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'.

‘FFTD’ or ‘Flat for the Dordogne’…meaning rolling hills.

After a family walking holiday described by the brochure as ‘through gently undulating countryside’ that on Day 1 required a climb up a metal ladder and didn’t get much flatter.

“Is it (Grandmothers name) messy, or (MY name) messy?”

Grandmother has anxiety driven OCD about being clean and neat as a pin 24/7, but after spending years on Valium in the 70s she won’t touch it (or any other MH meds any more) and I’m an ADHD chaos demon.

So basically

Is there not one speck of a dust anywhere and you’re being a paranoid nob?

Or

Is it looking like you’re a year deep into a poltergeist battle and you’d be better off burning the house down?

Is it a Justin Job?

Justin is the neatest builder in the world. He is tidy, accurate and a perfectionist.

So if either of us have done anything vaguely DIY the other will always ask "is it a Justin Job" to which the answer is invariably "Hell, no"

I should also add poor Justin has been know to shudder at the sight of some of our temporary bodge jobs.

We benchmark all holiday accommodation against a particularly dire campsite we stayed at for one night. Wanting a relaxing drink after our five hour drive we made the mistake of going to the clubhouse - full of hen and stag party types - ten minutes after sitting down, a very drunk young woman started vomiting on the floor in front of us We went back to our tent to find wasps everywhere!

The campsite had the unfortunate marketing slogan 'Summer better than others' - we now say this every time we encounter less than salubrious holiday accommodation.

We have “were they as loud as Jamie Grimes*?” - a child in DS’s Reception class who had a voice like a foghorn. DS is now 15 but it’s still the benchmark.

*name changed to protect the loud

I love this, OP!

We have the 'milkshake sip' which came about when me and my brother were younger and our older brother wanted to try some of my strawberry milkshake. He would usually, in classic mean big brother fashion, take a huge gulp or bite of whatever he was trying but this time he swore he'd only take a small sip and, to our surprise, he actually kept his word and took a teeny tiny sip just to try it. Now whenever we want to steal a bit of someone else's food or drink or try something we say we'll only take a milkshake sip, even if it's chips or something 😂

Our benchmark for weirdness is a b&b in Northumberland.

Things that break are “not tested in a 4 year old/strop/concrete floor rule situation”.

We have a measure of spoilt brattishness in children - a “Helen”

MrsPnut
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”.

🤣🤣🤣🤣

I thought I used my 'cancer journey' at every opportunity (got off a bus lane fine because "I was preoccupied because I had a chemo appointment the following day") but I never had the courage to threaten people with my possible death 🤣🤣🤣

May you have the same outcome as me ❤️

A Justin job reminds me of the house my family moved to 40 years ago where Barry had attempted a variety of DIY jobs. How unsuccessfully only came to light over the next few years as shelves fell down and plumbing stopped working etc. Although we are all now in different houses we talk about Barry jobs.

My husband once applied for a job, but the agency refused to put him forward for it because " we didn't live within 25 miles of Sheppton Mallet" (we lived 30 miles away). So now we use "within 25 miles of Sheppton Mallet" when referring to any displays of narrow mindedness.

Any non-work occasion which requires getting up stupidly early is referred to as "worse than Ski School" after my husband discovered on his first skiing holiday that he had to get up earlier than for work.

We have a snoring scale that goes Grandpa Pig, Daddy Pig, George, depending on how loud it was! Grandpa Pig was added by my brother as he reminded me how bad my father’s snoring was 😂

After a particularly dramatic tantrum in a Cornish cafe, the top of the scale of lost tempers is “the full Kingsand”.

My brother’s apparently call a very large of wine a Sarah Measure because of me.

I discovered this when my little brother was talking about his wife having a bad day at work and said. “It called for a Sarah Measure” and my big brother just nodding sagely

When my dds were little my mum was looking after them and my 90 year old grandma fell down a step and cut her head open, whilst waiting for the ambulance dd1 was so upset she threw up (my poor mum). Ever since when anyway says they are upset or stressed about something the question is but did you vomit? As if you didn't vomit you weren't as upset as dd was.

We have [family member name] portions - to mean a portion much larger than you wanted.

@Chelsea26

My brother’s apparently call a very large of wine a Sarah Measure because of me.

I discovered this when my little brother was talking about his wife having a bad day at work and said. “It called for a Sarah Measure” and my big brother just nodding sagely

We refer to my BIL’s measures in the same way!

Our measure is a friend Steve who is never ready on time. We’ll go to pick him up and he will say he is ready… he just needs to finish ironing his shirt, do his hair, find his wallet, put his shoes on, have a pee, get his coat etc. I ask DH ‘are you actually ready, or are you Steve ready’.

We have "at least they won't smash our windows in" for our slightly irritating neighbours, who are much more reasonable that the nasty scum we moved away from.

"A lot better than the carvery in Kidderminster" for a so-so meal. An ill-advised stop on a long car journey many years ago.

We judge all holiday accommodation by comparing to the barn up a mountain, with a hole in the front door and a stream running through the middle of it, where the most exciting local attraction was the museum of wood.

"Well, if we can have enjoy ourselves in the barn up a mountain...."

The Mother's Day mini golf incident. Dd1 then 8 threw the mother of all tantrums when losing at mini golf and wanged her club at the large T. rex that was guarding hole 12 (dinosaur mini golf you see). It ricocheted off his head and rebounded into the water feature narrowly missing the golfers behind. Then DH marched her off to the car and that was the end of Mother's Day for me.
Now when any of the subsequent kids are going into one we just say 'hmm but it's no Mother's Day mini golf is it?'

We have something similar @TheFlis12345 - a friend of ours is a super-faffer. "Yep I'm ready, just need to have a shower, dry my hair, nip down me mums and walk the dog."

He is known as "One-hour Willis*" (not real surname obvs) because everything will "only take an hour" even if it includes a trip to the hairdresser, and the opticians, and painting his mum's radiator. He is invariably hours late for EVERYTHING.

We have a new neighbour benchmark now, the "Michael* Mile" (also not real name). Twice he has recommended an alternative route to somewhere which is "only a couple of extra miles" in order to avoid a road closure or ice etc, and so far the record is 14 additional miles!

When you say a couple of miles, is that Michael Miles?

When recounting an embarrassing work situation 'but you didn't simultaneously shit yourself and fall out of a window'. If in politer company, 'nearly had a defenestration episode today'.

If we're talking about the view (gig, theatre, anything where you'd actually like to be able to see) 'Dots or swans?'. This originated from DP first attempts at being a sarcastic and grumpy old git aged 7 when his parents decided the weekend compulsory 'we must do something' was a lengthy drive to a Swan sanctuary - they didn't announce it until they'd been stuck in traffic for about three hours with two bored and irritable children. On being told where they were going, the little voice from the back, thinking they would just see them in the distance grumbled .'Oh great, three hours in the car just so we can go and look at dots'.

There's also a mimed 'small or far away' for signalling 'help, I'm dealing with an irredeemable idiot'

And then there are the particularly unpleasant people, the ones who tend to 'tell it how it is' and say deliberately offensive stuff whilst not grasping simple concepts/responding with aggression/racism. 'Folk of the soil' 'the Common Clay?' 'Yup'.