Things people do that just baffle you

[Whatexcellentboiledpotatoes]

What does either a specific person in your life, or just the general public do, you just don't understand why they do it, and you either can't ask them or you've tried to ask them and they can't tell you?

Write it here and maybe someone else that also does it can tell you why, or has an idea as to why.

Here are mine:

Why do my neighbours across the street bring their bins outside a full 24hrs early? They are retired, home most of the day, go in and out of their house five or six times during that 24hr period, but bring their bins out early Monday morning when they don't get picked up until Tuesday morning?

Why do people talk on their phones on speakerphone in public, what is the purpose?

Why do so many of my neighbours drive to our local corner shop which is approximately a 3 - 4 minute walk?

Parents who let their kids cause havoc in public spaces ie running near waiters carrying hot food, hitting other kids at soft play

It's habit I think. People just leave the house and get into their cars on autopilot.

Along a similar theme, why do some people insist on cleaning out their wheelie bins regularly? Even their recycling bin, which should only contain clean, dry waste.

I get that it might need a good hose out very occasionally if it gets really stinky and minging (which shouldn't happen anyway if you use bin bags) ; but it's a bin that's there for rubbish and it lives outside - why does it need to be sparkling clean every time before you dump the next load in it?!

See that doesn't baffle me. I know why they do it. They're selfish and lazy.

True! But i guess it still baffles me how common it has become

My MIL pays a company to do this for her every fortnight 🤣

Baffles me too!

The bins thing might be about memory issues - they may have forgotten in the past and now put it out early as a way of managing that.

I don't understand why people believe the bullshit of skincare companies and get so wrapped up in buying various potions in the hope of looking better/younger. I seem to not have inherited whatever gene makes you give a toss about this sort of thing.

Why do people mow their lawns at the crack of dawn on a Sunday? To me this is dick behaviour as it’s the most likely day for people to be wanting a bit of extra kip.

Why do people not lock their doors?

But surely in today's world of phone reminders and smart watches and Alexa's and googles etc etc and you set a reminder for yourself?
My Google reminds me every Monday night at 5pm, 6pm and 7:30pm 🤣

But maybe if they're older people, they can't deal with it.
They do have a daughter in her 20s at home though!

After a particularly annoying experience in Oxford yesterday, why do people go to a museum then wander round having a LOUD conversation about anything other than what is in the museum. Two people talking at length about their DCs uni issues through at least 4 rooms of the museum before I stuck my air pods in to drown them out. They never stopped look at a single exhibit in about 20 minutes.

It baffles me how horrible some Mumsnetters are to people struggling with infertility. Can they honestly not imagine how they would have felt if they hadn’t been able to have their own children?

I know someone who is leaving his (young teen) kids to go and be posted abroad for work for three years. Entirely by choice. Divorced dad.

Baffles me he’d want that, regardless of them having a very competent Mum!

I think Sunday is a lot of people's "get things done" day. They start off with the lawn to get it out of the way, and get on with other gardening jobs and they do it early so they have the day to do other stuff. They may also want to avoid the hottest part of the day.

Still 💯 a dick move though.

Why do people walk along staring at their phones and then looked completely shocked when someone else needs to get past?

Why do some people have no common sense?

In my area people are saying they don’t recycle because now you can only use clear bags to put it in the communal bin and the council don’t provide them. But there is nothing stopping you from using any bag you like and then emptying the recycling from the bag into the bin.

This reminds me of our neighbour in the 1970s who used to drive to the pub round the corner and 'just have one drink' (very much permitted in those days) because 'he was driving'. My Dad never proved it but thought he might get there first walking because neighbour had a big car and a very curvy drive that was quite tricky to back out of.

Regarding the bin thing, where I live they should be put out after 6pm Tuesday.
I once put them out at 2pm as I was going out overnight and didn't want festering black bags in the house for a fortnight.
The feckers have a collection van they pick rubbish up in on non-collection days.
They opened a black sack, saw a stray envelope that had got in there (I do recycle but it must have got in there in error) and I got a warning letter about putting bins out on wrong day.

Infuriating as they must know people go away.
No leeway with the buggers.

The bin thing might be to stop people parking across their drive…

I really really don’t get the speakerphone in public thing - if anyone does it, can they tell us why please? It’s so ignorant of other people’s peace!!

And the bin cleaning, well I used to pay someone to clean my normal bin til I wised up it never got dirty. I asked if they could clean my garden waste bin (the one that really does need cleaning) and they weren’t interested!

Surely this is the very definition of more money than sense.

I have a neighbour who seems to have made it her life's mission to run around and cater to another neighbour. The second neighbour is a very nasty piece of work and he belittles her and calls her 'stupid old woman'. Yet she trots after him and when he is away goes in and opens and shuts curtains and turns lights on and off because he's too much of an arse to get a burglar alarm. She;s 10 years older than him and although he is fit enough to cycle everywhere and runs half marathons she fetches his groceries for him in one of those little wheelie trolly things and puts them away for him. I sometimes hear him shouting at her for putting something in the wrong place. He's very deaf and so he shouts and we can hear him perfectly well. Once he was sitting outside and she went over and he said 'Get your fat arse up that step ladder and wash those windows'. She's not being paid, or anything, so it's not like this is a job, she's in her 80s FFS. He just orders her around all the time. It's beyond me why she lets any of that happen. Her son is a good friend of ours and he is baffled also and keeps telling her to stop. She;s clearly getting some sort of emotional fulfillment out of it- her late husband was similar so I think she's sort of sticking with what she knows. (It;'s not a romantic relationship.)

As regards bins, better to put them out in daylight hours than make a noise at night when small kids are in bedtime routine. We used to be really irritated by the noise of umpteen bins going down the lane to the pick up point when trying to read to DS

Why do people park next to you in an empty carpark!? Recently, I was sat in my car, in a car park which was barely full, and a woman decided to turn into the parking space next to me and scraped all the the way down my car in the process. I asked her why, and she couldn’t give me an answer.

That and why neighbours think “I know, let’s turn out music full blast in the garden, all my other neighbours will love that!”

I understand that but what's wrong with 5 or 6pm? Why are they out on the pavement from early morning when they are home all day?

And anyway, they don't care about noise, they walk their barky spaniel from 5am 🙃