What unusual benchmarks or comparisons do you have in your family

[BlackAmericanoNoSugar]

In our family we have 'brie in the back of Dad's car' as a smell scale of awfulness.

About five years ago a cling film wrapped piece of brie fell out of the shopping bag on the trip from the supermarket to home and fell into a sort of dip between the back of the seats and the boot floor. The smell started but the source couldn't be found. It grew increasingly worse until it was gag-inducing and we did a full strip search of the car, because it just couldn't be used anymore without all the windows wide open, and found it. Since then it has been used as the top end of a smell scale, so for instance the room-clearing farts that the dog does after he's scavenged some bread are about two thirds of 'the brie in the back of Dad's car'.

In a not entirely unrelated change in diet, we now mostly eat hard cheese.

"Spaghetti Factory level of tantrum"

Based on the time my 3yr old had a tantrum so horrific I ended up carrying him out under my arm as he, covered in bolognese sauce, screamed and kicked and snarled at me that he DIDNT LIKE DAT WOMAN (the perfectly lovely waitress).

And more recently, if someone says they had an unpleasant time, we say "but was it as bad as home school?" And the answer is always "no".

I can perfectly picture the epic nature of that tantrum.

DD (in second year of secondary) actually wants to go back to home school, mostly because she can wake up at the very last minute and put a PE sweatshirt on over her pyjamas to go on her Teams classes.

When we smell something so disgusting we say ‘a place name (I won’t name it as outing) guff’ in honour of when my DH did the most disgusting fart as he was getting out the car to get petrol and then locked the door as he got out and we were all choking on the fart smell. I was worried it would blow up the whole petrol station.

I love that you're protecting the identity of the place where your DH farted. Or is it that you're protecting your DH's identity because the smell was so bad that it has become a mystery that scientists are still trying to solve so that it can be weaponised and you don't want your DH to be sent off to war.

The Subway burp that I filled the car with after eating a sub filled with pepperoni and sweet chilli sauce. No subsequent burp has ever beaten it!

Basically any time you grumble or moan about something in my family you get "but did anybody die?" It's like you can't actually be upset or annoyed about anything unless someone has died. Its quite a high benchmark.

When our kids were in nappies we had a poo scale of 1 to 10 and then there was the occasional shout of "poo pants, poo pants!" which as you can imagine meant a full bath and a two person job to clean up

Hellocatshome Do the people who say "but did anybody die?" ever complain about anything?

ADialgaAteMyDog we were always fairly lucky with nappies, possibly because they were 10 months and 14 months when we adopted them so we had skipped the most dangerous stage. DS loved blueberries and would eat them in any quantity allowed. I generally only gave him blueberries on a Friday or Saturday as DH did half the nappies on Saturday and Sunday. There's a possibility that DH was less lucky with the nappies than I was. (Innocent face)

Hellocatshome Do the people who say "but did anybody die?" ever complain about anything?
Yes and I say "but did anybody die?" and they say "thats not the point" and carybon whinging.

I have this for hiking. Its wet but its not as wet as that walk on Arran.

We have ‘smelly cabbie’ as a poor personal hygiene barometer, after a ride in a taxi with a cab driver that absolutely stank to high heaven (think BO, bad breath, dirty clothes, greasy hair and farts all mingling together in one almighty stink).

Whenever my kids get soap dodging tendencies and I have to force them into the shower I just have to say ‘Do you want to smell like smelly cabbie?!’ and they’re straight in there! .

Smell cabbie sounds gross. I hope it was a short trip. I'm prone to car sickness and I suspect that a driver like that would probably tip me over the edge.

For manners (usually at the table) we have 'Would you do that if the queen was here?'.

Does that work Sprig1? My DC would definitely answer 'yes' to that. (Not royalists!)

Is it a poonuarmi????

Meaning is as bad as that time I lay my son on the newly carpeted floor to change his nappy at 3am , I was half asleep and as laid him down it just squelched all up his back into his hair and all over my hands, the carpet, his legs feet everything!

Anything embarrassing that happens to DS - 'But was it as bad as the time you farted in Science?' (He was at the front of the class doing a presentation at the time).

Any illness - 'But is it as bad as the Bowls Cold?' This was a hideous, hideous cold DH and I both had at the same time about 20 years ago, during which we sat and watched the bowls on TV for an entire afternoon because we both felt too ill to stand up and reach for the remote to change the channel.

@BlackAmericanoNoSugar

Does that work Sprig1? My DC would definitely answer 'yes' to that. (Not royalists!)

Actually it does work pretty well. Now my kids say it to my husband (who of course says 'yes I would'!).

"Leicester Square" was the high bar for poonami episodes in this house (they're teenagers now, but we still reminisce)

DS1 aged 2, out for the evening in central London...the poo explosion was so horrific I had to rinse his trousers in a sink in the public toilets in Leicester Square. There was a cleaner in there who shouted at me and stood over me while I cleaned up the mess we'd made. We then had to cross London on the tube with DS1's legs stuffed into the arms of DH's fleece. Great times.

Sausage curry burps. They were truly stomach turning on a very long drive home.

The curry had really thick, pale, flaccid sausages. The burps required all windows to be opened for 10 mins after each one. They were truly epic.

I think I may have taken an eye watering ride with your Smelly Cabbie.
Luckily it.was only a 15 minute ride during which I sat as close as possible to the open window, breathing through my mouth.
If he was a 10, I never want to smell a mere 8

Earliness is measured in how early my grandad once got me to the airport.

Was it the day before your flight Koalaslippers?

No it was at least the same day.

Mine, that I use at every opportunity in my family is “but do you have cancer though?”

I use that along side asking them to fetch things for me “because I have cancer you know” and collecting the money for the rugby tour “You’d better pay now because I might be dead soon”.