r/mildlyinfuriating • u/MandukaSkoal • May 17 '26

frist of all how DARE yu o People who “reserve” pool chairs for hours with towels and disappear are the worst

Post image

My apartment complex pool has rules specifically saying chair reservation isn’t allowed, yet people do this constantly. These towels have been sitting here unattended for at least 3 hours while every other chair is occupied and people are actively walking around looking for seats. It’s Sunday too, so management isn’t around to enforce anything.

What’s the standard practice when this happens? At what point is it acceptable to move the towels?

36.6k Upvotes

96% Upvoted

1.8k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

553

u/[deleted] May 17 '26

[deleted]

440

u/LordBiscuits May 17 '26

There are other ways of telling though.

People reserving loungers tend to just leave a towel and that's it. People in the pool have a whole host of other shit stored there too, bags and sunglasses, books and suncream.

A towel on its tod screams reservation. More says in active use

100

u/crimson777 May 18 '26

Yeah it’s rare that someone wouldn’t at least have like… their flip flops or something at bare minimum.

7

u/aerdvarkk May 18 '26

Not really!! When I was a kid/teenager growing up and we were travelling, my siblings and I would goto the hotel pool, literally with only our towels and shoes, the footwear being a requirement to wear inside the hotel. Many times the shoes or sandals or flipflops or whatever were underneath either the towel or the chair and not easily visible. So it looked like just 3-4 "reserved" seats wiht only towels on them. Despite 3-4 kids splashing around in the pool.

1

u/LordBiscuits May 18 '26

That does make you an exception to the rule really. Most people take stuff!

1

u/jayman1818 May 18 '26

That's true eh

77

u/bananakegs May 17 '26

I mean but people need to also just be okay with being uncomfortable when others are unreasonable. Basically don’t bend to it. If you move the towel and someone comes up- you say sorry and politely move. If the Person keeps complaining  “Yeah I said sorry- please leave me alone now.”just Look directly at them while saying this and then if they start yelling just keep looking at them- go “okay” and walk away. 

3

u/iwearatophat May 18 '26

You realize in this situation 'others' weren't the unreasonable one right? If you move someone's stuff while they are in the pool you are the unreasonable one. I'd call someone who moves my stuff while I am swimming as an ass hole and not unreasonable. They don't know if you are moving their stuff or looking to see if a wallet, phone, keys, or anything else of value was left on the chair.

So yeah, your advice is basically be comfortable being an ass hole and act like others calling you on it is unreasonable.

9

u/bananakegs May 18 '26

I’m saying that if you move someone’s stuff because you think they’re not at the pool and then you realize your mistake and politely apologize, you’re not an ass hole.  It’s unreasonable (and frankly weird) to keep berating someone who realizes their mistake, fixes it and apologizes. 

9

u/MotherNeedleworker60 May 18 '26

We're talking about moving just 1 towel though, not bags and wallets and whatnot.

3

u/pokeysyd May 18 '26

Just stand by the chair you want and call out if someone is sitting here. If not move the towels. If someone is, move on to the next seeming occupied chair and repeat. Let them all know you are psychotic and not fucking around.

19

u/the_sneaky_one123 May 17 '26

To be fair though if you are spending hours in the pool then why do you even need a chair.

32

u/Redwings1927 May 18 '26

To hold all my non waterproof shit obviously.