What's the strangest thing you've seen in someone's house that they thought was 'normal'?

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I'll go first.

When I was 7, I went to a friend's house, and had bright red mashed potatoes for dinner.her dad always put food colouring in food. She thought this was normal, a d everyone had coloured mash.

@5128gap

A horse. I went to play with a new girl from school when I was about 8, and there it was in their front room. Her mom gave us carrots and we fed it. Over 40 years ago now, and I still remember how jealous I was.

I'm 41 and I will remember this comment on my deathbed I'm sure of it. An 'Orse in the 'Owse was my dream!

I was vegetarian and was invited to Sunday lunch at my friends house, who was newly vegetarian.

Her mum served us roast potatoes, mashed potatoes, carrots, parsnips, gravy and…..a huge mound of boiled white rice. Everyone else had roast meat instead of the boiled rice. My friend didn’t stay vegetarian for long - can’t think why.

the plastic wrapped sofa thing - I had a friend whose parents had that.
they hired the furniture and did this to be able to return them without deductions.

@Cocolapew are you in Whitby?!

The cucumber thing is odd and not odd to me.

When I was little I hated cucumbers and refused to eat them. But through accident discovered that they were quite nice swimming in vinegar. So mum used to chop me up a few slices on a side plate that I'd cover in vinegar then chomp through. I thought it was just me. I didn't realize it was an actual thing other people do.

@Heatherjayne1972

My mum always used to buy minted peas I loved them It was a weird day when I went to someone else house to discover peas aren’t naturally minty

I had the opposite experience with regard to bread. I always hated the stuff that was served at home - it was dry and tasteless, and I could never understand why the awful stuff was compulsory at every meal. It was only when I went to a friend's house, and tasted fresh bread for the first time, that I realised that bread could actually be nice.

The system at home was based on First In, First Out. So a fresh loaf was never cut into on the day it was bought - it always had to go to the back of the queue and wait until the older bread had been eaten. When I asked why, the excuse was that fresh bread was indigestible!

I can't believe of all the comments on here people are more shocked at the cucumber and onions in vinegar. (We had it too in Yorkshire).

I'm more concerned about the young girl watching porn with her parents!!!

When I asked why, the excuse was that fresh bread was indigestible!

wow! I'm portuguese, I think as a nation we would find that kind of statement a heresy! There's always a small bakery in every corner and people go in the morning to buy fresh bread every day. The bread goes stale by the end of the day, only ok for maybe toast

I remember an early episode of Big Brother where one of the housemates was boiling her knickers in a pot and couldn't see the problem 😂

Reading the Reddit thread made me realise I had one of my own at home: a pickled snake in a jar.

My dad had killed one that got into the house when we were very young, and decided to preserve it?! No idea why. But every so often we'd ask him to get it down so we could take a look, thought it was the coolest thing, he kept it above the cabinets in the kitchen

It's no longer there

Called at a house with a friend to pick something up, went in the kitchen and waited while they chatted. On the wall by the fridge was a massive canvas photograph of the same woman perched on a stool in the same kitchen in jeans and nothing else.

Going to a girls house that was a mess with dirty knickers all over her bedroom floor

Going to a different friends house and her siblings were spitting on the food, throwing it etc. Her mum was shouting hysterically whilst insisting we eat. I found it very hard to eat!

some posts remind me of that episode in Friends when Ross goes home with a hot woman and her place is an utter pigsty. 😁

"That's called Yorkshire salad" is becoming the new "cancel the cheque"

Cucumber pickled in vinegar is also a mainstay of several SE Asian countries. It's hardly unusual.... but this was genuinely the first time I've heard of it with Yorkshire puddings!

My childhood friend's mum used to let their ponies in the kitchen.
My very well to do neighbour has on display a porcelain bust of her...actual bust!

My favourite is cucumbers in a lovely Korean dressing! So good.

@CustardySergeant

"Another friend we were playing hide and seek and I hid in her mums bedroom. Sat at the side of the bed and there was an awful smell coming from the bedside drawers. I opened the top drawer and there were actual dried turds in there. Nearly puked."

WTF? Did you say anything to her about it?

No, I didn't dare admit that I'd looked in the drawer, and I didn't know if she knew!

Perhaps the turds were some kind of test, to see if you were a turd burglar?

When I was a child my brother & I went to play at the house of a school friend. When it was time for tea we were told to wash our hands - I did this in the downstairs bathroom but my brother ran upstairs to the bathroom there. When he joined us at the tea table he said sorry for having been a long time and our friend's mum smiled and said it was fine, no rush. My brother looked surprised and said the little girl on the stairs had told him he should hurry up....

There was no other child in the house. But apparently he was not the first visitor to their house to recount a conversation with a little girl on the stairs.

I'm getting the chills thinking about it now, 50 years later

I must of been living under a rock all these years to have missed out on the mighty cucumber and vinegar, Yorkshire salad!
I might have to give it a whirl and see what I've been missing🤔

nice thread!

• free roaming chickens in the house, one flapped down the stairs in to my face and I screamed
• a stuffed bison in the hallway which you had to squeeze past
• massive handcuffs hanging over the seat where guests would sit in the kitchen
• newborn kittens in the sock drawer
• a kitchen table piled 3 ft high with nothing but brown paper bags
• a well in a sitting room
• ashes in an urn being clutched by resident (really sad, her dh had died years before)
• 100s of tins of food with best before from the 1990s

...not all the same home luckily!

All meals eaten off paper plates as her mum couldn't be bothered with washing up.

Being given spaghetti hoops and chips for tea in the same house, so carbs and carbs. Eight year old me didn't know what a carb was, but she did know that tinned spaghetti and chips was just not right....

A dog sitting up at the table with a placemat and plate eating the meal with the family

[quote RevolvingPivot]@Cocolapew are you in Whitby?![/quote]
No.
There's more than one? 🤢

My friend's dad used to buy the Bunty comic for himself and play with the dressing up dolls on the back.