Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hotels people!!!!!

after you've spent a couple thou on plane tickets, you may not have extra cash for hotels

I know that's why we wind up sleeping at ILs house and not able to rent a car

Plus, there might not be any convenient hotels. The closest hotel to my parents' home is 40 minutes away. For my ILs, it's 30 minutes.

After Christmas dinner at MIL's, she read "Little Black Sambo" aloud to my 4 year old while the entire rest of the family (8 adults) sat around and listened.

FIL and MIL live in a massive mcmansion but guest bed is a miserable, creaky, bouncy, cratered in the middle, ancient full-size mattress on an antique frame. It has two cheap very tall polyester bed pillows for our heads, along with 15 tiny lacy decorative pillows placed on top. When I see it I feel deep fear and dread.

Haha, OP! For a minute I thought "There are really multiple houses using bar soap for dishes?!"

^^^^whoops, forgot to mention I'm op!

Anonymous wrote:The orange juice is served in shot glasses.

The towels are strangely nonabsorbent. Trying to dry off with them just moves the water around on your body.

The crisper drawer in the refrigerator is filled with C and D batteries.

Same here. But next to the batteries are piles of condiments in to-go containers. Like spicy mustard, duck sauce and soy sauce from Chinese restaurants she went to months or even years ago. Also, you have to check the labels before eating anything. Last night when looking for dressing to eat with my salad I realized that 3 out of 4 opened bottles of dressing expired in 2014. The 4th expired in 2015. She'll decide that we're eating off of paper plates which is fine because I don't love eating off of dishes washed with a bar of soap but her paper plates are literally from the 80s or maybe early 90s. I looked up a photo of the packaging. Thanks to everyone who commiserated and understood the spirit of the thread. I feel much less alone now. And writing all of this out makes me seriously wonder why I come back.

Going home tomorrow!!!!!!!

Visited parents in senior living place in FL.
Had to sit on white towel to eat.
Temp in apartment: 77
"Classic Country Music" playing all day every day on the cable TV channel.
Don't walk in the living room because you will mess up the lines the vacuum put in the carpet.
Ten thousand (or thereabouts) paper grocery sacks piled on counter. Equivalent number of mail catalogs stacked in random places. See: hoarding.

This thread is hilarious. Thank god we didn't travel for Christmas.

Anonymous wrote:Hotels people!!!!!

after you've spent a couple thou on plane tickets, you may not have extra cash for hotels

I know that's why we wind up sleeping at ILs house and not able to rent a car

Hotels people!!!!!

The orange juice is served in shot glasses.

The towels are strangely nonabsorbent. Trying to dry off with them just moves the water around on your body.

The crisper drawer in the refrigerator is filled with C and D batteries.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Staying in a 1600SF rancher with my in-laws. They have 5 TV that are on from the very moment they wake up until they go to sleep. Full volume, all day every day. If I am the only one in a room I turn the TV off but IL comes in right after to turn back on, then leaves the room with TV on. Sports, NCIS episodes, Westerns, 24 hours of A Christmas Story . . .

Ugh. Do they play the same thing on each TV or are there 5 competing shows on at once?

usually all different. Sometimes two will have the same football game, but one TV gets the signal about 20 seconds before the living room, so there is all sorts of yelling from one room to he next, "Robbie, you better be watching, your team is about to do something."

Anonymous wrote:Staying in a 1600SF rancher with my in-laws. They have 5 TV that are on from the very moment they wake up until they go to sleep. Full volume, all day every day. If I am the only one in a room I turn the TV off but IL comes in right after to turn back on, then leaves the room with TV on. Sports, NCIS episodes, Westerns, 24 hours of A Christmas Story . . .

Ugh. Do they play the same thing on each TV or are there 5 competing shows on at once?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My MIL has no door handle on the ONE bathroom door. My husband went to Home Depot to fix it and she got all pissed off. She also does not believe in buying garbage bags. She just uses the small plastic grocery bags.

We checked into the local Marriott.

OMG. Are these depression era women determined to try to prove something? Besides the fact that they are batshit crazy?

No, no depression era. Just batshit crazy.

The fix-it posters and the PP trash-talking her brother's kids are worse than some of the ILs on this thread. Give it a rest ppl!