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Original poster

Random shite your parents tell you with utter conviction...

298 replies

CharleyDavidson · 15/01/2017 17:18

but that you know is bollocks!

My Mum insists that anything that you can inherit genetically from your family always skips a generation.

My Mum's blood is negative. As is mine. She asserts that I must have inherited that from my Grandmother. And she must have inherited hers from her grandmother.

Bonkers. I know that genetic traits can skip generations, but not always and not with such predictability. But she won't have it.

OP posts:
FishinthePerculator · 16/01/2017 16:53

DPs also believe that being gay is just a trendy thing that young people are doing these days and that it is now illegal to wish someone a merry christmas or display christmas decorations in Britain.

DPiLs think that they cannot describe their dog as black (he's a black lab) because they will inadvertently offend someone. FiL is also most upset that he can no longer wear a balaclava when it is cold or he will automatically be lifted by the police as a suspected terrorists (but it's not wear that the women wear burquas). FiL also swears blind that his family got a TV in 1954 and he remembers watching Tienanmen Square unfold not long afterwards. He describes the scene perfectly, with the man facing down the tanks but insists it happened in 1954. Countless attempts to prove otherwise just give him a platform to complain about the lies on the internet.

DPs believe that jobs are for life, if you are good at your job you won't be made redundant and six months of proper saving and cutting down on luxuries will be enough to buy a really nice family home. If we then sacrifice having a holiday for a few years, we'll have the mortgage paid off straight away.

They also believe that have a dead end job and just need to apply myself a bit more. I'm pretty much as senior as I can be in this industry and am quite well respected. They insist that I am a receptionist whose main job is to make teas and coffees.

Recently DF got inexplicably angry at the fact that DH has converted our garage into a workshop and parks the car on the street.

"It's a GAR - AGE! That's French for "put car in" "

redannie118 · 16/01/2017 16:56

This reply has been withdrawn

The OP has privacy concerns, and so we've agreed to take this down now.

Limitededition7inch · 16/01/2017 16:58

My mum always tells me utter medically-related shite. She told me that mixed feeding would lead to autoimmune or digestive problems totally ignoring that I have an autoimmune condition and Crohns and was EBF her latest one is that I must be having a girl as this pregnancy is totally different, and noticeably harder, than when I was pregnant with DS. Also because DS is quite an easy child she reckons this next one will be a total monster.

However, when I sarcastically ponder if not EBF DS has resulted in him being a healthy, happy child who sleeps fairly well and generally doesn't give us much hassle (though he has his moments) she tells me that my logic is ridiculous. Which of course it is, that's why I say it to her.

Honestly, I love my mum to bits but she doesn't half exasperate me.

paddypants13 · 16/01/2017 17:04

Fil is convinced that travellers who work fruit picking pee on them before weighing them. It makes them heavier you see so they get more money per punnet.

He is otherwise a sensible and very open minded man.

Sallystyle · 16/01/2017 17:05

must take my coat off immediately after entering the house or I won't feel the benefit when I go back outside.

That really is true though! I tell my children the same.

Patriciathestripper1 · 16/01/2017 17:06

Dad - Pain is only weakness leaving the body.... followed by "so stop crying"

moreslackthanslick · 16/01/2017 17:08

Love this! My mum (RIP)

Told me off for sewing a hem on a skirt while I was wearing it as I was "sewing on sorrow"

Frequently told me as a kid that it was "too cold to snow" being precocious I'd ask her how come it snowed in the Artic. But she trotted that line out a lot!

That if I drank Brandy and Babycham (this was the 80s) I'd have an uncontrollable crying fit.

LunaLoveg00d · 16/01/2017 17:26

Some more of my mother's gems (along the same lines as chocolate gives you spots)

Sitting on cold walls gives you piles.

Going out with wet hair will kill you instantly, or something.

Women over 30 shouldn't have hair longer than a short bob.

You can't put any pictures or any type of decoration at all on a wall with patterned wallpaper on it. Mirrors possibly acceptable.

OutDamnedWind · 16/01/2017 17:48

DF is adamant beyond adamant that he saw the Northern Lights.

Except we were in Kent, in summer and two miles from a funfair that had huge strobe lights shining in the sky. We thought he was saying it as a joke until a couple of years ago when we realised he actually seriously believes it. He poo poos and laughs off any suggestions to the contrary.

Huskylover1 · 16/01/2017 18:00

My Dad thinks that if you have salad with something, that instantly makes it a diet friendly meal. Sausage roll and salad - no problem. Steak pie, chips and salad - no problem. Pork pie and salad - no problem. He is very overweight

Tabbylady · 16/01/2017 18:04

LunaLoveg00d Pocahontas McGinty exists! While I don't wish to out her or myself, what I can tell you is that the one I know started going by her (much more normal) middle name by the end of primary school...
I do come from a place with a lot of McGinty's thought.

LunaLoveg00d · 16/01/2017 18:10

www.scotsman.com/news/pocahontas-mcginty-no-she-disney-exist-1-683286

Are you sure, Tabby?

Tabbylady · 16/01/2017 18:23

There was actually more than one Pocahontas that year LunaLoveg00d
Relative works for SNBTS and so saw all the baby names for the mums getting xmatched for pp blood. It's actually how I found out about my (!) Pocahontas middle name- don't think she'd have told me if I hadn't shared that story to start with! (Thank god she's not on MN)

GilMartin · 16/01/2017 18:32

Fil is convinced that travellers who work fruit picking pee on them before weighing them.

I know someone who used to do Raspberry picking in the 60s and confessed to do that to get the weight up. Apparently it was a common practice and on colder days you'd see the steam coming off the buckets.

littleme2016 · 16/01/2017 19:05

Sitting on the ground/wall will give you piles or worms. Me and my friends did this frequently as children and as far as I know, none of us ever had either condition.

Thinking I was there at places with her when I wasn't. 'Do you remember the day we went to xxxx cafe?' 'No it wasn't me. I have never been there' 'Are you sure? Who was it then?". I don't know...I wasn't there..

RamsayBoltonsPoodleParlour · 16/01/2017 19:34

An elderly female relative, who had been a nurse, back in the day, told me that you can catch diabetes if you are bitten by a diabetic.

girlandboy · 16/01/2017 19:46

On the same theme as a pp.

I might be guilty of telling my DD that when her Dad and I were born everything was black and white. The proof was in our baby photos!
Then when we got to the 1970's everything turned colour.

IT WAS A JOKE!!

Trouble was we forgot to tell her the truth and she didn't question it until she was about 12!

girlandboy · 16/01/2017 19:46

On the same theme as a pp.

I might be guilty of telling my DD that when her Dad and I were born everything was black and white. The proof was in our baby photos!
Then when we got to the 1970's everything turned colour.

IT WAS A JOKE!!

Trouble was we forgot to tell her the truth and she didn't question it until she was about 12!

MollyHuaCha · 16/01/2017 20:10

My MIL told me she'd emailed some photos of my DS to her friend's daughter, "but don't worry - I got her to email them straight back to me when she'd finished looking at them".

I love this! Grin

My mum refers to obvious sun burn as 'sun tan'.

Mum: June and Bob have just returned from Spain and they've got such a lovely colour.

Me: No Mum, look at them, they're totally burnt. That's sun burn.

Mum: (chooses not to listen) Ooh, you can't beat a lovely sun tan, can you?

FurryLittleTwerp · 16/01/2017 20:14

My FIL refused to have internet access at home because he thought "the internet" could somehow get into the house & see things - this was a long time before any sort of web-cam was possible for the average householder.

MIL uses her iPad a lot (80th birthday present) but he is still very suspicious & keeps well away Grin

GilMartin · 16/01/2017 20:16

you can catch diabetes if you are bitten by a diabetic

Is she getting diabetics and rabid dogs mixed up?

ReasonsToBeModeratelyHappy · 16/01/2017 20:20

Mrs McGregor - No I don't think jelly is full of iron, but my DM used to eat it if she got constipated, because its slippery...

GilMartin · 16/01/2017 20:27

Fish what your father in law remembers is not Tianemen Square, but the Hungarian uprising of 1956. Anti Communist protestors attempted to obstruct Soviet Tanks.

As this image shows

bertsdinner · 16/01/2017 20:46

My mum is adamant that you need to wash chicken before cooking " to get the germs off". She will stand at the sink washing and rinsing out the chicken, splashing germy water everywhere. Me and my sister plead with her not to wash the chicken, but she wont have it.