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

[00100001]

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.

@Vomtastical

Dogs. Yes. I realise Brits think it's normal, but where I was born, dogs are outside animals and considered the way most Brits view rats. Still seems hideously unhygienic to me, and I've been here for decades. Reading the disgusting stories on here about dogs pooing and peeing in people's homes, I still don't understand the appeal in keeping filthy scavenging animals indoors. 🤮🤮🤮

Interestingly I was once told that humans carry more diseases than any other animal - so I’m quite happy with my clean dog (wormed, deflea, smells clean and lovely) sleeping in my bed as opposed to another human

2021v2
I think you just proved the point

The duckling story is one of the most cheering things I've read in months Thank you. With reference to home made electrical appliances, a friend told me that when her old uncle died and they were clearing his house they discovered his alarming home made electric blanket on his bed. A companion piece for the home made sunbed.

@MWNA

And at another friends house having beans for tea and them mopping up the bean juices with bread afterwards (not even toast and butter which wouldn't be as bad) it was just plain white bread - the thought of it still makes me want to throw up to this day!

The utterly snobbery of this is repulsive.

Didn't read it as snobbery but more about taste. I had a similar experience at a friend's place with garlic snails and having to mop it up with bread. I don't know how I didn't gag at the table. Her mum cooked it most days I visited but I just never got used to it.

@SingleMamaGY

I once went to my friends house and her stepdad put porn on the TV. I was ten.

Omg how horrendous. I'm sorry this happened to you. His poor step child having to live with him.

@Cosmos123

At a friend's house and it was dessert night. The whole family were excited about their family dessert.

It was rice pudding with a dollop of jam in the middle.

Have you never had a good rice pudding?

Food of the gods.

@sadeyedladyofthelowlandsea
So happy for that duck!

It honestly sounds as though it's a reverse of that "instant imprint" thing that ducklings are supposed to do. Your friend, at first glance, instantly became its mother.

I am hoping that it lived to a blissful old age and that your friend hand-crafted bespoke garments for it so that it could retire in style.

Didn't read it as snobbery but more about taste. I had a similar experience at a friend's place with garlic snails and having to mop it up with bread. I don't know how I didn't gag at the table. Her mum cooked it most days I visited but I just never got used to it.

I read it as by people who had never visited France, Italy, Spain where everything is mopped up with bread and there is always bread on the table with a meal.

I used to do home visits.

One home had hundreds of baby and young children dolls. The woman living there was bringing up her older husband's sons and he didn't want any more children. The walls were all covered with large semi-pornographic boudoir pictures. I didn't know where to look and the eyes of the dolls seem to follow me around the room and I tried to keep my eyes off the walls so I wouldn't catch an eyeful.

@TatianaBis

Didn't read it as snobbery but more about taste. I had a similar experience at a friend's place with garlic snails and having to mop it up with bread. I don't know how I didn't gag at the table. Her mum cooked it most days I visited but I just never got used to it.

I read it as by people who had never visited France, Italy, Spain where everything is mopped up with bread and there is always bread on the table with a meal.

That too, I hadn't been to any of those countries or any other at 9 years old. Reminds me, I worked with a Italian lady in my last job who seemed to always have a baguette in her hand. She literally nibbled on a baguette all day on the office. She said she actually ate less bread than the rest of her family, who ate a lot.

Just emailed my friend to ask about the progress of Jemima Bucketduck. I will let you know what she tells me, and will add photos if she sends any!

She is absolutely bonkers, in the best possible way, and used to have a tame robin that would feed out of her hand which then 7yo DD thought was a kind of magic. It honestly wouldn't surprise me if she did make clothes for the duckling before she had it rehomed. She probably packed them in a little suitcase on the day of departure.

After reading this thread I really fancy some "hot buttered toast" 🧈🍞 🤤

@youshallnotpass9

Giraffe 2 of them (life size statues) in a garden in Surrey

Someone up the road from us has a life size gorilla in their front garden!

Some years ago we visited some friends of my husband's. There was an unusual stool in the living room and the wife said "that is a baby elephant's foot". Both my husband and I were shocked, particularly as the wife is vegan!

When I stayed with French families as a teenager they always dipped their croissants or bread with butter and/or jam into their coffee. I thought this was strange, although I do admit to dipping biscuits into coffee (or tea).

I used to visit elderly people at home when I worked for local government. Visited an unusual couple - he was obsessed with Baroque music and had hundreds of CDs lining one wall. She had dementia and would sit in her dressing gown cuddling a rabbit. The hutch was in the dining room.

he was obsessed with Baroque music and had hundreds of CDs lining one wall

We don’t have a house rabbit, though!

@SamiReed1
That option isn't there if you are using MN on the App.

Seeing above about the gorilla and Giraffe in the garden…..

In my village is a house behind a huge wall and solid wooden gates, there is a family of life size Indian elephants, bull, cow & baby on the front lawn. They can only be seen if walking by when someone is driving in or out of the grounds. I quite like them. Everyone in the village knows the 🐘🏡

[quote shinynewapple21]@SamiReed1
That option isn't there if you are using MN on the App. [/quote]

You can watch the thread without posting on the iOS app, I don't know about Android. You swipe left on the thread title and there's an option there.

@pheonixrebirth

Going for Sunday dinner at my friends house and her mum put a plate of sliced cucumbers in vinegar on the table along with the gravy boat. I've never seen or heard about cucumbers in vinegar before or since. Just weird???

My dad used to serve cucumber slices in vinegar as part of Sunday night tea. Not sure if it’s a northern custom (I grew up in Lancashire) or a southern custom (my Dad was from Devon)….

@CherryRipe1 this is incredible, I have exactly the same story about my own parents. Even down to the hoarding of broken TVs! I thought it was just me...

[quote EmmaOvary]@CherryRipe1 this is incredible, I have exactly the same story about my own parents. Even down to the hoarding of broken TVs! I thought it was just me...[/quote]
Haha! Can't believe your parents were equally as mad/frugal. You're not my big sis are you? I think it's maybe a Blitz mentality, make do & mend.

@Pliudev

On a different note: I remember coming home from school for lunch in about 1958 and grandma had made a lime green jelly with tinned mandarin segments set in it. We were astonished and wondered if grandma was all right because food was usually beige in those days..

Gosh that's reminded me that my grandma used to serve lime jelly set with chopped onion in it!

No one else from the family remembers it.

It was rather nice.

A friend of mine. Her Dad worked at Borehamwood TV studios. He was a lovely man. Her Mum was even more lovely. However. There was a TV prop horse in their front garden. Painted black and white. Like a cow.
Their whole house on the inside, was a TV set. Nothing was real. There were shields, from some vague TV show. Everything wobbled.
Even the tea came from a TV show. Mainly, it was the horse, in the front garden. Strangely, it was completely accepted as normal, by his family. Even more strangely, her friends accepted it as normal as well. Just a bit eccentric, that was all. Still weird though!