What's weird about where you are staying - Thanksgiving 2024 edition

[Anonymous]

We are hosting and my parents just arrived last night. At breakfast this morning I remembered that my mother eats everything with her hands - no utensils. We are from the American south, and this is considered very improper. I don’t understand it and it’s something she started doing in her 60’s. My in-laws are also southern and very formal. I am dreading this gathering with every bone in my body.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I love these threads. I had so many holidays spent together with a house full of relatives. My and my sibling’s kids are grown with kids of their own and my dear husband passed away recently, my parents and grandparents are gone. Being older now, we have tons of memories that were’t exactly funny at the time, but we crack up remembering them now. We no longer live close to each other, so our gatherings are smaller.
But, please keep the stories coming, they make me miss the holidays of old and provide some much needed laughter. I sympathize with so many of you.
~~HAPPY THANKSGIVING ~~

Happy Thanksgiving! I’m sorry for your loss. I’m glad you have so many happy and funny memories. I’m glad you enjoy the spirit of this thread, which is we know being together is important, but sometimes it’s also unintentionally hilarious.

+100

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My mom proudly told me on Monday that she just finished cooking the turkey so she can re-heat it for us Thursday.

I feel your pain. I am looking at a frozen turkey sitting on the counter. It was fully defrosted LAST YEAR and then REFROZEN when a contingent family did not make it up from the twin cities. This is an 18 pounder. Early tomorrow morning, crimes against nature will be committed in order to finish the thawing. This is one of many attempts on our lives that have/will occur this Thanksgiving. I’m going to go eat a snickers bar and have a Bloody Mary. They don’t believe in food allergies or food safety here, but they believe in large supplies of junk food and nobody monitors your drinking. #winnng

RED PLASTIC BIN IN THE FREEZER LADY PLEASE COME BACK

No, no, no, no, NO. Tell you don't have children who will be eating that killer turkey!

There are children here but none on my watch will eat the Turkey. All of the sane adults work together to protect ourselves and the innocents. The perpetrators don’t get sick. I don’t know if they’ve evolved to have cast iron stomachs or if it’s the alcohol (I’m indulging, not judging, but they drink SO MUCH).

My mother is 97, lives in her home on her own and still drives. She's never had cancer, has normal cholesterol etc. She is a unicorn according to my internist, who doesn't believe she exists. She still gardens and does stuff on her own. She has never been a person concerned with eating healthy foods. She has always eaten a lot of vegetables and few sweets but she's Southern and loves her Southern food. She's never had a heart attack, heart issues, or strokes. She lives in the hot South. She leaves food out all the time. We just visited and she made sausage and biscuits several mornings and they sat out all day. We didn't realize and the first day, most of us had stomach issues. I'm pretty certain she has poisoned herself so many times with every possible food borne illness that it has killed anything that can kill her.

My mom is only 78 but is like this (and also a Southerner). She doesn’t wash her hands, leaves food out, eats old leftovers; licks the spoon, doesn’t stay away from sick people, etc. and never gets sick. There have been holidays when every single one of us catches a stomach bug, she is right in the mix without taking any precaution, and she is the only one who avoids it. My BIL says she’s like a cockroach.

This whole generation is like this. I virtually never saw my mother wash her hands. Even after using the bathroom. It’s pretty gross.

I never knew so many people of that generation had some compulsion to leave food sitting out. My mom is like another posters in that she thinks putting the food in the fridge is something bad. My entire life she left food sitting out for hours. I thought it was our shameful secret.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cereal for breakfast. Do not know when any other food is happening.

You expect a cooked breakfast on Thanksgiving? You are the problem. Forage.

+1

What’s wrong with cereal, on Thanksgiving of all days? Reminds me of the poster who wanted to disrupt her host’s Thanksgiving prep to cook a full hot breakfast for her “adult boys” because they’d simply wither away if they ate a bagel.

and everyone probably needs some fiber.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am hosting my parents for Thanksgiving week and made sure to stock up on their preferred grocery items, etc. But they are very unhappy that we do not have cable so they can’t watch MSNBC at top volume all day long!

My sister comes for the day to my place for Thanksgiving and then both of us stay at my parents’ for Christmas… but as our families have grown, the guest room space there has gotten less comfortable. Because her kids are “bad sleepers” and can’t share rooms, DH and I have ended up on an air mattress in the den with one dc. So it might be time for a hotel!

Say more. Does one of their kids sleep with them? Or do they get their own room, their kids each get their own room, and your family is in the den? Why aren’t THEY in the den?

Each of her kids gets a bedroom and she and her DH get a bedroom. My parents consider her the fragile one and me the “hardy” one. I absolutely love her and my kid is a good sleeper but any attempt to adjust the imbalance has led to pouting and threats from her DH.

WTH? Your sister is horrible. This is absolutely ridiculous and unfair to you and your family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My little nephew is “helping” with the pies… interspersed with throwing a slobbery tennis ball for their puppy.

DH won't go near any food that kids have "helped" prepare. Not in people's homes, not at school bake sales, nada. He's completely grossed out by it. I'm less so, but even I don't eat from younger helpers (8 and younger)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cereal for breakfast. Do not know when any other food is happening.

You expect a cooked breakfast on Thanksgiving? You are the problem. Forage.

+1

What’s wrong with cereal, on Thanksgiving of all days? Reminds me of the poster who wanted to disrupt her host’s Thanksgiving prep to cook a full hot breakfast for her “adult boys” because they’d simply wither away if they ate a bagel.

I remember that! Her boys needed a full hot breakfast so she wanted to get into the host's kitchen and whip one up each morning, while displacing the host.

[Anonymous]

Last thing, I had never seen anyone store food in a cold garage until I got married. When MIL walked out with a pan of leftover turkey and put it on a cloth that was on the car hood, it blew my mind. And I don't care how cold it was, it bothered me that our food was sitting out in the garage with the cars and the lawn chemicals and boxes of books and broken garden tools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Last thing, I had never seen anyone store food in a cold garage until I got married. When MIL walked out with a pan of leftover turkey and put it on a cloth that was on the car hood, it blew my mind. And I don't care how cold it was, it bothered me that our food was sitting out in the garage with the cars and the lawn chemicals and boxes of books and broken garden tools.

NOT BOXES OF BOOKS!!!!! The horror.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are hosting and my parents just arrived last night. At breakfast this morning I remembered that my mother eats everything with her hands - no utensils. We are from the American south, and this is considered very improper. I don’t understand it and it’s something she started doing in her 60’s. My in-laws are also southern and very formal. I am dreading this gathering with every bone in my body.

This could be dementia. My mom has also forgotten how to use utensils

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My in-laws were the type of people who just left food out on the porch or in the garage, until a bear moved into their yard.

My mother would leave food out on our screened porch when I was growing up. I don't think I worried too much about it. She was also a caterer for awhile --she did this with food for clients too. I don't think anyone ever got sick...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are hosting and my parents just arrived last night. At breakfast this morning I remembered that my mother eats everything with her hands - no utensils. We are from the American south, and this is considered very improper. I don’t understand it and it’s something she started doing in her 60’s. My in-laws are also southern and very formal. I am dreading this gathering with every bone in my body.

Fine motor issues?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Last thing, I had never seen anyone store food in a cold garage until I got married. When MIL walked out with a pan of leftover turkey and put it on a cloth that was on the car hood, it blew my mind. And I don't care how cold it was, it bothered me that our food was sitting out in the garage with the cars and the lawn chemicals and boxes of books and broken garden tools.

NOT BOXES OF BOOKS!!!!! The horror.

boxes of books smell so musty though. esp stored outdoors

Like many have shared, my in-laws also have no garbage cans in any room except the kitchen. The kitchen garbage can is tiny--like a 5 gallon plastic bucket stored under the sink and lined with old plastic grocery store shopping bags.

Now, FIL never gets the plastic bags at the grocery store to take home his purchases; he uses reusable grocery bags--which he will not lend out to others--so we, of course, end up spending 10 cents a bag for the plastic grocery bags at the store because who brings reusable grocery bags with them while traveling?

Picture this, we are unpacking the groceries we bought in the kitchen. I turn around for a moment and poof! the plastic grocery bags are gone. FIL scoops up all our plastic grocery bags for his cache in the garage, while telling us what spendthrifts/environmental disasters we are to pay for plastic shopping bags at the store. Sigh.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am hosting my parents for Thanksgiving week and made sure to stock up on their preferred grocery items, etc. But they are very unhappy that we do not have cable so they can’t watch MSNBC at top volume all day long!

My sister comes for the day to my place for Thanksgiving and then both of us stay at my parents’ for Christmas… but as our families have grown, the guest room space there has gotten less comfortable. Because her kids are “bad sleepers” and can’t share rooms, DH and I have ended up on an air mattress in the den with one dc. So it might be time for a hotel!

Say more. Does one of their kids sleep with them? Or do they get their own room, their kids each get their own room, and your family is in the den? Why aren’t THEY in the den?

Each of her kids gets a bedroom and she and her DH get a bedroom. My parents consider her the fragile one and me the “hardy” one. I absolutely love her and my kid is a good sleeper but any attempt to adjust the imbalance has led to pouting and threats from her DH.

What are the threats? Why is your sister considered fragile? I still don’t get why the den isn’t good enough for your sister and her husband if it’s good enough for you and your husband. How can anyone possibly think this is fair?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Last thing, I had never seen anyone store food in a cold garage until I got married. When MIL walked out with a pan of leftover turkey and put it on a cloth that was on the car hood, it blew my mind. And I don't care how cold it was, it bothered me that our food was sitting out in the garage with the cars and the lawn chemicals and boxes of books and broken garden tools.

and probably rodents.