zzz...they've got the heating on so high i can barely stay awake...zzz...

[biggytitbo]

Jesus it's like an oven at my parents house! I keep nodding off because its so roasting. They may as well not bother with putting the turkey in the oven and just leave it on the side to cook.

If your visiting your parents over christmas, what weird things do they do?

[An tSaoi]

Argue.

[Baxter]

Something whimsical with slight sexual overtones but obviously made up.

Then something anachronistic yet still quite common among people of their generation which sounds reasonable, yet is also quite funny if only for the fact that your relatives probably do something similar, or at least you could imagine them doing it.

It drives me mad!

[Danger Man]

If your visiting your parents over christmas, what weird things do they do?

Well...they don't poo in a bucket, if that's any help to you.

[purlieu]

Lucky you, I'm sat here shivering because the heating doesn't work.
I mean, it works, but it isn't effective in any way.

[biggytitbo]

Well...they don't poo in a bucket, if that's any help to you.

We don't have to do that anymore. We chose too.

[purlieu]

biggy prefers to shit in clothes shops now.

[Baxter]

BTB can shit? It's a Christmas miracle!

[Serge]

My dad always likes to have the heating on especially high too, though with it being as fucking cold outside as it is now, I don't have a problem with it this year. In fact, it's pretty freezing in the bedrooms and bathroom at my parents, as they don't have any heating upstairs at all.

[Artemis]

If your visiting

Grrrr.

This is the first Christmas I've been in the UK and not been with my parents. I just can't put myself through the retarded regress into a childhood thing that they do, and feeling obliged to feign a disproportionate amount of gratitude for gifts I don't want. It's a drain. This year, I'm staying in London where I will be spending Christmas with my best friend and we'll be eating, drinking and watching crap.

[buttgammon]

I'd rather be in a too-warm environment all day than go out and slip over on the ice as I did earlier. Grr. Fucking ice.

[ThickAndCreamy]

I forgot how hard it is to watch most television at Christmas time or in general. I've just watched a version of A Christmas Carol with Ross "I'm gonna eat your children" Kemp and later I will have to watch Deal Or No Deal. It's really, really hard to do, you know, they're just painfully horrible to watch. I'd much rather just get drunk and play cards or a board game, much more fun with a lot less depressing television and my mum and nan shouting when someone talks.

[_Hypnotoad_]

Aye, it's like a fooking oven round my parents place, I don't think they realise the temperature has gone up about 10 degrees these last few days. Dad has an open fire and chops logs like he's in Alaska not a dreary London suburb.

Amongst other annoying traits is an ability to, admirably, allow 40 years of pent up frustration at living with the same partner seep out in a series of subtle and gently delivered put downs that are barely noticeable to an outsider. Though it does seem to be a fairly successful way of avoiding arguments.

[biggytitbo]

Grrrr.

This is the first Christmas I've been in the UK and not been with my parents. I just can't put myself through the retarded regress into a childhood thing that they do, and feeling obliged to feign a disproportionate amount of gratitude for gifts I don't want. It's a drain.

Tell me about it. I always tell myself ill get hospitalised or kill myself in order to avoid the horror. But i never do, im my own worst enemy!

[the midnight watch baboon]

I believe we'll have to watch Lord of the Rings I-IV on my dad's 35134657" tv whilst being terrified by the surround sound.

[biggytitbo]

I bet you're looking forward to LOTRs 4!

[the midnight watch baboon]

yeah he's made it himself! I thought it was a quadrilogy :(

[actwithoutwords]

Our house is like a furnace also. It must have some kind of Christmas 'up to 11' feature.

[Futurebobbers]

Posting from another suburban sauna. There's a thermostat, but my mum doesn't seem to appreciate that it doesn't do anything. Unless the difference between 40 and 80°f is so slight as to be unnoticable.

[Suttonpubcrawl]

Yeah, it's boiling here too. However after spending a fair bit of time recently in a house that's freezing all the time regardless of whether the heat is on or not, I think I prefer it too warm. At least you aren't afraid of getting up to go to the toilet because it seems like venturing out into an arctic wilderness.

[biggytitbo]

Its absolutely freezing cold outside but im sleeping with the window open so i can avoid been dessicated like an Egyptian mummy tomorrow morning.

[biggytitbo]

Yeah, it's boiling here too. However after spending a fair bit of time recently in a house that's freezing all the time regardless of whether the heat is on or not, I think I prefer it too warm. At least you aren't afraid of getting up to go to the toilet because it seems like venturing out into an arctic wilderness.

My flat is freezing cold, it reminds me of the old shit in a bucket days. In fact when my fridge broke recently i just moved all my frozen food onto the window sill in my bedroom and it was fine.

[ThickAndCreamy]

Grandad: What is this shit? I don't want to watch this poofter moan about food! (talking about Celebrity Come Dine With Me with David 'heterosexual' Gest'
Ben: So, what do you want to watch?
Nan: SCARFACE.
Ben: I promise you won't enjoy Scarface, it's about a mexican cocaine dealer who has sex with everyone and murders everyone for fun.
Nan: Look Ben, just put on Scarface, make your Grandad happy.

This has been the best drunken Christmas Eve I have ever experienced.

[always sober]

Got my window open here too!

You guys...

[Fry]

Me and my Brother have been talking about Scarface. Is it a christmassy film?

[biggytitbo]

Me and my Brother have been talking about Scarface. Is it a christmassy film?

Its christmassy for me, in that id like to dismantle everyone im forced to be with with a chainsaw.

[Shaun]

Ben: I promise you won't enjoy Scarface, it's about a mexican cocaine dealer who has sex with everyone and murders everyone for fun.

"it involves us making some money with our Mexican friends from Colombia"*.

_{*He's actually Cuban}

[23 Daves]

For some reason known only to herself, my mother sets up rigged "pass the parcel" games with my nieces and nephews, where the music always stops when the parcel lands with them. 

"So what's wrong with that?" you might think.  Well, the parcels are always filled with things my mother has found in the local Pound Shop which nobody much wants anyway - pens in the shape of a slab of cheese and that sort of thing.  Secondly, three of my nieces and nephews are now in their teens and have grown out of the whole charade.  Thirdly, it seems to go on for hours, with endless pieces of crap wrapped up in newspaper being paraded out for the amusement of absolutely nobody in particular anymore.

None of us have had the heart to tell her that we think it's all rather pointless and dull, and rigged to a degree Mugabe would be ashamed of.  I think she gets more entertainment out of wrapping the strawberry scented pencil sharpeners in bits of old newspaper the night before than any of us actually get out of playing the game.  She laughs and laughs and laughs whilst the rest of us pretend to be enjoying it.  Privately, we've all admitted that the whole thing is a bit ridiculous. 

[biggytitbo]

Tjats the essence of christmas really, getting stuck in this timeloop were you're 10, regardless of the fact that everyone and everything has changed since then. Forget Doug McClure christmas is the land that time forgot.

[23 Daves]

This is the first Christmas I've been in the UK and not been with my parents. I just can't put myself through the retarded regress into a childhood thing that they do, and feeling obliged to feign a disproportionate amount of gratitude for gifts I don't want. It's a drain. This year, I'm staying in London where I will be spending Christmas with my best friend and we'll be eating, drinking and watching crap.

I'm really envious of people who are able to opt out of the whole family do at Christmas without causing any offence.  Being in another country is, of course, the ultimate excuse.  I've got Australian friends in Britain who have all their mates around on Christmas Day and just make a party out of it, having approximately 200 times more fun than anyone would if they spent it wondering if or even when the huge family argument would erupt.

Of course, there's always one smug bastard who claims his or her family are 'great' at Christmas, and everyone should enjoy the time they have with theirs as well and be grateful.  They usually spout this stuff without bothering to check why Christmas might be a difficult time, as one condescending bint did with me one year. 

Still anyway - happy Christmas everyone!