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Original poster

What unusual benchmarks or comparisons do you have in your family

76 replies

BlackAmericanoNoSugar · 07/02/2022 13:01

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'.

OP posts:

Inclinedtochatter · 11/02/2022 19:06

If anyone has a particularly dodgy hair style it is referred to as 'sporting a Gene Wilder'

Frankola · 11/02/2022 19:51

My friend is so frequently late we ask her for her ETA in "Laura Time"

Cherrysoup · 11/02/2022 20:12

My dad, upon hearing some disaster that had befallen someone would always say ‘Worse things happen at sea’, even if everyone involved had died.

wheresmyshoe · 11/02/2022 20:55

Indian bottom hell, if anyone has a dodgy stomach, boiling bowels or horrific runs then judging seriousness in comparison to Indian bottom hell is inevitable. It was indescribably awful.

ComtesseDeSpair · 11/02/2022 21:13

We have a “Hannah and Dave scale” (not real names) of bad DIY or endlessly unfinished household jobs. Hannah and Dave were friends of my parents and their house was perpetually mid-project that they’d started about two years previously and then never bothered to finish.

FusionChefGeoff · 11/02/2022 21:37

I love these.

Anything tall / high is measured by our kids in terms of my brother / their uncle. "Is it as tall as uncle Martin?"

We have a scale of martyrdom measured against my Grandma.

I'm sure we've got loads more I just can't think of them!

Aroundtheworldin80moves · 11/02/2022 21:45

Stubbornness... goes up to Naked Protest (younger DD used to strip down to her nappy and pour when she didn't get her own way)

Campsite noise/cheekiness... goes up to Kareoke machine (I wish I was joking. It was a painful night)

SpikeDearheart · 11/02/2022 21:48

The severity of a head cold is measured against Spain levels of snotty. No-one has ever, ever been so snotty before or since compared to that cold on holiday in Spain.

Scarby9 · 11/02/2022 21:53

'Sad fish finger territory?'

Asking about the state of a house. Named for the lone, defrosted, furry fish finger found hanging through the bars of the shelf in my grandad's fridge. It took us a while to identify it.

We washed and bleached everything when we visited, before eating or drinking anything. He was NEVER ill, and lived happily to almost 100.

RandomMess · 11/02/2022 21:57

"Not as windy as Camber Sands"

Pushchair nearly blew off the prom with the youngest in it! Shortest walk ever.

nicesausages · 11/02/2022 21:58

@scooterbear

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?'

Just put me in fits of giggles, that one !

CorpusCallosum · 11/02/2022 22:01

It was a good nap but not as good as a Rome nap.

OutrageousFlavourLikeFreesias · 11/02/2022 22:01

For years and years we used "but it wasn't as bad as Mr Popper's Penguins" as a benchmark for a really shit film. Until we went to see "Pixels" and discovered that actually, there was an even worse film out there.

RandomMess · 11/02/2022 22:02

Illness is measured against "the time of Noro Virus"

We were simultaneously puking down the loo, handbasin, bath, bucket. Utterly hideous only the breast fed baby escaped being ravaged.

SisterRuth · 11/02/2022 22:11

"More boring than Dave & Gillian?!"
"Oh god no. Just normal boring."

Ivyleagueunderthesea · 11/02/2022 22:12

I love these but they make me a little sad that we don’t have dc to pass these down too.

We have a couple of things.
A cup of tea is a tup-a-tup because it’s what our nephew used to call it. He’s now grown up and married with children.

StickerPlace · 11/02/2022 22:23

DH and I use Tring as a place that's very far away.

Owing to a comment in Eastenders YEARS ago when someone commented they couldn't possibly get to Tring and back in a day. (?!)

bowlingalleyblues · 11/02/2022 22:32

Thanks so much I needed a laugh and am currently sitting in my parked car alone howling at these with tears streaming down.

fridacakehole · 11/02/2022 22:33

A 'no sausages at the canteen day' when anything that can go wrong does. Used since the day everything did go wrong for my husband and to top it off (in pure outrage and disgust) 'there were no sausages at the canteen'.

Doing a Cotswolds. Fouling someone else's bathroom

nomoneytree · 11/02/2022 22:36

"But do you have poo in your wellies?"

My daughter aged about 6 had the squits suddenly and out of no where as we walked around the garden centre. It literally ran down her legs and half filled
her wellies. My husband and I just froze at the sight of it! I took her to the loo and sat her on the loo as I rinsed her pants off in the sink. A lady came in and gave my possibly the worst look anyone has given me in my life. But i was pouring the poo back out of her welly at the time.........

CoodleMoodle · 11/02/2022 22:45

Me and DM have "Crystal Palace Park wet", from the time we took DD when she was about 2. DM lives very near CPP so we usually take the DC when we stay with her, and every time we do we're always wondering if we should take our wellies because of That Time.

It was a beautiful July day, and I put the rain cover under the buggy just in case. We were feeding the ducks when all of a sudden the heavens opened and it POURED. It was biblical. I threw DD in the buggy, shoved the rain cover on and we legged it back to the car as fast as DM was able to go.

DD kept saying "Well, I dry!" from under the cover, and then when I was lifting her from the buggy to her car seat, she complained that she was getting wet!

Then suddenly it stopped. It was too late by that point however, as DM and I were soaked to the skin. The car seats took days to dry out.

Butteredtoast55 · 11/02/2022 22:48

We had a stratosphetically tantrumming child years ago when we had stopped for something to eat en route to our holiday, because his baked beans were 'the wrong colour' so our scale of reference when angry or frustrated is 'It was Happy Eater level'
Also, if things enrage us for no good reason it's because 'My beans are the wrong colour'.

LubaLuca · 11/02/2022 22:55

We have 'York racecourse' as a measure of diarrhoea urgency.

"York racecourse?"
"No, it's not that bad."

PriamFarrl · 12/02/2022 13:25

@nomoneytree

"But do you have poo in your wellies?"

Now that story can be used to help remember how to spell diarrhoea - Doesn’t It Always Run Rather Horribly Over Each Ankle.

DropYourSword · 12/02/2022 13:32

Having a bit of a tantrum is also known as having a 'pap' where I grew up.

We went camping with a group of people and one night one guy one had a big sulk and stormed off to his tent.

Since then my family refer to the "pap tent".
As in "I'll go to the pap tent!!" if you're lightheartedly telling someone you are displeased about something. Or "did they go to the pap tent" when asking about someone's reaction to something unfavourable!

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