More vaguely petulant ramblings about my the annoying habits of my mother

[FrannyandZooey]

Do other people's mothers do this?

It's my birthday soon and she rang to ask what I wanted.

Me: I'd like a raincoat.
Mother: Ooh I've got a raincoat you can have!
Me: Well, I'd like a pac a mac one.
Mother: Yes, yes, I've got a pac a mac one and you can have it, it's just sitting here!
Me: Well I would like quite a smart one, that fits me nicely (mother is entirely different size to me), and is in a colour that I choose.
Mother: Oh well this one is VERY smart and when I wore it on our trip EVERYONE said how nice it was, I can send you this one!
Me: I WOULD LIKE ONE THAT I HAVE CHOSEN.
Mother : [crestfallen silence]

I have a terrible urge to ask what she wants for Christmas and then say "oooh, an X? I've got an X! You can have this one, I'll send it to you..."

PMSL

my mum is often given jumble to take to the church jumble sale - she sometimes has a look through it to see if there is anything we would 'like'

most priceless offering was camisole and briefs set that used to belong to my godmother (was worn and a bit bobbly) but yes, I still took them to avoid a row!

rofl at 'producing the wheeled item'

my mother talks in French in front of the kids. Except she cannot speak French, and neither can I (we both did O level)

and it is in a Yorkshire accent

with rolling eyes and gurning expression as if I have not realised what she is doing

"Shall I produce the wheeled item" is the most brilliant thing I've heard all week.

And Marthamoo, my Granny does that. She even PHONES me specifically to tell me what just happened on programmes I don't watch.

My Granny also gives me the most extraordinary things;
Her: Darling, I'm sending you a cape.
Me: What? Why?
Her: It's for you to wear when you peg the washing out while you're pregnant.
Me: But... what?
Her: Well, I wanted a nice beige tailored summer coat but Chadds didn't have one, so I've ended up with this cape. I've no use for it, so I've sent it to you.
[A parcel duly arrives containing a beige, fleece poncho thing. Why???]

Oh, and another thing...
My parents were going to have a car boot sale and asked Granny if she had anything she'd like them to sell. A box duly arrives with a few things from Granny. My mum was poking through it saying "I don't remember this..." and " when did you get this salad bowl?" and my granny looked most confused and asked my mum why she thought she'd be able to recognise any of the stuff, when she'd only just picked it up from the Red Cross shop.

Yes, my Granny had gone out and bought some tat for my parents to sell at their car boot.

Oh this just gets better.

Yes my mum phones me (internationally) to tell me a joke she's heard on Radio 2. Then she asks if I watched Coronation St and I tell her again we don't have ITV.

My Gran also did the following and my mum now does it too: If she's trying to tell me something slightly scandalous in front of the dc's, she will mouth the words she doesn't want them to hear. Something like "pregnant" for example. I remember my ears pricking up as a child when my gran went silent and I just got really good at lip-reading.

My friend called my mum's house recently thinking I was there, and my mum proceeded to interrogate her about her love life, including telling her she'd "better get her skates on and have babies". Oh my God has the woman no shame?!

Had a fairly typical conversation with my mother this afternoon after asking her to get me the new Armistead Maupin to go with the pac a mac (you see, she is generous).

She asked how to spell Armistead about 4 times and then had to mutter it a few times further just to let me know how very peculiar this new fangled name was. She said "Would I like it?" and I said I thought not, as it was a bit camp (most tactful way I could think to tell her that it was about swinging San Francisco and all that entails).

She immediately launched into a very whispery discussion of the latest Mark Haddon novel. "I mean it left NOTHING to the imagination....GRAPHIC descriptions of, well, HOMOSEXUAL encounters....I mean in my day you never would have dreamt of asking "what do homosexuals do in bed?" but now it is ALL SPELT OUT FOR YOU..." [shuddering]

You mum sounds like great entertainment Franny! You wouldn't catch my mum with a novel - she's more into the obituaries and checking out estate agents' websites for sneaky peeks into people's bedrooms.

Oh good, I thought my mum was on her own somewhere in la-la land. Now I am quite happy knowing she has the company of other lunatics her age. I love her to bits though, despite the "Hurry up and produce my Grandchildren!" and the "Do you need anything? Are you okay for money?" whenever I see her. I work full time FGS.

Oh obituaries...that's another one. This is a real life conversation (as witnessed by me) between my Mum and another Woman of Mature years in WHSmith the other week. They had both reached for a copy of the Manchester Evening News at the same time (my Mum, like me, now lives in Cheshire)...

Mum: Oooh, are you from Manchester?
Other Woman: I am. Are you?
Mum: I am - I used to live in Withington.
OW: Nooooo....I used to live in Didsbury.

OW: I get the Manchester Evening News every day, do you?
Mum: I do. Only to see who's died though.
OW: Me too.

oh goodness Franny, don't let her read the latest Armistead Maupin then - it gave me a bit of a turn, it would probably finish her off altogether!

er no MMMJ
still awful
all time low this evening, 10 mins sleep in the cot. am now pinned to my chair as he's asleep on me as per bloody usual and DH out (at work sponsored meal at yummy indian that I was going to as well except my parents both have flu and so couldn't babysit). So I have no dinner as can't get up. And it's 9pm. No idea what to do with him, 2nd tooth still not through. All possible drugs and potions have been administered.

but thanks very much for asking!

not really, not many friends about and also it's FREEZING, wouldn't make anyone come out in this! was -4 last night, will probably be the same tonight.

DH shouldn't be too late, he can make me something when he gets in. I am losing hope that DS will EVER sleep again though TBH.

This is the funniest thread I have seen in a long time.

When I was a teenager my mother passed on to me a denim skirt she no longer wanted.

The reason she no longer wanted it is that there was an obvious bleach mark on the back from where she'd had her period...

thanks MMMJ!
and this is a funny thread, do ignore my moaning on it everybody!

My mum (apart from recounting the entire plot of A Touch of Frost at me when I've told her I hate David Jason and have no interest in the programme) is genius at doing the following:

Mum: (ringing with impeccable timing halfway through dinner) You remember Mrs Lampshade?
Me: No mum
Mum: Yes you do, she lived next door but one to Mrs Tablecloth... had a poodle. Her eldest daughter was a bassoon player.
Me: No mum, I don't. And I don't know Mrs Tablecloth either.
Mum: Oh yes you do, she babysat for you once when you were tiny. Had to stop driving because of her gammy eye. Lost her sweetheart in the war.
Me (grinding teeth): No, I don't remember her.
Mum: Oh! (sounding wounded on a deep & personal level). Well, her son married Annie Carpet's youngest daughter. You know her, she went to your playgroup.
Me (losing will to live): Erm...
Mum: Anyway, they had triplets last week. All boys.
Me: Oh. Lovely. Anyway, while you're on, dd said her first word today.
Mum: Well, I haven't got time to be chatting all day, bye now!

And when she's not doing that she's wondering loudly who the vaguely familiar actor on telly is and what she's seen him in all the way through the programme...

My Dad is the car boot king, however. I've taken to visiting my parents on public transport (all 500-mile-round trip of it) because then I have an excuse not to take home the sheer tat that he's picked up thinking we might like - the toys that have previously featured in those safety warnings on the local telly, any kind of scary singing/dancing teddy/fish/santa, books no-one in their right mind would want to read, broken golf clubs for OH (he plays once in a blue moon and already has a set)... the list goes on. I daren't express a preference for any food or drink in his hearing, because he'll rush out and buy half a hundredweight of it and then act hurt if I don't want to eat/drink it all immediately. He means well, I suppose...

Love 'produce the wheeled item'! Franny, thanks for starting this thread, I have been crying laughing!

My MIL lives in a tiny one-bed flat, but when we told her that we were going to do a carboot sale, she produced two carboot-loads of stuff for us to sell for her! Where she kept it I have no idea....

oh my PMSL with tears in my eyes...my mum is plain barking but my MIL is just like this sweet but annoying - every snday without fail they traipse off to the car boot sale and stock up on tat/xmas pressies/bday pressies etc - every now and then they take DD and she comes home with loads of tat similar to that I have just soent hours clearing and chucking out - once I whispered to H that they had taken her to a rubbish sale again - and nw she repeats this with glee to MIL on frequent occasions - MIL just looks at me in confusion

I'd nearly written my own Mum off as a lonely old fruitcake. Now I'm wondering if we should unite all these kindred spirits on their own web forum. Gran-net?

Swap shop
Offered: Large bag of seldom worn run-resist flesh coloured tights.
Would like warm socks. Willing to darn.

Good Housekeeping
Is anyone else using their George Foreman grill as a tie-press? I say this on QVC but can't remember whether it's sandwich or steak sear for polyester.

Chat
I saved £75:00 in Sainsbury's today! At 9:00am I hid £100 of groceries with today's sell-by date. I then came back at 4:00pm and gave them to the young man doing the reductions. I even got a family size trifle for 70p. Can anyone beat this record?

|Relationships
My daughter is so ungrateful. She is refusing to let DGD1 play with the Mattel Barbie house and accessories that I bought at the bootsale. In my day all toys were covered in lead paint and it didn't do me any harm.

LOL

Does anyone else's Mum do the irritating stream of consciousness thing where you have NO idea what she is talking about?

'I wsa talking to Jean (which Jean?) and she'd been to the place, you know, and I thought why not? but your dad didn't agree and anyway I don't like cabbages'

cue bemused silence from me on the other end of the phone

Like the idea of Gransnet - many threads on Cash in the Attic and Bargain Hunt

and

AIBU to refuse to travel abroad because of my knees?

and
''Can anyo e tell me where I've putmy glasses''

(My mum rings me up at least twice a week in the hope I may magically guess where she's put them. The worrying thing is, I'm often right )