Please tell me we all don’t end up like this

[Queijo]

Just spent a few days with my parents who are now entering their 70s.

The FAFFING. It took 25 minutes(!) to serve up lunch because they couldn’t find the right teapot, and then, horrors of horrors, it wasn’t the right ham. So they had to have a very intense discussion about the properties of ham. Whilst I’m slowly dying in the corner from hunger and frustration.

Cups of tea take decades to make, is this the cup you want? Do you want decaf? No? Oh ok I’ll just get the special non-decaf pot down. Are you sure you don’t want decaf? Right. Sugar? No sugar?! Since when?

Can’t say no to cup though or there’s 3 days of fraught discussions.

Lunch at 12 noon dinner at 6pm. CANNOT under any circumstance deviate, and if anything is taking slightly too long to cook it’s the end of the world. God alive 😂

I’m exhausted. Please tell me I’m not going to end up this way.

LIGHTHEARTED before anyone starts! I love them dearly but they never were like this before.

I'd rather they faffed. My sort of parents argue and bicker about everything and they're awful to each other. It is very stressful

I am retired and simply do not have time to Faff and certainly do not stick to a strict timetable. After 4 kids and working in schools one of the great pleasures in life is being allowed to be spontaneous. Eg Yesterday morning I found out there was a showing of a film I wanted to see at our local art house cinema (one day only) so I just dropped what I was doing and went. Everything now gets done when and where we want. Interestingly our DCs get annoyed by this.

I'm completely with you. My parents are only in their early 70's but embraced old age relatively young whilst still in their 60's. Everything now has a set day it has to be done, beds on a Saturday, washing on a Sunday etc.

If they need to go for a medical appoint at the hospital it needs scoping out before hand with a trial run. They no longer travel anywhere and even going to my sister 20 minutes up the road is a big deal, never mind traveling over 3 hours to visit me. It simply doesn't happen.

I really don't want to end up like this and I hope I fight it tooth and nail. It's sad to see.

What drives me nuts is actually if you offer to do it, or suggest a quicker way so you can do something more fun for the whole family then it can be rebuffed. I don't discount routine but it's lack of flexibility when you are together multigenerationally that can be an issue.

For example, internet shopping for food. This is not a new thing. But for a family occasion there is simply no need to traipse around a supermarket to do this. Get it delivered! It's that kind of thing where pfaff ends up meaning that everyone meets the time of the older generations.

I think modern life, with all its choices, makes faffing almost inevtiable.
So true! Oh for the days when one would walk into a cafe and ask for a cup of coffee without being expected to navigate a long menu and then some people faff about the 'milk' they want. In a Dales cafe some years ago we were behind and American woman who rambled her coffee order to the bemused waitress who then turned to the coffee maker, barristas worked in court then, and she called She wants a milky coffee.

I like to think I'm not like this because I'm too slapdash to be a faffer, more of the mind 'it'll do' to be bothered by huge amounts of detail. Parents of a friend of mine used to discuss whether to have a whole digestive biscuit each, or half each. That's top level faffing.

Mine aren't even 70 yet and are already doddery. I think it's because my step dad has worked from home for over a decade and my mum has no life outside the house - no hobbies, no meeting up with friends etc (because step dad tells her "he just likes her close" and "worries when she's out the house"), so they literally almost never leave the house and have physically and mentally vegetated.

I'm old now and for sure it takes me a lot longer to do stuff than it did in the past. That's because whilst my mind is still 35 my body is definitely 75 and aging rapidly. However, the worse faffers I know are all young mums, getting them out of the door is beyond awful, the amount of stuff that they have to pack up 5 minutes before we are due to leave the house is mind boggling, the endless snacks, drinks, toys and stuff. Inevitably when we get eventually get out, they will have forgotten something essential. I've reared children, kept a bag packed by the front door ready for outings, topped it up once a day in a quiet moment. It would have been highly unusual to find anything edible in it. Don't get me started about mealtimes, too painful for words.

I thought of this TikTok too! I love watching them and their faffing 😂

My mam was like this.
Food shopping HAD to be done at 9am on a Tuesday morning, despite her having the rest of the week entirely free. Despite me either being at work, still in bed from a late shift the night before, or having a lie in on my day off.

This one absolutely confounded me. Bedtime was at 11pm. If she was watching a film or a tv programme which ended at, say, quarter past, did she stay up and watch it til the end? No. Went to bed at 11pm. Even if it meant missing the last 10/15 minutes, when she'd already watched an hour and a half of it.

I see so much faffing when l'm at work (supermarket checkout) it's terrifying. Couples packing shopping where one will pick something up, look at it, put it down again, then the other one picks it up, looks at it, then they have a conversation about which bag it should go in. One of them packs it, then the other one changes their mind, so they take it out, both look at it, and put it in another bag. Repeat ad infinitum, with a queue building behind them.
Then one has the loyalty card 'somewhere.....' so they have a discussion about where that is/who's got it. Ditto with the payment card. Then they'll stand folding the bags they haven't used, like it's some kind of origami exercise.
And l suspect some of them aren't much older than me....

I'm 65, and please, shoot me if l start doing stuff like this.

Having read through this patronising diatribe I have made a decision. I'm off to cut the grass!

I'm a bit of a faffer myself and I'm in my 40s 😂

I find it endearing in older generations though and do have a soft spot for seniors of all species (I take in geriatric cats and dogs to care for) so I may be in the minority with it not bothering me. Having so many close family members die young , I'm just glad I get to see family growing old, dithering and all.

LOL wasn't it all so perfect in the good ol' days, judging by this thread 😁
My PILs faff so much that it actually puts us off from visiting. We have to start saying our goodbyes half an hour before we leave because there is so much faffing around us leaving. Have to have a little "chat" with both (despite the fact that we've been there for hours chatting) lots of well-wishes, Did you want the leftovers? No? are you sure? ARE YOU SURE? I'll just put some in a container. No, not that container. Another container. Please don't wash it in the dishwasher. Did you know there are little icons on plastic that show you if you can wash it? Yes? Shall I just show you anyway? Did you know if you heat the plastic it's harmful? And on it goes...

I actually think that my parents' generation often had TOO much choice - PILs have about six dining sets, and there's endless discussion as to which one to use with which glasses, which water jug, small or big spoons etc etc that we often end up eating when the food is already cold and then it needs reheating and so the cycle starts again. We have one set of plates so it's pretty straightforward.

However, on the other hand my mum is almost manic - at 65, she might ask me at 9.30am if I fancy a trip to town for some charity shop browsing and a coffee, and by 9.33 she's sitting in the car while I'm still in my pyjamas... She hates faffing, and I would rather go that slightly manic route when I am older.

Is there also an age at which you can't tell a story without discussing which shops used to be near where the person lives even though it bears no relation to the story?

What about the faffers at work? The Head of Geography is a king of faffers and he is early forties with a couple of young kids. I made a vow not to go on any more trips with him - the trip was great but his faffing was mentally exhausting.

The stuff thing is interesting because my older relatives have a lot and will not throw stuff away. They grew up with less and costs were big so I understand the mentality but occasionally I get asked why I don't have more stuff or furniture! I think I don't see the value in it. Goods are very disposable now

Oh I'm hooked!

I use this as a form of orientation. As in 'You know x shop/pub? it's just around the corner from there near the retirement home.' It's giving people a mental picture. If it means I'm faffing I'll try not to do it 😄

I am very faffy in the supermarket these days. Mostly because I do most of my food shop online so usually I am on my way home after work and distracted and trying to remember what's in the cupboard already and noticing things that I wouldn't usually buy and and thinking about six other things at once.

Sorry @katseyes7 !

My mother does this - but she will still complain if we end up being late. She’ll dither about, muttering to herself about how we’re always late, why are we always the last in the family to arrive for any event, we were supposed to be there at three and it’s already five to now… yet she’ll still be loading cups into the dishwasher or tidying up the papers. If you point out that this is making her later, you get this pained look and “I can’t just leave it!”

YES, yes you CAN just leave it. The cup will not spontaneously combust if left unwashed until after Auntie Pat’s barbecue.

Theres a lovely account on Tik Tok where a man documents his time with his elderly parents, theres so much faffing but god, its so comforting to watch, especially for those of us who have lost our elder gen relatives.

ROFL this is exactly what it’s like with my ILs, bless ‘em. Add a glass of wine and they are hysterical. Love them to bits, but DH and I have been known to go into the downstairs WC to p*ss ourselves laughing/scream in frustration. Not together, obviously…

Ah yes its this one!

I love love love them :)

Mine are definitely like this! When they visit they bring more pairs of shoes than I own and going between buildings (or car to building) there is a whole range of things to do :gloves, hat, scarf, change shoes, change glasses, put things in a bag in a special case, oh no where's the case?

I think (some) people get less adaptable and there's a big comfort in having everything "just right". More worries over things being different or difficult, partly due to physical changes (feeling cold more, less mobile) and partly the luxury to take things slooooow

My mum (78) has 46 lists on the go at anyone time.