2 AIBU in one, table etiquette and in-laws..

Oh ffs, you r looking for a fight

Well actually I'm not too worried now, as Charles just had a bung of £35m per annum from the Duchy. So we may forget about sharing with the public. He's also getting a new helicopter and various other toys so bugger it, I'm definitely getting a new hat. 🍷 👑 🙂

The horror!

I hope you have managed to keep the off the croquet lawn at least.

I understand. We've had to open the gardens to The Public. Such a strain.

Unfortunately the estate finances no longer stretch to a footman.

As with many other roles across multiple sectors, responsibilities once held by many different employees are being rolled up into just a few - we're all having to cut our cloth accordingly

Lol get a grip

Your butler? My butler passes such duties to a footman.

Don’t sweat the small stuff. You have enough going on. Just laugh it off.

Pah - the correct table laying etiquette is to have your butler do it - peasants!

Just put the cutlery in a pot in the middle of the table, or wrap each person's in a napkin. Problem solved!!

Yeah, but that is real! Totally on your side for toilet roll hanging at the front not back. When I was a child it was always the other way round. I had to survive my childhood trying to get to the paper behind the roll 🤣🤣 when I discovered the other way one time. It was a revelation and I vowed to hang it the other way 😂

I was expecting something far worse. First world teeny tiny problems. If that’s all you’ve got to worry about then good for you. I wouldn’t give a shiny shit about something like that. It might be just a little habit they have.

I'd be fuming about a visit by anyone the week before I moved. Where people place their own cutlery, no fucks given. I swap my knife and fork around, it's not the end of the world.

I get it OP, the knives thing was really "and another thing" on top of the visit at an inconvenient time. My parents start driving me bananas the minute they pull into the drive and start faffing about where to park. Their visits are always better in concept than in reality. And the very thought of them coming during a house move gives me collywobbles. More wine?

I understand about the cutlery @PardontheFrench (they are wrong) but you undermine your rage by spelling the plural of "knife" incorrectly.

Use old fashioned fish knives (bladed both sides) daggers or dirks? Or something so ‘sushi chef’ sharp that outward blades are fluffing ridiculous.

lighthearted response from me! But it would bother me too if the blades were turned out, it’s just wrong. Like not having the loo roll the right way, or labels not facing the same direction. Yes, I’m a nightmare to live with. 😉😁

They only sound petty if you accept OP's reasoning that them changing the position of their cutlery was to make a point when it was far more likely just because that's how they like it.

OP thinks they were "correcting" it to how they think it should be and trying to teach her a lesson. Which is quite a lot of extrapolating from someone just exhibiting a preference

I was watching TV- First Dates - a young woman was shown to her table and said "Oh. Knife and fork. I don't know how to use those". It does matter that people know how to behave in new social situations, it saves them embarrassment and from posting on MN 'everyone laughed at me AIBU?' For whatever faux pas has occurred. Although how you get to 18+ without using a knife and fork at least once is beyond me.

Every day is a school day. I gad no idea about cutlery etiquette

Not sure why you’re getting such harsh replies, OP. Your in-laws sound petty AF.

I had to dig through 10 boxes before I found the gravy boat,

I hope you also found the ladle and didn't pour the gravy from the spout!

I wouldn't draw attention to poor cutlery etiquette but I would judge 😄

I love a bit of righteous pettiness. DH and I had a silent war going on over the way the toilet roll should be positioned - I placed it with the sheets hanging from the front (the correct way 😌) and when he next used the bathroom he would alter it so the sheets hang from the back. We were as petty as each other, neither uttering a word but each of us changing the roll whenever we used the toilet. He gave up eventually - I knew he would. A small victory but an important one.

Also my mother. (I wonder if they would agree?)

This thread is interesting to me because it highlights, again, how strongly our early training in stuff likes this lasts throughout life.

I am quite old now and I’m still really, really trying to get over all my programmed-in snobbish nonsense from my mother and grandmother, but my first instinct is always to care about table manners, the ‘right’ words to use and how to pronounce things correctly. Before having a word with myself.

I’m not surprised that in a stressful moment for OP, that’s what annoyed her most.

This reminds of a moment in a P.G. Wodehouse novel when Bertie Wooster asks, "What do ties matter, Jeeves, at a time like this?", and Jeeves replies, "There is no time, sir, at which ties do not matter". Ditto table etiquette.

My mother.