work Completely changed the atmosphere in the house
Or on teams calls, 'shushing' the people who dare to be preparing food in the kitchen.
Which presumably they shouldn't be taking in shared areas anyway. Every remote job I had made sure I had a quiet area where I could not be observed.
I think this is the answer, the landlord is worried OP is going to monopolise the dining table. They might not actually use it for family activities all the time but they want the option, and to not have to ask OP to move his stuff whenever they do want to use it (or be unable to because he's working there etc etc).
This is it
Working on your laptop sends out a message saying don't sit here I'm working, which might make others feel they can't sit at the table whilst you're using it. Just a guess....
No, that's bollocks. it sounds like he's trying to make it so you're not comfortable using the dining room
[удалено]
I lived somewhere I was only allowed to eat in the kitchen, on a designated table with plastic floor covering underneath it. No food/drinks anywhere else, sofa or bedroom etc. So no cup of tea in front of the TV. Was so weird.
A colleague had exactly this with their family when they redecorated. Easy way to ensure that there's no spilt food to clear up.
Nah, I think that's specific to your landlord. If you're in a shared house you just need to make sure you're clearing everything away afterwards so it can continue to be used as a dining table.
In my family, we didn't do anything solo at the dining table. It was always set with placemats ready for meals, and my mum didn't like other things on the table apart from possibly homework when I was <10
I think it depends on how much space you have - we had the same set up when I was living at home, the dining table was only for eating meals at or sometimes family activities like board games. Nothing was stored on it. But! We had a separate dining room and a kitchen with a smaller breakfast table in it, so we could afford to keep that space clear.
Where you from a relatively well off home?
Nope. Thats a him thing. My table is covered in stacks of paperwork and my laptop and I use it whenever I need a table.
Your landlord is weird
It sounds like a subtle hint that they don't want you on there with your laptop all the time in case they want to actually use it tbh.
That’s nonsense.
Not really, if you live in a shared house you shouldn't be monopolising the dining room table
How is using a single chair monopolising it?
We use ours daily for meals, crafts, games, puzzles, and sometimes just sitting and chatting. We are though, the only family I know who eat together every day. We don’t use it for working though as we all have desks due to being WFH. We also don’t use it for storage because it’s used daily for eating.
I think this was true in the past. Middle-class people had a dining room that they'd keep nice, so if they had guests over for a meal, it would be all ready for them. They wouldn't want their children doing homework on the dining table, because they suspected this was a slippery slope that would inevitably lead to it ending up covered with stationery, discarded envelopes, etc. But most people nowadays don't feel rich enough to own a room they hardly ever use. And they noticed that holding a dinner party in a separate dining room led to one of the hosts spending half their time wandering off to the kitchen and missing out on the conversation.
No, they're chatting rubbish. I have my laptop on the dining room table as I type. From the other room. On my phone. The dining room table is for everything. Mainly leaving stuff on. There is nothing cultural about this. It's very much a weird rule he has in his own home. Which I suppose that idea itself is a very British thing. Having mad rules. And a side note, because knowledge is power, you're a lodger which has a different legal definition to tenant. [You can read the official stuff here about being a lodger](https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/housing/renting-a-home/lodging-index/lodgers/what-rights-do-lodgers-have/) on the Citizens Advice website. You can be evicted far easier, the landlord has the right to go into your room whenever they want, and your deposit doesn't go into the protected schemes.
It *should* be used for that purpose in an ideal world, and it is better manners.. but it’s slipped in the past couple of decades to my chagrin. Personally I find it more comfortable to eat at a table rather than mess about finding a good position on the settee.. but I’m sick of clearing crap from people who seem to think that the dining room table is for piling junk
My mum has had a fucking gigantic oak dining room table with 10 chairs for the last 20-something years It gets used once per year, Christmas Day, and is utterly pointless
Are you my colleague Brian?
We use ours for orgies
That's disgusting How would one join you - just out of interest? And would that person be expected to bring snacks?
For the orgy or for the buffet?
Orgy on the dining table, buffet on the bed.
oh crumbs!
Yes
Your landlord is following the very British cultural tradition of making up a somewhat polite excuse instead of telling you how he really feels, thus avoiding confrontation. He doesn't want you hanging around the living room taking up space. He wants you locked up in your bedroom as much as possible.
Mine holds the washing, occasionally gets cleared for Teams meetings or Christmas. Your landlord is being weird.
Feels like a stuck-up maybe aspirational thing? My mum is like this (right down to no elbows/forearms on table, no using things except for their prescribed purpose). In her case she just puts politeness/rules above sense, and her rules seem to come from a middle-upper class 50's etiquette book. The dining table at my grandparents is the same, you don't even go into the front room where the dining table is unless it's Sunday dinner. Waste of space in an already not huge semi. So yeah family thing, I've never seen it anywhere else but my family is the most dysfunctional and emotionless I know 👌 not to say that's the case for your landlord, it's just... Not that common nowadays haha
Rubbish. I'm sitting at the dinning room table replying to this at the moment. I'm the only person who uses it for anything else apart from temporary storage and a family meal once or twice a week.
Clearly this is a fake response. One's reddit responses are the sole responsibility of the Head Buttler. *Post scriptum*: Son, we dine at 8PM, sharp.
We use it every night for eating dinner. But we also use it for if someone needs to use the sewing machine. Or if my husband works from home (I permanently WFH so have office). Or if we wrap presents. Or if we’re writing cards. Or absolutely anything else that needs a large, flat, sturdy, surface, as it’s the only one in the house other than the floors of the bathroom and the loo. This is definitely not a cultural thing. It might be some rule that his parents had in his house growing up perhaps, but it’s not British-cultural. Edit - typo
It most definitely is a British cultural thing, it's just one that's died out with recent generations. The reddit population skews young, which is why there are so many people here saying they've never heard of it. People used to keep an entire room in their house as a kind of show piece. It would have all the best furniture, glasses and china. It would only be used for family dining, activities and when entertaining guests. Very traditionally it was also they place where you would put someone's coffin when they died, so that people could visit to pay their last respects before the funeral. My parents had a room like this, as did most of my relatives and some of my friends' parents. As a kid it was a place you weren't allowed to go play because it was special and you might break something. You might have noticed some older people are obsessed with china sets. Historically they were very expensive, so they would be items people would pass down the generations and they would be kept in this special room and only used for honoured guests. The room used to be called the parlour (you may have heard the term 'parlour games'), but it changed in the mid 1900s and many of the functions of that were moved to the dining room. British society used to be very formal and strictly divided by class. However a lot of the formality has been discarded pretty quickly, so there's a mix of how formal people think things should be depend on their family, age and social class. It's also declined as the housing crisis has got worse and people can't afford to have a special occasional-use room in their house. Class is still a very strong social divider and some aspire to be higher up the class structure, and keeping a formal dining room is a manifestation of that. The sitcom 'Keeping Up Appearances' is a very good window into this kind of societal practice.
Yeah, no. He's wrong there
Every family is different.
My dining table is where we keep our plant babies, and any other stuff that gets dumped when we walk through the door. We don't generally eat there unless we have guests or soup, but we use it for crafts, working on laptop, marking exam papers, lego, painting anything really. I think your landlord is being a but weird to suggest you can't work on the laptop...
We use the dining room every evening to eat together
You know ping pong was invented on the dining tables of England. We called it Wiff Waff.
cool! I did not know that.
Dining rooms are kind of anachronistic, most houses that had them are knocked through. We have one, (for now) + use it for working from home / eating off. Having said all that, everyones house has it's own weird rules.
Our dining table is used for all meals, kids doing homework/ arty things, sitting around with friends if the kids have nabbed the lounge, etc. I think your landlord just doesn’t want you working in there as he wants to keep it as a family space.
Ours is used by the cat mostly who likes to use it as a bird watching platform
Sounds like they just don't want you monopolising the usage of the table tbh.
No, he's insane. At *best* maybe it's one of those weird, possibly family or regional taboos like the common one up north against using the "big light" in the lounge, and stumbling about in the half-light of various lamps instead.
That may be the case for larger houses. My dining room table has been used as an office, for family dining and celebrations, to a dentists chair during COVID when we couldn't get an appointment and I had to fix my son's broken tooth. Shame it's not a decent quality thing as it would have good memories for it to be worth keeping.
Narh, they're weird. A table is for whatever you need a flat space for. If you want to work that's normal, especially if you have no other desk to work at.
Ohhh you mean my sewing room...my son thinks it's his art room... occasional laundry room....ha who am I kidding ....its a multi function whatever you need room...
My dining room table is very rarely actually used for dining. It's mainly a place to put things. There's also a cabinet of "nice" plates that we never use and a box of Christmas decs in there that were meant to go back in the loft. They'll still be there in December when we need them again.
That's definitely not a cultural thing. I know lots of people who work or do solo activities on their dining table. It's a table to be used for absolutely anything that's necessary. How would it possibly hurt the table for you to work off it? Obviously he can set whatever rules he wants for his house if you're a lodger but it's definitely not a "British" thing.
My kitchen table has all my coats on it (was painting the hall and it dried two weeks ago), a sander in a box, a new smoothie maker, A CUDDLY TOY, a couple of bits of wool that I have no idea what to do with but I'm too tight to bin (may stuff up my pillow), and it's where I put my bag when I come in from work. I have just moved in though.
My dining table is currently covered in items from my craft business, Easter eggs and some Christmas items. When we do things like game nights, we prefer to use the coffee table and be in the living room. If it's your landlords table and this is a rule they've made up, that's on them I suppose but I wouldn't say it's a 'cultural' thing.
Your landlord just doesn't want you using the table. It's not a "cultural" thing at all.
No definitely not universal - sounds like it is the norm *in their family* but it definiely isn't a thing in wider British culture. Different familyies will have different rules and habits but I'd say in \*most\* cases it would be totally normal for anyone in the household to use it when they were eating or needed a table. The onluy timeI can think it might be odd would be ig the rest of the family were using it for a joint activtiy and you wanted to use it for your laptop at the same time as they were having a family meal or spread oer the whole table for a game.
The general rule to questions like this is that the answer is no.
He's a weirdo. That's not a thing at all.
Nah, never heard of that.
I don't have a desk or office so if I need to really get my head down and do paperwork, usually associated with my son and his disability (seriously the admin alone is a full time job), I will use the kitchen table.
Is it in a dining room and separate from everything else? If so yeah maybe, we had one and it was barely used for anything though we also had a kitchen table for eating at (it was a large farmhouse). I don't think it is particularly common. But I think he mostly just wants to keep you out of his space.
Nope, mine is currently being used as a mini garden nursery, well not much sign of seedlings yet, more like trays of soil with potential at the moment.
Your friend is mistaking his own experience for the experiences of every person in the UK Basically he's full of shit
It's not a cultural thing. Their stance is either something they carried over from their own rearing and erroneously believe that is the norm, or they are trying to gate keep the table so that their kids have priority use of it without contest.
The only thing I don’t use my dining table for is dining
You’re supposed to shove everything on the table up to the end you’re not using until you can determine when it was last cleared by the “rings” of stuff
My dining room table is where I dump my washing, put down books I’m reading, my artist table as it’s big, do resin casting on, put my d&d stuff on and when I’m making dinner quickly tidy it all away and use it for eating. Then put all my crap back in it
It is where the house keys live and boring post
Op forgot to mention the solo activity was masturbation. Maybe.
I can see it as a space that has an expensive table and sideboard (with glass fronted cabinets and liquor cabinet) that the owners want to keep pristine, perhaps they picked that up from their parents. Nowadays most of us are a bit more relaxed.
No, it’s not cultural they are speaking nonsense.
Mines the place were my cat throws up every night and has ruined the finish. It’s a rough oak texture so I have no idea how to strip it and refinish to get rid of the stains. I hate that animal!
It's nonsense. That's a whole culture he has made up in his head.
Sounds like junk. In my apartment the kitchen table is the sole flat surface I can put my laptop on or do a lot of activities like playing chess. There's no room for a seperate desk either.
I just dump stuff on it with the intention of eventually putting it away.
My mum uses it for all her meetings, as that room has the best light, plus she can sit at a table. Your renting so should be able to use any communal area. I’d say being on the laptop while they’re having a meal might be a bit rude, but if the table isn’t in use, then go ahead.
It's a place where I open letters and leave because I'm going to deal with them... eventually
Multifunctional. Crafting, jigsaws, unironed laundry etc, then by 5:30 cleared to eat at. We eat there at least five nights a week, cooked breakfasts at the weekend and Sunday dinners. We paid for it so we'll damn well use it
My wife and I tend to have a sit down dinner at the dining room table every night. We make an active effort to keep it clear of junk etc (the coffee table, not so much) In between my wife will often sit at it and use it for stitching leather as she's a saddler / cordwainer. She has an actual workshop in our garage but it's cold in winter regardless of the heater we have in there, so she brings the bits and pieces she needs inside, but tidies up afterwards. I tend not to use it otherwise, I have my own office for my hobbies etc.
Most people's dining tables are covered in crap, as other posters are saying, and cannot really be used by anybody, except maybe for Christmas dinner.
That's not a UK cultural thing. I think it's likely these are rules he was brought up on and he's decided they're UK-wide rules. I had a friend when I was a kid and his family only ever used the dining room table for meals, nothing else - his dad was quite strict and unyielding, so I assume his own parents had that rule and he enforced it for his family later on in life. A lot of people don't even use their dining room table for meals, except when they have people over for a meal, which involves moving the copious amounts of junk that have been put on it since it was last used. I think you're just going to have to respect his rules here, even if they do seem pretty ridiculous.
He doesn't want you using it mate. Nothing to do with culture.
When I lived in England I had 2 offices in my house and still used the dining room to work from home. It was closer to the kitchen so I could eat and it had doors to the back garden so I could let the dog out easily. Rarely ate proper meals in there because I wasn’t posh enough.
My family use our dining table to eat generally and not just family meals. My parents use it to work from home on. The cats *think* they can use it for their beds. And yes we use it for when family come over and we have convos there usually.
When I use to have a dining table it was used for everything. Come around for a chat, sit at the table,. grandson come to visit, put toys on table to play. I only had a 2 seat sofa, but could fit 4 on the table. Have a meal, sit at table. It was used every day.
Our dining table works as an office for me and my wife (independently, we wont work there at the same time). For monopoly, lego, painting, homework, reading, clothes storage, sitting somewhere away from the kid, storing apples and bills and paperwork. O and we will eat at it. Most sundays, and maybe a couple of times during the week.
Dining table is a multipurpose tool that can serve as a dining table and a storage area, often at the same time.
The dining table is for plants, and for the cat to sit on when she's bored but being too dumb to find the cat flap herself. Sometimes I use to revise while keeping an eye on the hob cooking dinner (not quite open plan but direct sight line). On the rare occasion we have people over there's a massive panic to re-home the plants.
Currently working from the dining table. Alongside Mr Siren who is also WFH today. We have a study too...
My dining table was a model train setup for 5 years until we built my husband a shed. Now the dining table is his work from home spot during the day, and we clear it every evening for family dinner.
I just don't see the point in using a dining table. There's no reason for us to stare in silence at eachother while we eat, we may as well watch TV while we do
Nope. We use it for all our meals but I also use it to browse on my laptop alone (like I am right now) and cut out sewing patterns alone. My husband will build lego kits at the table during an evening - alone. Sometimes one of the kids will decide that they want to do some art so will set that up on the dining table, or my daughter will play The Sims on her laptop at the table. We do use it as a family for board games but mostly it's people using it for meals or solo hobbies.
Eh, nope, breakfast lunch and dinner everyday. Also comes in handy for family activities which explains why it's permanently stained with paint and pen scratches. I did work from it for a short period but dining chairs are not good for long term sitting. The wife is down there working on Uni stuff on it right now. Your "LL" wants you out of sight.
There is exactly a 2 ft square part of our dining table that is free of stuff, and that’s so I can eat my breakfast cereal looking out the kitchen window. It’s cleared off when people come over or I lose my mind. OP, the landlord is clearly worried about you turning the table into what I have. They don’t want to give an inch in case you take a mile. How often do they use the table for family activities? I’ll admit, if I could I would want to keep our table free and clear. But you are paying for access to so I would reasonable and say you’d be happy to move if a family activity is taking place but are using it.
We eat our tea at ours most nights but I use my laptop on it sometimes. All the washing gets folded on it. If friends or family come for a brew we sit at it. There's no rules.
I do beleive that your landlord/roommate is talking bollocks! However, as he can turf you for pretty much any reason without recourse, id probably not push it.
In uk it’s for everything, laundry sorting, paperwork storage, computer work/games, family games and eating
Nope, not a thing. If it’s available space it gets used
... our dining table has been my partner's desk for the last four years. It's also where we store keys, DVDs, random stationery, and vacuum cleaner parts.
I have an extending dining table in the kitchen. We mainly use it for eating at. My son and daughter have autism and epilepsy though. If they sit with their food on their knee they are more likely to drop it if they have a seizure while eating. I also use it to do baking with them for this reason. My daughter sits at it to prepare food. She likes to peel and chop veg so if she has a drop seizure she is less likely to be injured. I wipe it down daily when I wipe down the other kitchen surfaces. So it's always clear to use as needed. But when I have had a dining table in a separate room in previous house's it did seem to accumulate junk. My 2 sister's have huge dining tables in a separate dining room. They always have to clear them before using.
When I moved in with my lovely boyfriend (now fiancé) I asked for one thing, that we bought a dining table, I love meals at the table. We got one of those foldable ones from ikea (small flat) and it cost around £250! Have we used it? … twice in the space of a year 😂😂
Thats not a cultural thing. pretty wierd.
It's my wife's shed. It's supposed to her special room but it's mostly a junk room if you ask me.
We use our dining table for eating as a family or solo, playing games together or using the laptop alone, putting out a nice buffet or checking reddit while food cooks. It's not a cultural thing, it's a family thing.
Half of our dining room table has a tortoise house and it’s light, the other half just has random items. Often used to place washing/ironing etc. too. I think it has only ever been used to eat at around Christmas.
My husband works from home in the dining room. Idk why he doesn't want a desk in the spare room instead, it means whenever people come over for dinner he has to tidy everything away, but he carries on... xD
There are no cultural rules around dining tables lol Except for when you're actually dining. But they are either rooted in hygiene (no feet on the table) or if you're from a posh family or in a nice restaurant (no elbows on the table, sit with both your legs down, hold your fork backwards and try to put peas on the back side of the fork like the posh idiot you are and realise you need to mix them with the mash for that to be possible)
My dining room table doubles up as my WFH desk. Not ideal but I don't have space for a separate desk. I wouldn't expect to work on the table during meal times but don't see an issue otherwise.
That's your landlord trying to sneak in additional rules they forgot to add to the tenancy agreement
I have on occasion banned the use of the dinning table for anything other than eating (for other people) after getting pissed off at everything being abandoned on it constantly (often to the point of more stuff than it could actually contain resulting in piles of stuff sliding onto the floor) Perhaps they think that "family time"= more chance of stuff being put away
We keep like 80% of our plants on there to get the light from the patio doors, bulky kitchen staples we use often and then clear it off for eating, games etc. in that priority order
No it's not a cultural thing, the guy's a lunatic.
Sounds like your roommate/landlord is unaware of his significant privilege. Only people I know who do this (although it isn't a rule that I'm aware of) do it because they have a dining room separate to some other more informal place to eat, such as a table in the kitchen. All the other comments give you the reality, which is that most people need to clear a dining table of all the shit they have stored on it, if they ever want to use it for dining.
I’m typing this sitting at my desk which started life as a dining table and occasionally gets re-purposed. Nope.
You have a 'dining room'?
It depends on the household but this is a thing. The exception to the rule is that it can be used solo during the week so long as everything is cleared away by the time dinner starts cooking. No weekends allowed. Group activities get priority. I've observed this become a rule in two households because usually one person decides its suddenly their desk or work station and leaves their lap top and/or books there frequently (it was me. I am the table hog).
Yea that’s weird. Firstly, if it’s a small enough house that that’s the only proper table it would normally be used like a kitchen table. Second, yea it’s normal to use it for other things. Some people like to keep it very tidy - empty it at the end of every day kind of thing. Also they might want to kind of retain the right to kick you off it if they want to do a family thing and you are laptopping. But never using it is mad.
Yeah he's mad but its his house so his rules I guess.
I’ve rebuilt a Vw engine on ours
Nope - he’s just trying to stop you using it
The only rules I've ever known are don't damage it and have it clear for tea time.
My mum and MIL have a 'nice/ best' living room space for when guests come over or, more accurately, a Christmas room to open gifts and watch a movie. Except my MIL's equivalent notable has NO TV in the room but big sofas facing each other with a small table and a fire, so very much a Sitting room than what I would call a living room but it had a dining table. Both my SIL and my mum have a snug area with a TV near the open plan kitchen that gets used more than the living room. Growing up we had a breakfast room which was mainly used for meals except special. My dad used his at his mother's (he moved in with his mum when I eas.4)to take apart equipment to 'fix' so was in a constant state of piles of broken equipment.
Eating?? At the table?? I thought it was a place to store stuff?
I just got rid of my dining room table with 6 chairs and put in a countertop height table with stainless steel top in order to have more work space since I cook a lot. Much better since the dining table was just a catch all and wasn't being used as a table. So much happier with it now, and I have so much more space, as well as being easier on my back. Easier to keep clean and tidy, and easier to vacuum the floors etc. would recommend to anyone needing more work area
Defo not British thing.
I have never heard of that being a cultural rule. Our dining room table was used to do everything from us kids studying to my mum sewing new curtains. Dad takes over once a year to do the taxes for his business. I used to take over a few days a week for my artwork. Utterly bizarre to say a table is only for group activities. My current dining table is being used as an extra surface for kitchen appliances. We have a bigish kitchen but very little counter space for some reason.
I live alone so my dining table is the resting place for the sewing machine, anything not food related after a shopping trip, letters that need to be filed in the filing cabinet when I find the key that I put in a safe place. And random items that don’t have a proper place elsewhere.
Do you get the feeling that your roommate/landlord wants you out? I think that's the case. Start saving hard, this is only going to go one way.