Omg such anality from pil. Come and share your anal behaviour stories (lighthearted)

MIL has a complete set of "best" crockery and a canteen of cutlery only used on christmas day and boxing day, maybe new years day if you're lucky.

She gets dressed in the morning, and then gets changed into her finery (sp?) to go into town shopping and then immediately gets changed again when she gets back, she won't sit in the house in nice clothes, just really old tracksuit bottoms and t-shirts.

This christmas i discovered she checks the napkins after christmas day lunch and if they don't look dirty she puts them out again for boxing day lunch, so you get a napkin someone else used the previous day.

Plates must be warmed, even if they're taking up room in the oven needed to cook food.

She makes bisto gravy from granules with boiling water and then brings it back to the boil in the microwave, gravy must be bubbling on arrival at the table.

She is also obsessed with airing and constantly tells me how well its drying today "it's dried lovely today" etc.

oh, the interesting articles clipped from the paper thing, I'd forgotten FIL used to do that! Every time we visited, bless him. In his defence, they were usually funny - the sort of stuff that columnists get paid for collating.

dh collects teabags although he doesn't have a little dish for them, he just squishes them on the side of the sink. However, he has almost convinced me that they are just too wet to go straight into the recycling bin when retrieved from a cup... Does this mean it is starting..?

I've been reading this all day today, it's great!!!

I've got loads to add, but I'm typing on phone so will just add a couple for now....

MIL called a couple of weeks before Xmas to say her central heating was broken, and an emergency plumber had diagnosed X and quoted Y for the work to be done. DH (her son) is a plumber, and she wanted to know what he would charge, and if the quote she had was reasonable.

DH offered to repair for free, but MIL has now decided to wait approx 10 weeks to have a whole new system installed by age concern uk, as she is entitled to a grant.

DH can supply and fit a new boiler for a 10th of the grant she thinks she's its entitled to, and he could fit it in this week. But no. She doesn't want to inconvenience DH by putting some work his way!!!!

MIL drives, has her own car etc but resolutely refuses to drive 25 miles to our house as she doesn't know the way. She has a satnav, a car 10 years newer than ours but will not make the journey alone - henceforth she has turned up at our house with a rather odd collection of acquaintances, including one friend who was so travel sick she couldn't have a cuppa when they arrived???

She has no problem with us piling three DCs in the car and ambling over to her too small for more than two people at once house, where she will force offer lukewarm tea at 7 minute intervals and stale cake/biscuit, or if we're really lucky chip butties.

We also have the 90 minutes chatting on the doorstep when trying to leave, and the piece de resistance, was her telling me she had put a stool in the bathroom for me ready for when I needed to bf ds.
I totally ignored her, commandeered an end of the sofa and sat and bf ds in the living room. DH ended up telling her that this is the norm these days, and if she wished to eatin the bathroom she should go ahead, but ds eats with the rest of us :)

She buys so much crap stuff off the shopping channels, then tries to offload it to us.
She has already given us three sets of suitcases, we do not need a fourth.

She irons EVERYTHING. If we go to her house, and she has stuff needing to be ironed, she hides it in the tumble dryer! I mean, why???

She has a dishwasher, but doesn't use it. She says this is because the heating is broken and there is no hot water - I pointed out it is cold fill and doesn't need hot water, and will use less energy than currently being used to boil the kettle to wash the fucking pots!

The house she lives in now, she chose it because of the wood floor in the lounge and the leather sofas which were included in the sale. She has lived there less than a year and has had a new carpet fitted OVER the wood floor that she loved so much and covers the carpet with a variety of rugs. The leather sofas are covered in so many cushions and various throws that I'm not actually certain the sofas are there anymore IYSWIM!! I think It is just a pile of cushions!!

She cannot cook for toffee, she literally boils everything to a mush. Roast dinner is a chicken breast so overcooked you could use it as a foundation stone, along with carrots, peas and potatoes that literally disintegrate to a pulp at the first sign of a knife and fork.

There's no hope!!!

Oh shit...

I collect teabags in a little bowl before depositing them in the bin. (lazy)

I have 2 gravy boats.

I own a lot of Tupperware.

I'd rather take a picnic than buy lunch.

I actually have special plates and glasses for Christmas.

I'll be 29 in a week...

Ah yes and the tiny cups, the weak pallid tea...I've taken to making my own. Tea bags on the highest shelf, and they use a miniature teaspoon to measure out your paltry ration of coffee,

In other ways they are generous and kind but their frugality and fogey habits are frustrating to me as someone whose parents dont know the meaning of the words routine, savings account, planning etc

I recognise lots of my pil traits here

On Xmas day pils arrived at 10:30 am laden with presents and the usual bags of odds and ends - interesting articles clipped from local paper and who knows what else. From this time until I served dinner at 4pm mil spent constantly footering with small sandwich bags, wrapping paper, unpacking bags, showing me the contents and repacking neatly, placing all items in my living room in neat but impractical stacks and talking constantly about unknown (to me) jeans and daves and their various comings and goings.

When I used to drop dd off for the day at 8:30 lunch would already be prepared and in the slow cooker...why? They don't go anywhere necessitating this time saving device

The leaving rital ...90 mins from stating intention to leave with hugs kisses and requests for us to Phone soon...we see them 2 to 3 times a week!

YY to teabag collecting thingy. My lovely MIL brings tea on a tray, with a wee jug for milk, a teabag in a cup, a teabag plucking-out tool, and teabag collector.

Whilst finding most of this great fun, I don't understand why it is considered weird to warm plates before serving a hot meal. Just seems logical to me.

Also only ever make tea in a teapot.

Slippers - I don't see the issue here either - especially with those of you who don't like guests to wear shoes in the house - sounds like they are just being courteous to me.

And they are in the shape of a teapot, not a spoon. Phew.

mil has china dish she collects teabags in
china dish for resting wooden spoons

I may be ok drjohnson. We use the china tea bag spoon to put the teaspoon on, the tea bag goes in the food waste caddy.

Sparkling you need to step away from the china tea bag spoons. You'll be on the Scott's of Stow/Ambrose Wilson mailing list before you know it.

Oh sunny that's adorable. We spent last week with DH's DGM and she proudly told us she'd voted CDU as the candidate for state first minister had written her a personal letter ("It was addressed to Mrs. A Otto"). She wanted to show it to us but couldn't find it, "oh dear, I must have thrown it away once I sent off my postal vote." So sweet. We didn't have the heart to explain about automatic mailing lists.

This thread is fabulous! So funny but bitter sweet as well as I can definitely start to see my DPs getting old

My cousin almost died of embarrassment to time she took my now sadly departed DGF to have his hearing aid checked (as he complained it never helped him hear better we decided it must be faulty). After the Dr checked it DGF put it back in and Dr exclaimed, "but it's in the wrong ear!". God knows how he was jamming it in, these things are shaped for goodness sake probably because he only deigned to wear it once in a blue moon so forgot which ear it was prescribed for

DM travelled solo across central Asia when she retired a few years ago but she now doesn't notice that she hasn't switched off the kitchen tap in my kitchen when she comes to visit. "What, it's still running? But how can you tell?" Umm, the running water gives the game away...?

DM and DF bring their slippers when they visit and I always get given a pair when we visit DPIL but our floors are cold so I'm not sure if it's a sign of something or not

DFIL is a Mega worrier. He once drove over to our house to check on us when we didn't answer the phone (as we were napping with 10 day old DS and he got shouted at by me) He also has to park somewhere where he can see the car when they're staying away from home overnight.

Unfortunately DH and I are showing some early signs - I have dishwasher loading system and DH insists on keeping boxes from electrical goods we buy and asked if I minded if he throws out the old toilet seat when he was clearing out the garage yesterday wtf

But none of us display any worrying food weighing/hoarding/tupperware-ing tendencies (yet)

I have 2 china tea bag spoons.

DM has a thing about trolleys for food. She has two in her flat in which she lives alone. She likes to use them to wheel food from her kitchen to her dining table - her kitchen/dining room is open plan so this is a journey of about two metres.

And what's the deal with older people and tea bags? Why can used tea bags not go straight in the bin? Why must they rest on one of those strange china tea bag spoons, or in a little cup, before joining their friends in the bin after an hour of cluttering up the work surface?

I used to work at a charity sending out direct mail. Every time we sent a letter out, a Mr X used to write back to us. He'd always send us a beautifully handwritten missive about the weather where he lived, and how he was sleeping.

One time his letter was about a week late. I was that close to finding his number in the phone book and checking to see if he was well. Thankfully, his letter arrived and all was well.

I hope he's well.

PS just considered making a cup of tea and then thought "best not, I've already started the dishwasher." It's starting, isn't it?

(I already knew it was starting. When I went back to work and DP became SAHD I explained that when you buy salmon fillets in 2s, you have to open one packet and freeze them separately, because 3 is the right number for us for dinner - the small dcs share one. He looked at me as if I was bonkers. Tell me that is ok? They cost about £2 each, ffs!)

Indulge me as I hypothesise:

one of the key discrepancies between our generation and our parents' is that doing things "nicely" (showing high standards, hospitality, reasonable "comfortableness" in the financial sense) is more likely to be shown by our generation by deployment of consumables (generous and good wine & food; frequently painted houses and frequently updated bedlinen and clothes;) but in theirs by the ritual of using permanent items Properly (the gravy boats, the serving dishes, the napkins, the thingies standing about that have to be dusted, the ornamental bed spreads etc). None of this stuff is ever broken, replaced, tired of or chucked away. But you show you are polished (you show you care and have the resources to care) by the labour involved in fiddling about heating a teapot and getting out the cups and saucers which match, rather than by having a whole clutch of trendy pretty looking ikea mugs which tone with your stylish new kitchen.

They're both just ways of using material resources designed to make you seem nice and your guests feel good. At the end of the day it's all just stuff produced by labour somehow.... [wibbles off into considering that all energy comes from the sun]

MIL must arrive at least one hour early to catch the train. The tickets are already booked and so are the seats. She starts pacing the livingroom 2hrs before DH is due to drive her to the station. Seriously, has a train ever left early?

I have noticed that my Mum has taken to noting down the exact time that the street lighting switches on in the evening.

chez pil
plastic sheeting around electric sockets and plastic sheeting on carpet at front and back door
plates on the wall and a bedpan on wall
hideous china ornaments on top of Telly
sofa was in pastic wrapping for ages
patterned thing looks like a tea towel over sofa and chair, keep it clean I'm told

I have cackled out loud at this thread perhaps more than any other. Lovely reading. Has certainly made me appreciate my generous, relaxed PIL and, um, relatively normal parents more than ever.

That said...

MIL, a woman who has survived a murder attempt and spent her working life in an extremely challenging environment, refuses to drive outside of her home town in case she has to turn right.

FIL once sulked for the rest of the day after I refused his very insistent offer (made while we were eating lunch) of some tinned sardines made by the firm he was working for at the time. He is one who has improved massively since retirement!

DDad cannot countenance travelling by public transport. He must come in his own car. This means he and Stepmum will turn up two hours late for lunch, having fought their way across South London. He will be beet-faced and furious, swearing about roadworks, traffic etc. My dad has lived in South London all his life and driven all over the place for work. Roadworks and traffic should be no fucking surprise! However, should I suggest they get the train, he will visibly recoil and spend 20 minutes telling me how shit and unreliable they are.

The one exception to this is his annual trip into town, to Fortnum and Mason's to buy his Christmas pudding.

Love him really, however when they come for lunch now I make sure I ask them over two hours earlier than necessary so that DC are not crying/fainting with hunger by the time they arrive :)