The nerve of some people

While I was on vacation a week ago, we stayed at a really nice hotel with a pool that was located right on the ocean. We had an ocean front room and it was simply heavenly waking up, opening the shades and seeing the beautiful ocean right there in front of me. I would sit on the balcony late at night and listen to the waves crashing and think about how much I would like to live there forever. I belong near the ocean. Case closed.

During the day, my daughter would spend a lot of time at the pool because she doesn't especially like the annoyance of sand. From the beginning of the week there was a group of women (about 4 of them) who would come to the pool with their children (each woman had at least 3 kids) and they would hog a whole section of the pool area with all their pool/beach/snacking/drinking paraphernalia. This wasn't a quiet little group as you can imagine. There was lots of drama coming out of that corner, including, but not limited to: the women downing beers as early as 10:30 AM (who watches the kids when you're partying with the gals???), balls being misfired and landing on other hotel guests who were minding their own business, fights between the kiddos while the moms were focusing on their tans, and there was even an episode of a MISSING CHILD where they could not locate one of the children for about an HOUR. Come to find out, the little boy had wandered to the BEACH by himself to play in the ocean. The horror! I would need to be sedated for the duration if something like that happened on my watch, but this group merely gave the lad a little time out then he was sent back into the pool to splash and make noise to his heart's content.

This group could give soap operas a run for their money what with all the over-the-top-nonstop-nonsense. Both my daughter and I wondered where the husbands were because we never saw any men in the group. Then, on the second to the last day a man showed up and spent about an hour with the group--but that was it. I assumed they must be out fishing or golfing or whatever it is men do while avoiding taking care of their kids and hanging out with their wives on these "group" vacations. I've never really understood the need for group vacations. I know people who NEVER go on vacation unless they have another family (or two or three) going along with them. I don't get it. I keep thinking these people cannot stand to be alone with their own families for any extended period of time if they have to have "buffer" families along. Maybe I'm just an oddity. I only want my family around, and sometimes even THEY are too much for me, let alone 2 or 3 other families.

On the second to the last night there, my daughter and I headed out to dinner and as we were turning out of the parking lot of the hotel, I happened to look across the street and saw this entire group of people camped out at a house (a rental home). There were 5 cars outside the home, and everyone was on the front porch having some sort of gathering. I said to my daughter, "Is that the noisy group of people that have been at the pool all week?" (I thought I must be seeing things because if they were renting that house for vacation, there was NO WAY they should have been hanging out at the hotel pool). She said, "Yep, that's them."

Huh? I couldn't it believe it. I had noticed that a couple of the women had brought along beach chairs for when they went to the beach (from the pool), and I wondered why they would do that since we were given complimentary beach chairs and umbrellas if we stayed at the hotel. I decided to keep an eye on the cheaters the next day so that I could confirm their nefarious pool/beach shenanigans.

So the next day, I watched them at the pool, then they'd go to the beach (and they would take along their chairs), they'd go into the hotel and use the bathrooms. We ended up going out for a while and when I came back later that evening I noticed the troop marching over the stairs from the beach. The women instructed the kids to jump into the pool to wash the sand off, and they also rinsed their boogie boards off in the pool. Then the group took their belongings and made a beeline across the street to their vacation house for the evening. I kid you not.

As far as I am concerned, those people were stealing. They were using a pool for free that everyone else had to pay for. And the thing I couldn't get over was how brazen they all were. If I was blatantly stealing something, I think I would at least try to be as inconspicuous as possible and yet this little party did nothing to blend into the background--in fact, they behaved as though they owned the place. Who acts like this? Who thinks it is a good idea to teach your children that it's ok to be dishonest in this manner? Do they not have consciences? Don't they think it's important to do the right thing, especially when little eyes are watching?

I learn something new every day, and some days I learn more than one thing. Lately, the things I've been learning about people leave me wondering what the hell is wrong with some people.