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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To pick a pub with a log burner for a family meal?

238 replies

hippohippohippo · 09/01/2022 11:43

It's my DH's birthday and I've booked a table at a pub for us and SIL and family. We have a 6 month old and they have a 5 month old. SIL says they are free but not coming, as the pub has a logburner and it's winter and might be on. It hadn't occurred to me that this was a problem and am fine taking my DS (and have regularly been to pubs with a logburner). She insists we look for somewhere that doesn't have a fire if we want them there. Is she being unreasonable or am I?

OP posts:
Magnited · 09/01/2022 12:32

Roll on a few years and I can just envisage OP sitting at another pub without a log burner in years to come and SIL's DCs are happily munching on chicken nuggets and knickerbocker glories while merrily drinking coke.

whynotwhatknot · 09/01/2022 12:32

she mght not want her baby to go out near cars either-horrible things

InFiveMins · 09/01/2022 12:32

YABU to not elaborate what the problem is with there being a log burner!

ancientgran · 09/01/2022 12:39

@Fallagain

They are horrific for air pollution. I’m amazed at the number of parents who would (rightly) not allow smoking around their children but who then install log burners.

As for your question I’m not sure I would have considered it but there is still a significant SIDS risk at this age so it’s probably not the greatest idea.

I know someone who had one installed. Was amazed as their child has been an emergency hospital admission with asthma and there is a strong family history of severe asthma.
ancientgran · 09/01/2022 12:39

@Magnited

Roll on a few years and I can just envisage OP sitting at another pub without a log burner in years to come and SIL's DCs are happily munching on chicken nuggets and knickerbocker glories while merrily drinking coke.
But that is just your imagination isn't it.
eagerlywaitingfor · 09/01/2022 12:45

Surely it will have a flue that vents outside. She's being totally over the top.

Magnited · 09/01/2022 12:45

An imagination contributed to with a lifetime of living with humans and all things from the most wonderful to the most hypocritical and everything else in between. Grin

CantHaveTooMuchChocolate · 09/01/2022 13:01

@JabNotInArm

Log burners are bloody horrible things - worse for air quality than Diesel engines.

Doubt it'll be long until they're banned.

www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/dec/18/wood-burners-triple-harmful-indoor-air-pollution-study-finds

100% this. I’d not have any children especially a new born around one. Would you feel the same if they allowed smoking in the pub? It’s been proven that wood smoke is actually more toxic than cigarette smoke so YABVU to think one is ok and the other not.
Wiredforsound · 09/01/2022 13:04

Is there a problem with getting somewhere else reasonably close? Or ask her to suggest somewhere suitable?

TenoringBehind · 09/01/2022 13:06

It’s your dh’s birthday not hers so if that’s where he wants to eat then you should stick with it.

Just send a polite response: ‘that’s a shame. Thanks for letting us know. Let’s catch up soon.’

starfishmummy · 09/01/2022 13:07

I grew up when coal fires - which everyone had - were the norm. She's mad. But her choice. However I wouldn't be changing the booking, I'd just send a "sorry you won't be coming" message and if I was feeling generous I'd extend an invitation for cuppa before we went/after we got back.

JabNotInArm · 09/01/2022 13:08

@Pendolino

PFB. Log burners generate lung damaging particulates, but it’s chronic exposure over a long period that causes most of the damage, not a few hours.
This isn't accurate. The harm can happen over a matter of hours
JabNotInArm · 09/01/2022 13:11

@Magnited

An imagination contributed to with a lifetime of living with humans and all things from the most wonderful to the most hypocritical and everything else in between. Grin
Aah, the old "some things are harmful so you're hypocritical to be worried about ANYTHING that's harmful" trope.
BendicksBittermints4Breakfast · 09/01/2022 13:11

@WiganDiva

Wow. I thought she was bonkers until I read that Guardian article. Totally unaware of this!
You do realise that the Guardian is as reliable as the Daily Mail, it too has an agenda but one can assume that its agenda is more acceptable to some!
PriamFarrl · 09/01/2022 13:12

@Jennalong

How does she think she even exists ? Her ancestors would have heated theirhouses with open fires , and the fact that she had been born is proof they lived to produce children , who would have lived the same and so on .
When I grew up many households only had open fires as a source of heat. That was the 70s not caveman times.
StrychnineInTheSandwiches · 09/01/2022 13:12

Tell her 'That's a shame. Hopefully see you soon then'.

BendicksBittermints4Breakfast · 09/01/2022 13:13

@Wiredforsound

Is there a problem with getting somewhere else reasonably close? Or ask her to suggest somewhere suitable?
Why should they allow someone's over-active mind dictate where they want to eat? If the SIL doesn't want to come, they don't come but they don't get to dictate to the hosts.
Lockheart · 09/01/2022 13:15

Log burners do emit harmful particulates and do present a risk to health.

But you are not going to suddenly develop stage 3 lung cancer from sitting in pubs with one for the occasional lunch.

You might develop lung cancer if you regularly use one throughout your life, just as you might develop lung cancer if you smoke and you might develop bowel cancer from eating too much processed red meat and you might develop cancer if you live next to a road or spend a lot of your life driving.

Unless you are severely asthmatic (for example), the risk is not so high that it presents an immediate danger to your health, just like hundreds of things we do. And we all have to go at some point; over Christmas my dad passed away from something completely unrelated despite having open fires in his house from childhood.

PriamFarrl · 09/01/2022 13:15

Unpopular opinion:

Bring back smoking in pubs and all of then install a log burner and then pubs can go back to being adult only spaces.

MrsKDB · 09/01/2022 13:17

They are incredibly harmful to young lungs. Would you be happy to have your baby at a table where someone was chain smoking for three hours?

KiloWhat · 09/01/2022 13:18

It's her family, her rules. Neither are being unreasonable and you can't force her to eat somewhere she doesn't want to.

Original poster
hippohippohippo · 09/01/2022 13:21

Sorry - thought I had replied!

Her issue is pollution yes, she sent me the same article. But I had assumed that 2 hours in her brother's favourite pub for his birthday would be okay!

I have suggested she comes to ours first instead... will she have a similar problem with candles on his birthday cake?!

OP posts:
JabNotInArm · 09/01/2022 13:22

@Lockheart

Log burners do emit harmful particulates and do present a risk to health.

But you are not going to suddenly develop stage 3 lung cancer from sitting in pubs with one for the occasional lunch.

You might develop lung cancer if you regularly use one throughout your life, just as you might develop lung cancer if you smoke and you might develop bowel cancer from eating too much processed red meat and you might develop cancer if you live next to a road or spend a lot of your life driving.

Unless you are severely asthmatic (for example), the risk is not so high that it presents an immediate danger to your health, just like hundreds of things we do. And we all have to go at some point; over Christmas my dad passed away from something completely unrelated despite having open fires in his house from childhood.

Tell that to the parents of Ella Kissi
JabNotInArm · 09/01/2022 13:25

@Lockheart

Log burners do emit harmful particulates and do present a risk to health.

But you are not going to suddenly develop stage 3 lung cancer from sitting in pubs with one for the occasional lunch.

You might develop lung cancer if you regularly use one throughout your life, just as you might develop lung cancer if you smoke and you might develop bowel cancer from eating too much processed red meat and you might develop cancer if you live next to a road or spend a lot of your life driving.

Unless you are severely asthmatic (for example), the risk is not so high that it presents an immediate danger to your health, just like hundreds of things we do. And we all have to go at some point; over Christmas my dad passed away from something completely unrelated despite having open fires in his house from childhood.

And how do you imagine one might become "severely asthmatic"?
Lockheart · 09/01/2022 13:26

@JabNotInArm I'm very aware of Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah's case and agree there needs to be a huge reduction in the level of traffic and personal car ownership in this country. I've posted about this several times before if you don't believe me. But that doesn't change the fact that for the majority of people the use of a logburner (or car) is not going to have a material impact on their health and that the risk of a log burner in a pub is being massively overblown on this thread.