MIL situation after she arrived early

She's family. She sees them every couple of weeks. No need to stand on ceremony or expect to be waited on during working hours when she turns up early.

a guest has been invited. She was not. She was even told not to arrive before 2:30.

She was not a guest, she was an inconvenience 😂

We will have to agree to disagree on this. He spent an hour with his grandmother and fixed her phone for her. He'd have had dinner with her too if she hadn't gone home early in a huff. I know who I think behaved badly and it isn't the OP and her familiy.

I know it’s madness. She’s a family member not the Queen or an acquaintance that might feel uncomfortable making herself at home.

'I just dont understand why you'd have to go and lie down in a darkened room for a week with a sack full of of paracetamol if you had to.put a teabag in a cup..'

But surely the above ridiculous hyperbolic comment could equally apply to OP's MIL who was just sitting there doing nothing. If she was thirsty (or 'gasping' as you prefer to put it) surely she could manage to totter to the kitchen and put a teabag into a cup, rather than expecting her DIL to leave the room in the middle of an interview?

Because he had no idea that she was coming.

From what the OP said, he didn't even know she was coming.

Ahaaaaaaa. If you think people stick to the rules when they wfh you must have come down in the last rainshower.

I'm not sure many jobs require a lack of reading and comprehension skills.

I can't figure out if you ever had a job, or if you are just bitter against people WFH?

It's not a recent concept, most people WFH actually WORK and have been for decades.

You cannot genuinely believe you would drop absolutely everything the second your own MIL click her fingers 😂

You know, the more of your posts I read, the more I’m beginning to wonder if you’re actually the MIL in question. 🤔

Your DH did a great job, and his dad sounds lovely.

MIL is a nobhead.

100% my experience!

If you want to mention the "apples don't fall far from the tree" argument, then I can only assume your forebears were as thick as fucking mince.

That’s what I just said!

If my Mum had accidentally arrived early or we needed to do something unexpected she would have made herself a cup of tea, made Ds2 some lunch when he came in, probably done something useful or made a cake, and taken the dog out!

MIL similar! She’d have had everything out of the cupboards and made into 3 different curries simmering on the stove. Then gone out and cut the lawn. With kitchen scissors if she couldn’t find the lawn mower (yes this actually happened) .

Then made you tea when you finished work,

I’m about the same age as your MIL. I would have made a coffee, sent some e mails and taken the dog out.

Ageism. 👎

I’m just highlighting why MIL may think they made little effort. Because they didn’t.

Sounds a bit like you are the common denominator there. Confirmation bias making you try too hard to find something that backs up your views.

I am on teams calls daily with dozens of people who WFH. It’s rare I find what you describe. If I am in a meeting and there is too much background noise, it always comes from someone in an office. I have to find a quiet room at work for calls as my colleagues will often have loud irrelevant chats. If you were on the phone to me on my office at work, you’d hear children crying in the background because there is a nursery next door and they load up all the buggies with kids right outside my window when they go for a walk. (If I have to listen to one more rendition of “grand old Duke of York”….🤬)

The key point is, the person you are phoning is working. They took your call. If you call any organisation about anything, it’s not at all uncommon for the person who takes the call initially to have to pass you on to someone else. That you would be unable to focus enough to work from home sounds like a you problem. Don’t put it on anyone else.

Of course she was wrong to arrive early and then send a text like that.
She sounds like a bit of a weapon to be honest.
Far too young to be so demanding.
Your husband handled it perfectly.

Is she increasingly difficult as that text from your FIL is concerning.
Not normal for a one off incident.
There is a big difference between her being mildly irritated on the day and actually sending such a rude text.
She needed telling and your husband did a perfect job.

Our daughter is a solicitor with one of the Big Five London law firms, our son-law is a software engineer for a Bosch subsidiary and our son is a senior academic and researcher at a London university. I can assure you that the hours they put in working from home far exceed normal working hours. Plenty of people working from home are professional, utterly reliable and trustworthy.

Your tone is really quite antagonistic. Why are you comparing your MiL to a toddler?

Of course your son is allowed to sleep after being out until 8am drinking. Bit strange that you didn't even tell him that his nan was coming.

And you normally walk your 2 dogs separately 3 times a day? Sounds very busy. Is there ever a convenient time?

Rubbish.

Well done, you! 🥇

That's a bit ageist. I am the same age-group as the MIL (mid 60s) and started WFH in 2004 - although online meetings were with dodgy Skype connections back in those days.