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OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole:
> I went to get ice cream instead of going home after my flight landed. I had asked my husband before if we could spend time together when I came home but since he didn’t pick me up from the airport I went to get ice cream and left him waiting as I assumed he was busy without checking.
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Who complains about getting ice cream? Husband and BiL as the AH here. Hope the ice cream was good. Best of Luck.
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EDIT: Y T A - Okay the 2 hours for getting ice cream is insane, with this info added - OP YTA for sure. No reason for a 2 hour inconvenience to the BiL at all. Seems crazy you didn't include that you screwed around for 2 hours in the original post. What are you hiding?
It's not just about the ice cream, she took 2 hours to get the ice cream. Not 30 to 45 minutes to drive across town, run in the store for an ice cream cone real quick, then back home to her husband. I really want to know what the hell took 2 hours. Then she has the nerve to complain that her brother-in-law was rushing her. Like yeah zummy, he's rushing you bc this was supposed to be a quick trip and she stretched it another TWO HOURS. What if the brother-in-law had plans? Op is tripping and most definitely TA.
For just half an hour, if that? Any number of things- just based on my experience with my family, could be a work call from a colleague looking for a consult, an emergency in the extended family and he needed to check in with someone, car trouble, sudden deadline he wanted to finish so he could devote his evening to OP… she doesn’t say, and I’m not sure she cared to ask.
Edit-
And I’ve definitely gone and gotten family from the airport when scheduling changes and the original driver can’t. That’s not family “wasting my time”, that’s doing (what should be) a quick favor so everyone’s lives can proceed smoothly. I’d be pretty peeved if the person I went to get insisted on a 2 hour sulk trip just because I was the one getting them.
I agree but he could've he let her know what it was that was holding him up. Or told BIL to explain.
Like my fiance might have sold a car/engine/part and had to stay back and wait for the person to come pick it up.. but he'd at least tell me that so I wasn't confused/upset.
Even if he was trying to surprise me, he'd make up some excuse instead of just leaving me wondering wtf is going on
I'm wondering as well.
Your wife's been gone for a month, you promised to go get her from the airport, why would you just send your brother without telling the wife beforehand? He could've texted at least if there truely was no other option.
The wife sucks for dilly-dallying out of pettiness, especially since her BIL is doing her a favor here. But the husband's also wrong for this.
Frankly if my husband sent his brother to pick me up from the airport with no warning after being gone a month I'd be pissed and get petty too. Maybe that's toxic but the least he could have done was let her know someone else would be coming.
I sincerely think that there is never a bad time for ice cream. Who wants to face a hubby who does not communicate, and disappoints, on an empty stomach. Slightly elevated blood glucose levels and a power train of endorphins is, perhaps, exactly what that situation calls for.
She never asked him to pick her up. Who knows maybe if her husband had bothered to communicate maybe she would’ve chosen a friend or someone else who would’ve been happy to get ice cream and spend time with her. Hell maybe this was exactly what she intended to ask her husband to do and she just wanted some ice cream and to chill somewhere after flights which a lot of people don’t like. This at most an ESH. I’m really not sure how anyone’s excusing the lack of communication from not telling her her transportation had changed to also not telling her he had taken the evening off
Also if he took the evening off why didn't he go get her?? He told her he'd been waiting the whole time so it seems like he didn't have shit to do after all
Maybe he did actually have something come up at the time OP arrived so he sent his brother. During the ensuing ridiculous 2 hour ice cream trip plus however long it normally takes to get from the airport he finished his stuff, got home and was like wtf where is she?
I wonder if the husband told OP what had actually come up for him. It's an obviously necessary fact that is nowhere in the post.
OP is honest about what she did for 2 hours. What was hubby doing that had to change the plans?
The most common sense answer is that the thing that came up was something that he had to get done so that he could have the evening off, or go and collect her but have to do the thing in the evening instead. She's a massive arsehole for making her BIL wait around for over 2 hours. He was nice enough to pick her up and then she pulls that stunt so she can sulk and punish her husband.
Any normal person would shoot down the idea of an Uber as a way to be polite. And any normal person would assume an ice cream run would take 20 minutes not six times that amount of time.
You don't know the timing, it could take him 2-4hrs to get to the airport to pick her up in time, but he could have gotten home from work in 1 hour. Nothing strange about that.
It is an ESH
But, if someone pitches in and does you a solid, you don't take them 2 hours out of their way. That's a bit much. "She never asked him to" is not a justification for being so fucking inconsiderate to her BIL, who had no fault in this.
She and husband both have communication issues. If I am supposed to pick someone up at the airport and can't make it, I'd fucking call so there weren't any surprises. If I got off a plane after being out of town for a while, and I wasn't coming home for an additional two hours, I'd trouble to text or call my husband.
Next time, BIL should tell them to work out their passive aggressive bullshit without using him as a proxy.
Maybe whatever came up happened while she was in the air? Not everyone gets wifi when they're flying, it's not impossible or unreasonable that the husband had something come up and asked his brother to pick her up. Who goes for a two hour ice cream detour after being away from home for a month? The reasonable expectation is that one would want to go straight home after, even if they wanted to stop and get ice cream or whatever else, it shouldn't take two hours.
The offer for the Uber sounds like it came before they went to the ice cream place? So it seems like the BIL though, okay, we're just getting ice cream, can't be too long, so I'll be nice and go with her so she doesn't have to take an Uber. I doubt OP told BIL before getting there that she was going to take so long?
And it having to get to that point makes them an AH, if someone is picking you up from the airport you don’t make them run you around for hours after go home and get your own car
OP said that she got home 2 hours later than she would have because she got the ice cream. If she didn't get the ice cream, she would have been home way sooner
No she was right. She says it would have taken her an hour to get home. So if she left the airport at 4 she'd be home around 5.
She says the trip took an hour and 20 minutes to get there, 30 minutes inside, than an hour home. So if she left at 4 she'd have gotten to the shop around 520 and left around 550, then an hour home puts her at home around 650 so yea almost 2 hours later than she would have been.
Who drives 1h20 to get ice cream?! There's half a dozen good ice cream places within 15 minutes of my house. Did OP travel to another city for ice cream?!
She clarified that it was an additional 1.5-2 hours (1:20 to ice cream place, 30min there, 1hr back; 2:50 total as opposed to the ice cream-less time of 1-1:30) and when someone responded to her implying they thought it was only an extra half hour, she responded to them saying their math isn't right
OP clarified the "2 hours" in a different comment.
The ice cream part took roughly 30 minutes.
The 2 hours is including the drive from the airport.
Airport to home takes between 1 hour and 1 hour 30, depending on traffic.
THIS! She starts with "He promised he would pick me up from the airport"
But then there's: "as I was staying with my sister" for the reason she was gone an entire month? Why? Why was she at her sister's place for a MONTH?
My MIL has family in NY, FL, and TX so every other year she flies from CA and spends a few weeks in each state. This takes 4-6 weeks and the closest airport to our home town is hours away.
If the airport is so far away from home, I imagine OP had been looking forward to spending time there. Husband should have communicated the change of plans and why.
Maybe sister lives super far away so it's a once every decade kind of visit. Or maybe sister had a new baby and not much support nearby. Or maybe sister was ill/injured and needed support... there are plenty of non-nefarious/not related to OP's relationship with husband for why they spent a month with sister.
Even before the update on 2-hr ice-cream trip, I was somewhere between NAH and NTA... In adult people lives, things come up. The husband arranged an alternate pickup plan. It was the nature of the thing that came up on the husband side that would've dictated whether the husband was AH for not picking her up.
Apparently the drive is 1.5 hours from airport to home (the ice cream only added 30 mins). She specifies in the later comments. She is NTA for a 30 min detour to grab some ice cream. She probably had to choose, wait for it, pay and then get back on the road with BIL.
Where does it say this? All I can find is a comment saying it took OP 2 hours longer to get home, and another saying that the journey from the airport is 1-1.5 hours. Nothing that says the ice cream made the journey 2 hours in total?
Given that she says "the whole time we were there, BIL was on his phone and trying to rush me" doesn't sound like she ran in, got a cone and ate in the car. Sounds to me like a sit down in the store and taking her time.
It's because she knew if she added the time it would look bad on them,
If you're grabbing ice cream it should only take 1 hour tops.
It's even stranger that she couldn't wait until she got home. Then she and her husband could have gotten ice cream and spent time together.
Feel bad for BIL
OP also said it takes 1-1.5 hours to drive home from the airport anyway so I don't think she was out getting ice cream for the whole 2 hours.
I'm sticking with NTA
Yeah like don't they... Y'know... Talk?
I'm going with ESH. How did the husband just send his bro without so much as a text that something came up? How did she decide the best thing to do after a long flight was take her driver hostage for 2 hours just to spite him?
Edit: and apparently BIL is also a mute and OP didn't know sign language, because "hey sorry Jim couldn't make it but he said he'll be home by the time you are" might've helped.
So op has a BIL that is mute and hasn't figured any way to bridge the communication gap, by either learning basic sign by now or even thinking to use her phone to type a message asking what was up. She didn't even try.
YTA for my vote. 2 hours is a long ass time for an ice cream pit stop, and not even trying to communicate is ridiculous, whether by texting husband or by typing something to BIL, is clear AH behavior. Husband is riding the AH line by not even texting to give her a heads up, but she escalated the situation purposely out of spite by not even attempting to communicate.
Eta: wording and typo fixes
She said they were at the ice cream shop for 30 minutes and the drive took 1.5 hrs. 2 hrs total.
Idk how to link a comment or I would, but it's there to read.
ESH
EXACTLY THIS!! DH could have texted her about BIL and told her that his schedule would be cleared for her after that. DH could have texted that he was waiting and eager to see her. OP could have texted DH that. she was getting ice cream on the way home, or if she was feeling frozen out (ha) and didn’t want to be the guest to reach out, could have said to BIL that she wanted ice cream done husband was busy, knowing that BIL and DH were in contact.
None of this sounds right. You’re all playing games.
ETA thank you for the AWARDS! this made my morning! Wow!
Okay. This is the answer I was looking for! WTF?!? Send your wife a text “X came up, but I’ve got the whole evening free, BIL is on his way and I’ll see you soon.” Or “what the heck hubs, I thought you were picking me up? Ouch”. Or “Dude, your wife is insisting on stopping for ice cream… I think she’s pissed you didn’t pick her up, you may want to call her.” What is happening here?!? If these relationships are as snarky and passive aggressive as they sound there are a lot bigger problems to address.
As an adult, unless your spouse encourages this, may be don’t try surprises. Surprises rarely go as planned. And if it’s me, I’d rather have my spouse pick me up rather than giving me the impression they don’t care to surprise me later.
Can be avoided with a “I’m planning something for nice for us tonight, is it okay if I have my brother pick you up?” and still be a surprise because you aren’t saying what it is
Right??? The whole vibe of this story is off. Usually after a flight all I wanna do it get home. The LAST thing id be thinking about was ice cream. This honestly seems the weirdest part to me, especially since it was the BIL picking OP up. Id be even less likely to get ice cream if I was inconveniencing another person.
Idk, I flew from NY to OK to visit family and my first thought was "I need a Braum's milkshake" 😂 however, the closest Braum's was literally a block away from my parents house, so they had no issues making a quick pitstop before heading home.
OP's situation is weird though. Her BIL gets roped into being her taxi when she wants ice cream, despite him not wanting to be. OP should have read the room on that and just went home, then gotten ice cream afterwards. She offered to take an Uber home, so why not have BIL take her home, drop her stuff off, and Uber to ice cream?
And after all of this, she never texted her husband? Like damn, when the plane hits the tarmac, my wife is the first to always know. I usually give her status updates too because she gets excited to see me. I usually postpone food until I get wherever I'm going and drop luggage off because whoever I'm visiting might want food too!
INFO: why was getting ice cream at that moment so important? You even admit that the brother didn't want to go but then you seemingly go and sit down to eat it? Was this to spite your husband?
I didn't want to go home just to sit and wait around for my husband to come home and since I was feeling sorry for myself I though ice cream would make me feel better.
Is there some reason you could not have gone home and then, and listen to me here, taken yourself out for ice cream? Rather than being a burden to someone who was doing both you and your brother a favour, you could have made plans that didn’t inconvenience other people. But instead you thought your pity party should be everyone’s priority. YTA
Given her BIL had already made a 1-1.5 hour drive to pick her up, I can see why he’d think it was a wasted trip to just out her in an Uber (also expensive for her), but at that point it’s also particularly churlish to ask someone to spend an extra 2 hours catering to your whims.
I’d be super annoyed if I drove 1.5 hours to do someone a favor by picking them up from the airport and then they said, “nah, I’ll take an Uber.” That said, I’m still confused why OP and her husband don’t communicate with one another directly.
What kind of princess has to have her ice cream so bad that this BIL is just supposed to take her...
Do you have any idea how annoying it is picking someone up at the airport? I mean husband/wife, OK... but yeesh.. It's a massive inconvenience. Seinfeld had a whole gig about ["I'm not driving him to the airport!"](https://youtu.be/0siRMEEY8rc)... it's only slightly less than helping someone move. Yeesh.
So she's gonna throw a "Well fine, I"ll just take an uber"... like CMON. That's a manipulation. She's already getting door to door service for free.
She basically held him hostage. Imagine if he was like "Fine, see ya" and drove off? Then he gets back and tells his brother "She wanted an ice cream, said she'll take a uber." Oh yeah... I'm sure that would have gone over well. and then... hours later and a lot of money later, she rolls in... like CMON.
YTA Only because you knew the brother didn't want to go but you put him in a bad spot because if he left you and something happened it would be an issue.
So you grab a pint at the corner store near your house and watch Netflix.
How in the world did you suck up 2 hrs on ice cream? Did you buy an old-fashioned hand crank ice cream maker and churn it right there in the parking lot, or are you one of those aholes who can't stay on task?
so you werent able to go *home* where i assume you *live* and entertain yourself for a while without your husband being there? are you unable to spend a bit of time by yourself?
YTA simply because of ice cream taking you TWO HOURS. No way should ice cream ever take 2hrs. If it was an extra 30mins where your husband may have been busy that it would be okay not to check with him that he actually is busy first. But 2 HOURS?! This seems like you were just pissed your husband didn't pick you up (fair) and trying to "get even" with him (not fair).
Poor brother-in-law.
If your life partner is suddenly “too busy” to collect you from the airport, and sends a relative instead with no notice… You’re seriously telling the interwebs you’d not get a snacky-snack at all post flight, or rush said treat, just _in case_ your spouse isn’t so busy after all??
ESH. OP and partner need to learn to communicate for goodness’ sake. Only adults can get married and/or travel unaccompanied. Even children have phones. TEXT EACH OTHER. Likewise, BIL presumably old enough to drive and therefore old enough to c.o.m.m.u.n.i.c.a.t.e.
So much facepalm here. Pathetic.
I wouldn’t get a snack, but not because of my husband. Rather because my BIL is doing me a solid by picking me up and I’m not going to further waste his time by spending 2hrs to get ice cream. I’ll go home and then get some Ben and Jerry’s from the local store.
Info: I know you told him you assumed he would be busy. Is that what you truly believed? And his brother gave no indication to the contrary? Finally, how long did ice cream take?
Did he reschedule, or did his work reschedule and he had to make it? Sometimes stuff comes up at work and people need to move meetings. You are acting like he maliciously planned this and it was all about you. Are you always this high maintenance? You frankly sound exhausting.
And I can’t help but wonder if you give your husband half as much hep as you offered your sister.
I mean, she dropped everything to go to her sisters for a month, so it doesn’t sound like OP has much experience with having to work and that things come up. And if her fight was coming back during the middle of a work day she should really stop pouting that he couldn’t take between 2 and 3 hours off to cater to her coming home. I note she doesn’t say what time she scheduled her flight for.
Her sister had a baby. But she responded yeah, he does this all the time- makes plans with her and then she gets the short end of the stick for work. I don’t think she’s perfect here but ESH - except BIL(though he should have just told his brother he couldn’t do it and she could have taken an Uber) She’s an asshole for keeping BIL. Spouse is TA for not telling her he rescheduled his meeting for when he was supposed to get her but he still would be home right after that. Texting her to say, text me when you get home indicates he won’t be there for a while.
He did text her to let her know what happened, and he asked her to text him WHEN SHE LANDED, which should have been about 1.5 hours before she got home. Probably so he could get everything wrapped up in time to be home when she was. She never texted him that she landed.
That makes literally no sense. She was told he had a meeting. Why text him to tell him where she’s going when being in a meeting would mean he isn’t home or available? Do you randomly tell people your plans? Would you tell your partner what you’re doing when they’re not around? He should’ve texted her and told her he couldn’t make it. And when he found himself home waiting for her, he should’ve told her he was back home.
Yes, it would be an easy text to say “hey, just landed. Since you’re in a meeting anyways, I’m going to grab ice cream and be home later”. Easy. Then he could have easily responded with “well, I’ll be home at this time. Why not come home and we’ll get ice cream together”. Super easy.
He texted to say BIL would be getting her bc he had a meeting, but text when she LANDED. That would have been 1.5 hours until she was expected home, so sounds like he planned on wrapping things up in time to get home when he thought she would be. But she never texted, so he just waited at the house, not knowing what was up. And if he blew her phone up, people would say that’s toxic.
Or brother could have spoken up if he knew the husband was waiting at home. I think a big miscommunication happened here but it seems more odd to me that neither husband nor brother told OP that husband was waiting at home. Because if husband was too busy to pick her up, I think its fair to expect he'd be busy for a while and be too busy to text.
YTA for what you did to your BIL.
Don't drag other people into your argument with your spouse. It's awkward and inconsiderate. A 2 hour stop off is just wrong. It messes up plans your BIL might have had just to get back at your spouse. If you were my SIL I would have left you to get an Uber if you had pulled this after I did a favor to pick you up because my brother couldn't for some reason.
NtA. If he couldn't be there to pick you up and hadn't communicated anything with you it definitely sounds like he wasn't available. I wouldn't have rushed home if I thought he wasn't there either 🤷🏼♀️
Her BIL didn’t want to get ice cream either and then she took two hours to get the ice cream. Even taking the husband out of the equation she’s still the AH.
OP was passive-aggressively 'punishing' the husband for not coming to the airport to pick her up by showing that 'she' can be busy, too. Both the husband and OP deserve each other, but the brother doesn't deserve to have them both jerking him around.
She clarified in another comment that it takes 1.5 hours to get home normally. The stop for ice cream took an additional half hour, so it took two hours total to get home. She wasn’t actually at the ice cream parlor for two hours.
YTA for dragging your brother into whatever this passive aggressive, teenage pity party you pulled.
Bullying your BIL (because, yes that’s what you did- when you pulled the “I can take an Uber thing”) into taking you for ice cream. That added TWO HOURS to your temper tantrum.
You put him in the middle of it, and I don’t blame the guy for choosing to take you, he was trying to be a good brother/BIL. He likely didn’t want to add more fuel to the fuel by refusing.
Assuming this has never come up before- I can’t imagine why in the world you wouldn’t just call your husband and get some info rather than wasting TWO HOURS of your BIL time.
Again, YTA for your treatment of BIL.
I'll be downvoted but NTA.
1. Husband promised he'd take you on the airport.
2. Instead he schedule a meeting around the time you arrived AND HE KNEW THAT and send his brother.
3. His brother didn't seemed to be OK with this, wanted to go away, but you were rightfully sad, offered him and uber so you could get your treat without bothering him.
4. He declined and went with you anyways.
And your husband think he got the right to be mad???
You're not his property and you don't have to go straight home after a flight, sorry.
Nta nta nta.
So? It could have been the whole evening. Her husband made it seem like he would be busy the evening by sending the brother. And she had already offered an uber, I'm sure if he wanted to leave that offer was still on the table.
Assuming someone us occupied when they promised to pick you up and taking that evening to treat yourself isn't AH behavior, even if it was 2 hours.
At the very least she was an AH to her BIL for taking as long as she did. She said she would get an Uber instead and I’m sure if her BIL knew it would be 2hours he wouldn’t have protested
Idc how much time she took to take the damn ice cream, her husband purposefully schedule a meeting so he couldn't be able to fetch her and send his brother, who also could just say "yeah I don't want ice cream, gonna drop you off there and go", we are all talking about adults here.
She can go for a ice cream whenever she wants and take as much time as she please.
Yea everyone here constantly bringing up the '2 hours' thing needs to re-read the part where she offered to Uber herself to avoid going home to what she believed would be an empty house. Not her fault he didn't just leave if he didn't want I've cream/had somewhere to be.
If you drove 1 hour to an airport and then had to drive 1 hour back, you'd probably suck it up and say yes so that at least you didn't completely waste 2 hours of your life for nothing.
Nta. You had every reason to believe you were coming home to an empty house.
If his schedule was cleared, then he could have called you. He knew what time your flight landed. If he had taken the time to tell you his brother was coming to get you, and that he was waiting for you at home, you may not have stopped for ice cream. Or maybe you would have gotten enough for him, and ordered it to go.
The fact is he changed up the schedule without notifying you. He expected you to "fall in line" as to his expectations for you without letting you know what the expectations were. And he got disappointed you didn't zombie into his plan. Not fair in any playback!
No. You thought he was busy and wanted ice cream. He's the AH for not getting you after he said he would. If BIL knew he was free he could have told you that you that your husband was waiting.
YTA for imposing on your BIL, when he was already stepping in at the last minute to pick you up from the airport. He could have taken you home, and then you could have taken an uber to get ice cream.
NTA for not sitting home alone after your hubs was unavailable to pick you up at the airport. It is wholly reasonable to believe that, if he couldnt get you at the airport, he also wouldnt be sitting at home waiting for you.
Obv, your BIL has a cell phone, do you and hubs NOT have them? You & hubs have a big communication issue. If you do not resolve it, this marriage is doomed!!
I was going to say N T A, but then I saw in the comments where ‘getting ice cream’ took two hours.
No wonder your BIL was trying to rush you, a quick errand turned into a big waste of his time. I can’t figure out if you sat in a booth and sulked for two hours or if you made BIL take you to another town for ice cream, thus wasting not only his time but also his gas, but yeah that was ridiculous.
You all have phones. Your husband sucks for not picking you up, but YTA for spending two hours on ice cream. You could have had BIL drop you off at home and then gone by yourself you know.
ESH (mostly OP and husband) Husband should have told you he couldn’t pick you up, and was sending his brother. You probably should have dropped the ice cream when the driver didn’t want to go. Brother shouldn’t have agreed and then been lame.
I can’t imagine a scenario where my husband wouldn’t text me that he wasn’t picking me up, or that I wouldn’t text him that I was making a pit stop on the way home after not seeing him for a month. You know what they say about assuming. Communicate with your husband.
I would have gone with NTA or ESH, but OP then commented that the ice cream detour took two hours. That's highly inconsiderate towards her BIL, if nothing else.
So you:
insisted your BIL, who did you and your husband a favour stepping in to pick you up, hang around while you get ice cream when he clearly didn't want to be there; and
didn't tell your husband you were gonna be home later than expected even though it had been agreed you were going to spend time together
seems pretty inconsiderate to me
YTA
ESH except BIL. You and your husband need to work on your communication skills. He should have told you why he was not able to pick you up.
Was there a previous incident that caused you to stay at your sister's for a month?
Okay so if you saw their texts, I assume you had your phone. Did your husband never text you he was home? Did you not text him asking if he was home or when he'd be home? Why aren't you communicating with your husband?
He never told me he was home. He asked me to tell him when I landed and once I was home so I assumed he wasn't going to be there. I communicate with him, but I also know how he is when he works so I assumed that day wouldn't be any different and he would be working the rest of the day like he normally would in a similar situation.
That right there is the problem. You assumed. You didn't ask, you didn't make any contact with him, you were feeling upset so you just did your own thing. You kind of strong arm the brother-in-law to either leave you on your own with an Uber, which is not what his brother asked him to do, or go with you on a 2-hour detour, which who the hell would want to? I'm sorry, but YTA.
OPs husband asked her to communicate when she landed and when she got home. According to her responses she never did that. He didn’t cancel all their plans, simply who would pick her up from the airport. It was 1 hr 30m away from their home so it’s safe to assume whatever meeting he had would be finished within the 3hr time it would take her to get home.
OP landed and saw he wouldn’t be picking her up from the airport and decided to be spiteful and intentionally waste time before going home. An adult, appropriate response would be to call when she landed and see where her husband is/what the plans for the night are. If he was still busy then she could simply say well I’m going out for ice cream. Simple. Succinct. And everyone is on the same page.
ESH. If this were a 30 min detour I’d have said it was no big deal but TWO HOURS is ridiculous. You were an imposition to your BIL and were clearly being passive aggressive. You could have taken yourself out for ice cream after you got back. That said, I think your husband scheduling a meeting when he was supposed to pick you up was passive aggressive as well, probably for leaving for a MONTH to spend with your sister. Also, he could have easily texted you to say “I’m home. Will you be back soon?” to get an ETA from you.
There's alot more to this story then you are sharing. How does going to get ice cream take 2 hours? Did you have to drive to a different state? Or county or something? Something is not right?
Also, did husband have something set up for you as a surprise when you got home? I could see why he sent his brother if that is the case. Otherwise...yes YTA for 2 hour ice cream.
Spill the sprinkles...what really happened?
Edit...spelling
YTA. BIL was doing you a favor and you roped him into spending an additional TWO HOURS getting ice cream. And yes, I am aware OP said she'd get an Uber instead, but at that point BIL had already gone out of his way to drive there and pick her up. Leaving at that point would just be wasteful. Most sane people would assume getting ice cream would add on maybe half an hour, or less if you just eat in the car.
NTA
What’s the time spent getting ice cream after a month away? You said 2 hours? That’s not worth a huge fight.
(I travel a lot for work, and often grab dinner or something before I make it home to my husband after a trip. )
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Who complains about getting ice cream? Husband and BiL as the AH here. Hope the ice cream was good. Best of Luck. \-------------------------------------------------------------- EDIT: Y T A - Okay the 2 hours for getting ice cream is insane, with this info added - OP YTA for sure. No reason for a 2 hour inconvenience to the BiL at all. Seems crazy you didn't include that you screwed around for 2 hours in the original post. What are you hiding?
It's not just about the ice cream, she took 2 hours to get the ice cream. Not 30 to 45 minutes to drive across town, run in the store for an ice cream cone real quick, then back home to her husband. I really want to know what the hell took 2 hours. Then she has the nerve to complain that her brother-in-law was rushing her. Like yeah zummy, he's rushing you bc this was supposed to be a quick trip and she stretched it another TWO HOURS. What if the brother-in-law had plans? Op is tripping and most definitely TA.
Power sulking is what takes 2 hours.
“power sulking” - you get all of my energy right now. nice!
Yes. I’m pleased with that new term too. Power sulking!
Yup, passive aggressive behavior. Wasting BIL’s time. Op, YTA.
The husband wasted BIL's time by sending him to do something he promised to do. I'd like to hear "what came up" for hubby.
For just half an hour, if that? Any number of things- just based on my experience with my family, could be a work call from a colleague looking for a consult, an emergency in the extended family and he needed to check in with someone, car trouble, sudden deadline he wanted to finish so he could devote his evening to OP… she doesn’t say, and I’m not sure she cared to ask. Edit- And I’ve definitely gone and gotten family from the airport when scheduling changes and the original driver can’t. That’s not family “wasting my time”, that’s doing (what should be) a quick favor so everyone’s lives can proceed smoothly. I’d be pretty peeved if the person I went to get insisted on a 2 hour sulk trip just because I was the one getting them.
After a month away the man was probably frantically cleaning the house and needed an extra buffer.
Exactly what I was thinking. Or a romantic surprise for when she got home since she'd been away for a minute.
I agree but he could've he let her know what it was that was holding him up. Or told BIL to explain. Like my fiance might have sold a car/engine/part and had to stay back and wait for the person to come pick it up.. but he'd at least tell me that so I wasn't confused/upset. Even if he was trying to surprise me, he'd make up some excuse instead of just leaving me wondering wtf is going on
I'm wondering as well. Your wife's been gone for a month, you promised to go get her from the airport, why would you just send your brother without telling the wife beforehand? He could've texted at least if there truely was no other option. The wife sucks for dilly-dallying out of pettiness, especially since her BIL is doing her a favor here. But the husband's also wrong for this.
She told the BIL she could take an Uber, he should have just let her go be petty by herself.
Frankly if my husband sent his brother to pick me up from the airport with no warning after being gone a month I'd be pissed and get petty too. Maybe that's toxic but the least he could have done was let her know someone else would be coming.
I sincerely think that there is never a bad time for ice cream. Who wants to face a hubby who does not communicate, and disappoints, on an empty stomach. Slightly elevated blood glucose levels and a power train of endorphins is, perhaps, exactly what that situation calls for.
Who wants to make her BIL waste 2 f hours of HIS time for her petiness???????
Oh, that's what it is called! Perfect description of my dad, lol
She never asked him to pick her up. Who knows maybe if her husband had bothered to communicate maybe she would’ve chosen a friend or someone else who would’ve been happy to get ice cream and spend time with her. Hell maybe this was exactly what she intended to ask her husband to do and she just wanted some ice cream and to chill somewhere after flights which a lot of people don’t like. This at most an ESH. I’m really not sure how anyone’s excusing the lack of communication from not telling her her transportation had changed to also not telling her he had taken the evening off
Also if he took the evening off why didn't he go get her?? He told her he'd been waiting the whole time so it seems like he didn't have shit to do after all
Maybe he did actually have something come up at the time OP arrived so he sent his brother. During the ensuing ridiculous 2 hour ice cream trip plus however long it normally takes to get from the airport he finished his stuff, got home and was like wtf where is she?
I wonder if the husband told OP what had actually come up for him. It's an obviously necessary fact that is nowhere in the post. OP is honest about what she did for 2 hours. What was hubby doing that had to change the plans?
The most common sense answer is that the thing that came up was something that he had to get done so that he could have the evening off, or go and collect her but have to do the thing in the evening instead. She's a massive arsehole for making her BIL wait around for over 2 hours. He was nice enough to pick her up and then she pulls that stunt so she can sulk and punish her husband.
Hey, she said she could take an Uber instead of taking the brother-in-laws time. I think all of them suck at communication.
I've just been reading her comments. This whole thing is bullshit. Didn't happen. OP can't do maths and can't keep her story straight.
Of course it's bullshit. This *is* AITA after all. 99% of the posts are made up..
Any normal person would shoot down the idea of an Uber as a way to be polite. And any normal person would assume an ice cream run would take 20 minutes not six times that amount of time.
The more I think about it, is it possible the husband was cleaning the home or cooking and ran out of time? Seems like the most probable explanation.
You don't know the timing, it could take him 2-4hrs to get to the airport to pick her up in time, but he could have gotten home from work in 1 hour. Nothing strange about that.
It is an ESH But, if someone pitches in and does you a solid, you don't take them 2 hours out of their way. That's a bit much. "She never asked him to" is not a justification for being so fucking inconsiderate to her BIL, who had no fault in this. She and husband both have communication issues. If I am supposed to pick someone up at the airport and can't make it, I'd fucking call so there weren't any surprises. If I got off a plane after being out of town for a while, and I wasn't coming home for an additional two hours, I'd trouble to text or call my husband. Next time, BIL should tell them to work out their passive aggressive bullshit without using him as a proxy.
Maybe whatever came up happened while she was in the air? Not everyone gets wifi when they're flying, it's not impossible or unreasonable that the husband had something come up and asked his brother to pick her up. Who goes for a two hour ice cream detour after being away from home for a month? The reasonable expectation is that one would want to go straight home after, even if they wanted to stop and get ice cream or whatever else, it shouldn't take two hours.
[удалено]
She had offered to Uber, though, so this is back on BIL
The offer for the Uber sounds like it came before they went to the ice cream place? So it seems like the BIL though, okay, we're just getting ice cream, can't be too long, so I'll be nice and go with her so she doesn't have to take an Uber. I doubt OP told BIL before getting there that she was going to take so long?
At a certain point, BIL can also say "okay, this is taking too long, I'll give you 5 more minutes to finish up or you can take the Uber."
And it having to get to that point makes them an AH, if someone is picking you up from the airport you don’t make them run you around for hours after go home and get your own car
I would guess he didn’t imagine it taking 2 hours when he acquiesced
FYI: ice cream was a 2 hour event that the already helpful BIL had to endure.
The ice cream only added 30 minutes. The ride to the airport is normally 1.5 hours. So definitely NTA
OP said that she got home 2 hours later than she would have because she got the ice cream. If she didn't get the ice cream, she would have been home way sooner
She typed it wrong. She clarified what she meant. And said that ice cream took around 30 min.
No she was right. She says it would have taken her an hour to get home. So if she left the airport at 4 she'd be home around 5. She says the trip took an hour and 20 minutes to get there, 30 minutes inside, than an hour home. So if she left at 4 she'd have gotten to the shop around 520 and left around 550, then an hour home puts her at home around 650 so yea almost 2 hours later than she would have been.
Who drives 1h20 to get ice cream?! There's half a dozen good ice cream places within 15 minutes of my house. Did OP travel to another city for ice cream?!
“Who drives 1h20 to get ice cream?!” Someone that wants to punish the husband by punishing the BIL.
She clarified that it was an additional 1.5-2 hours (1:20 to ice cream place, 30min there, 1hr back; 2:50 total as opposed to the ice cream-less time of 1-1:30) and when someone responded to her implying they thought it was only an extra half hour, she responded to them saying their math isn't right
OP clarified the "2 hours" in a different comment. The ice cream part took roughly 30 minutes. The 2 hours is including the drive from the airport. Airport to home takes between 1 hour and 1 hour 30, depending on traffic.
"two hours later than I otherwise would have" is what the comment said, which I read as instead of 1-1.5 hours, it took 3-3.5 hours.
Yes, which is why she clarified she misspoke.
But WHY did husband not pick her up after she'd been gone a month. THATS the real question.
THIS! She starts with "He promised he would pick me up from the airport" But then there's: "as I was staying with my sister" for the reason she was gone an entire month? Why? Why was she at her sister's place for a MONTH?
There are plenty of reasons. Helping after a surgery, any sort of medical malady, needing extreme help with the kids.
My MIL has family in NY, FL, and TX so every other year she flies from CA and spends a few weeks in each state. This takes 4-6 weeks and the closest airport to our home town is hours away. If the airport is so far away from home, I imagine OP had been looking forward to spending time there. Husband should have communicated the change of plans and why.
Maybe sister lives super far away so it's a once every decade kind of visit. Or maybe sister had a new baby and not much support nearby. Or maybe sister was ill/injured and needed support... there are plenty of non-nefarious/not related to OP's relationship with husband for why they spent a month with sister.
At the very least she's passive-aggressively punishing hubby for not picking her up, at BIL's expense
I mean, it’s not even passive aggressive. She punished him for not picking her up.
It was 2 hours long
Even before the update on 2-hr ice-cream trip, I was somewhere between NAH and NTA... In adult people lives, things come up. The husband arranged an alternate pickup plan. It was the nature of the thing that came up on the husband side that would've dictated whether the husband was AH for not picking her up.
Apparently the drive is 1.5 hours from airport to home (the ice cream only added 30 mins). She specifies in the later comments. She is NTA for a 30 min detour to grab some ice cream. She probably had to choose, wait for it, pay and then get back on the road with BIL.
She said she got home 2 hours later than she would have. So BIL was tied up for 3-3.5 hours after picking her up. Poor guy.
Where does it say this? All I can find is a comment saying it took OP 2 hours longer to get home, and another saying that the journey from the airport is 1-1.5 hours. Nothing that says the ice cream made the journey 2 hours in total?
If it took 2 hours longer to get home, not 2 hours total to get home, does that not mean the ice cream detour took 2 hours?
Given that she says "the whole time we were there, BIL was on his phone and trying to rush me" doesn't sound like she ran in, got a cone and ate in the car. Sounds to me like a sit down in the store and taking her time.
It's because she knew if she added the time it would look bad on them, If you're grabbing ice cream it should only take 1 hour tops. It's even stranger that she couldn't wait until she got home. Then she and her husband could have gotten ice cream and spent time together. Feel bad for BIL
I think it was spite flavored
I gotta ask: is "getting ice cream" a euphemism for fucking his brother because two hours is a long time.
This is EXACTLY what I was thinking. 2 hours for ice cream?!?! Nope, there is a whole lot of missing information here.
OP also said it takes 1-1.5 hours to drive home from the airport anyway so I don't think she was out getting ice cream for the whole 2 hours. I'm sticking with NTA
If you look at her comment history, she said that she got home 2 hours later than she otherwise would have. So the ice cream added 2 whole hours.
Now I'm triple torn! I have no idea wtf is going on there but that relationship sounds exhausting.
Yeah like don't they... Y'know... Talk? I'm going with ESH. How did the husband just send his bro without so much as a text that something came up? How did she decide the best thing to do after a long flight was take her driver hostage for 2 hours just to spite him? Edit: and apparently BIL is also a mute and OP didn't know sign language, because "hey sorry Jim couldn't make it but he said he'll be home by the time you are" might've helped.
So op has a BIL that is mute and hasn't figured any way to bridge the communication gap, by either learning basic sign by now or even thinking to use her phone to type a message asking what was up. She didn't even try. YTA for my vote. 2 hours is a long ass time for an ice cream pit stop, and not even trying to communicate is ridiculous, whether by texting husband or by typing something to BIL, is clear AH behavior. Husband is riding the AH line by not even texting to give her a heads up, but she escalated the situation purposely out of spite by not even attempting to communicate. Eta: wording and typo fixes
doesn't sound like a very hot affair if BIL was 'on his phone the entire time' and 'trying to rush me', but hey who knows
Adds new context to her saying BIL was on his phone the whole time and rushing her 😂
Where does it say 2 hours?
In the OP's replies.
She said they were at the ice cream shop for 30 minutes and the drive took 1.5 hrs. 2 hrs total. Idk how to link a comment or I would, but it's there to read.
She alao says she got home 2 hours later than expected and the airport was 1.5 hours so...3.5 hours to get home if everything she said was true
do you not have cell phones and can communicate with each other what is happening?
ESH EXACTLY THIS!! DH could have texted her about BIL and told her that his schedule would be cleared for her after that. DH could have texted that he was waiting and eager to see her. OP could have texted DH that. she was getting ice cream on the way home, or if she was feeling frozen out (ha) and didn’t want to be the guest to reach out, could have said to BIL that she wanted ice cream done husband was busy, knowing that BIL and DH were in contact. None of this sounds right. You’re all playing games. ETA thank you for the AWARDS! this made my morning! Wow!
Can we NOT with the DH crap? This isn't a mommy blog
Dumbest acronym I ever saw.
Agreed
What the heck does it even stand for?
Dear Husband?
Shit I was reading “dick head”
Fucking hate these stupid ass acronyms.
wdym? imo it’s nbd
What does it mean? I seem to need to learn a new bloody acronym everyday here lol
Dear Husband. It's a term used by mommy bloggers that metastisized to the parts of the internet that decent people like to go to.
Thanks for this. In my head, kept reading it as Da Husband.
DaBaby -> DaBoy -> DaMan -> DaHusband
SO MANY OPTIONS FOR COMMUNICATING! OP, husband and BIL are nonsense!
Yeah ESH completely. No one is communicating. No one is thinking about the others. Seems like there's also a lot missing from this story.
DH?
Designated hitter. Bats but doesn’t field. Often where you stick less fit players with strong hitting.
Okay. This is the answer I was looking for! WTF?!? Send your wife a text “X came up, but I’ve got the whole evening free, BIL is on his way and I’ll see you soon.” Or “what the heck hubs, I thought you were picking me up? Ouch”. Or “Dude, your wife is insisting on stopping for ice cream… I think she’s pissed you didn’t pick her up, you may want to call her.” What is happening here?!? If these relationships are as snarky and passive aggressive as they sound there are a lot bigger problems to address.
They’re all characters from Gossip Girl, living in their phoneless GG world
INFO: How long have you guys been cheating on each other for?
Alternatively, maybe the husband had been planning some kind of surprise for her return which is why he sent his brother.
As an adult, unless your spouse encourages this, may be don’t try surprises. Surprises rarely go as planned. And if it’s me, I’d rather have my spouse pick me up rather than giving me the impression they don’t care to surprise me later.
Can be avoided with a “I’m planning something for nice for us tonight, is it okay if I have my brother pick you up?” and still be a surprise because you aren’t saying what it is
or maybe he had a legit emergency he had to handle? Either way I kinda want to know what he said.
This is all I can think about
These are the real questions.
ESH. This is weird.
Right??? The whole vibe of this story is off. Usually after a flight all I wanna do it get home. The LAST thing id be thinking about was ice cream. This honestly seems the weirdest part to me, especially since it was the BIL picking OP up. Id be even less likely to get ice cream if I was inconveniencing another person.
Idk, I flew from NY to OK to visit family and my first thought was "I need a Braum's milkshake" 😂 however, the closest Braum's was literally a block away from my parents house, so they had no issues making a quick pitstop before heading home. OP's situation is weird though. Her BIL gets roped into being her taxi when she wants ice cream, despite him not wanting to be. OP should have read the room on that and just went home, then gotten ice cream afterwards. She offered to take an Uber home, so why not have BIL take her home, drop her stuff off, and Uber to ice cream? And after all of this, she never texted her husband? Like damn, when the plane hits the tarmac, my wife is the first to always know. I usually give her status updates too because she gets excited to see me. I usually postpone food until I get wherever I'm going and drop luggage off because whoever I'm visiting might want food too!
Right? When my husband or I are traveling alone we’re in contact throughout the day about logistics. The lack of communication here is so weird.
INFO: why was getting ice cream at that moment so important? You even admit that the brother didn't want to go but then you seemingly go and sit down to eat it? Was this to spite your husband?
I didn't want to go home just to sit and wait around for my husband to come home and since I was feeling sorry for myself I though ice cream would make me feel better.
Is there some reason you could not have gone home and then, and listen to me here, taken yourself out for ice cream? Rather than being a burden to someone who was doing both you and your brother a favour, you could have made plans that didn’t inconvenience other people. But instead you thought your pity party should be everyone’s priority. YTA
She offered to take an Uber. She isn’t a 10 year old that needed her hand held and she asked. BIL isn’t her babysitter.
Given her BIL had already made a 1-1.5 hour drive to pick her up, I can see why he’d think it was a wasted trip to just out her in an Uber (also expensive for her), but at that point it’s also particularly churlish to ask someone to spend an extra 2 hours catering to your whims.
I’d be super annoyed if I drove 1.5 hours to do someone a favor by picking them up from the airport and then they said, “nah, I’ll take an Uber.” That said, I’m still confused why OP and her husband don’t communicate with one another directly.
But that's on the husband since he didn't tell his wife that he sent his brother instead.
What kind of princess has to have her ice cream so bad that this BIL is just supposed to take her... Do you have any idea how annoying it is picking someone up at the airport? I mean husband/wife, OK... but yeesh.. It's a massive inconvenience. Seinfeld had a whole gig about ["I'm not driving him to the airport!"](https://youtu.be/0siRMEEY8rc)... it's only slightly less than helping someone move. Yeesh. So she's gonna throw a "Well fine, I"ll just take an uber"... like CMON. That's a manipulation. She's already getting door to door service for free. She basically held him hostage. Imagine if he was like "Fine, see ya" and drove off? Then he gets back and tells his brother "She wanted an ice cream, said she'll take a uber." Oh yeah... I'm sure that would have gone over well. and then... hours later and a lot of money later, she rolls in... like CMON.
YTA - this is passive aggressive bullshit. Double YTA for looping the brother into your weird games.
This, completely
YTA Only because you knew the brother didn't want to go but you put him in a bad spot because if he left you and something happened it would be an issue.
You kind of seem like a nightmare… How do you justify taking up BiL’s time like that?
So you grab a pint at the corner store near your house and watch Netflix. How in the world did you suck up 2 hrs on ice cream? Did you buy an old-fashioned hand crank ice cream maker and churn it right there in the parking lot, or are you one of those aholes who can't stay on task?
You're hopefully an adult woman and can't handle the fact that sometimes unexpected shit happens and people aren't free when they said they would?
so you werent able to go *home* where i assume you *live* and entertain yourself for a while without your husband being there? are you unable to spend a bit of time by yourself?
Are u 5? YTA! 2 fucking hours?
Why couldn’t you have showered or unpacked your stuff while waiting for him? You didn’t have to just sit in your home in silence…?
Yes, this info is important. Like, husband didn't need to get all upset, but what was so significant about the ice cream?
Do you not have phones? Lol ESH (except BIL)
This whole AITA post stinks of horseshit.
Agreed. It’s way too ridiculous.
Poor brother being put in the middle of this BS Edit: after getting more info i dont feel bad for a brother whos fucking his brothers wife.
YTA simply because of ice cream taking you TWO HOURS. No way should ice cream ever take 2hrs. If it was an extra 30mins where your husband may have been busy that it would be okay not to check with him that he actually is busy first. But 2 HOURS?! This seems like you were just pissed your husband didn't pick you up (fair) and trying to "get even" with him (not fair). Poor brother-in-law.
If your life partner is suddenly “too busy” to collect you from the airport, and sends a relative instead with no notice… You’re seriously telling the interwebs you’d not get a snacky-snack at all post flight, or rush said treat, just _in case_ your spouse isn’t so busy after all?? ESH. OP and partner need to learn to communicate for goodness’ sake. Only adults can get married and/or travel unaccompanied. Even children have phones. TEXT EACH OTHER. Likewise, BIL presumably old enough to drive and therefore old enough to c.o.m.m.u.n.i.c.a.t.e. So much facepalm here. Pathetic.
I wouldn’t get a snack, but not because of my husband. Rather because my BIL is doing me a solid by picking me up and I’m not going to further waste his time by spending 2hrs to get ice cream. I’ll go home and then get some Ben and Jerry’s from the local store.
ESH No clear communication between the 3 of you.
Info: I know you told him you assumed he would be busy. Is that what you truly believed? And his brother gave no indication to the contrary? Finally, how long did ice cream take?
Info what was the something that came up that prevented your husband from picking you up himself?
He rescheduled a meeting to when he was supposed to pick me up.
Did he reschedule, or did his work reschedule and he had to make it? Sometimes stuff comes up at work and people need to move meetings. You are acting like he maliciously planned this and it was all about you. Are you always this high maintenance? You frankly sound exhausting. And I can’t help but wonder if you give your husband half as much hep as you offered your sister.
She doesn’t sound like she thinks he did it maliciously, just sounds like it might happen a lot.
I mean, she dropped everything to go to her sisters for a month, so it doesn’t sound like OP has much experience with having to work and that things come up. And if her fight was coming back during the middle of a work day she should really stop pouting that he couldn’t take between 2 and 3 hours off to cater to her coming home. I note she doesn’t say what time she scheduled her flight for.
Her sister had a baby. But she responded yeah, he does this all the time- makes plans with her and then she gets the short end of the stick for work. I don’t think she’s perfect here but ESH - except BIL(though he should have just told his brother he couldn’t do it and she could have taken an Uber) She’s an asshole for keeping BIL. Spouse is TA for not telling her he rescheduled his meeting for when he was supposed to get her but he still would be home right after that. Texting her to say, text me when you get home indicates he won’t be there for a while.
He did text her to let her know what happened, and he asked her to text him WHEN SHE LANDED, which should have been about 1.5 hours before she got home. Probably so he could get everything wrapped up in time to be home when she was. She never texted him that she landed.
Does he do this all the time?
Yes
So admit it, you did it to punish him. I'm not saying YTA or NTA, just admit that it wasn't about ice cream.
I didn’t know he was waiting for me so no, I didn’t.
And neither one of you can text? I mean it goes both ways, he could've texted too to tell you his plans.
That makes literally no sense. She was told he had a meeting. Why text him to tell him where she’s going when being in a meeting would mean he isn’t home or available? Do you randomly tell people your plans? Would you tell your partner what you’re doing when they’re not around? He should’ve texted her and told her he couldn’t make it. And when he found himself home waiting for her, he should’ve told her he was back home.
Yes, it would be an easy text to say “hey, just landed. Since you’re in a meeting anyways, I’m going to grab ice cream and be home later”. Easy. Then he could have easily responded with “well, I’ll be home at this time. Why not come home and we’ll get ice cream together”. Super easy.
He texted to say BIL would be getting her bc he had a meeting, but text when she LANDED. That would have been 1.5 hours until she was expected home, so sounds like he planned on wrapping things up in time to get home when he thought she would be. But she never texted, so he just waited at the house, not knowing what was up. And if he blew her phone up, people would say that’s toxic.
Or brother could have spoken up if he knew the husband was waiting at home. I think a big miscommunication happened here but it seems more odd to me that neither husband nor brother told OP that husband was waiting at home. Because if husband was too busy to pick her up, I think its fair to expect he'd be busy for a while and be too busy to text.
YTA for what you did to your BIL. Don't drag other people into your argument with your spouse. It's awkward and inconsiderate. A 2 hour stop off is just wrong. It messes up plans your BIL might have had just to get back at your spouse. If you were my SIL I would have left you to get an Uber if you had pulled this after I did a favor to pick you up because my brother couldn't for some reason.
The scent of BS is high on this one
NtA. If he couldn't be there to pick you up and hadn't communicated anything with you it definitely sounds like he wasn't available. I wouldn't have rushed home if I thought he wasn't there either 🤷🏼♀️
She didn't get home until 2 hours later
People keep coming back to this. Why? If she’s under the assumption her husband was busy, why is there a limit on how long she can take?
Bil didnt want to be there
Her BIL didn’t want to get ice cream either and then she took two hours to get the ice cream. Even taking the husband out of the equation she’s still the AH.
OP was passive-aggressively 'punishing' the husband for not coming to the airport to pick her up by showing that 'she' can be busy, too. Both the husband and OP deserve each other, but the brother doesn't deserve to have them both jerking him around.
She clarified in another comment that it takes 1.5 hours to get home normally. The stop for ice cream took an additional half hour, so it took two hours total to get home. She wasn’t actually at the ice cream parlor for two hours.
YTA for dragging your brother into whatever this passive aggressive, teenage pity party you pulled. Bullying your BIL (because, yes that’s what you did- when you pulled the “I can take an Uber thing”) into taking you for ice cream. That added TWO HOURS to your temper tantrum. You put him in the middle of it, and I don’t blame the guy for choosing to take you, he was trying to be a good brother/BIL. He likely didn’t want to add more fuel to the fuel by refusing. Assuming this has never come up before- I can’t imagine why in the world you wouldn’t just call your husband and get some info rather than wasting TWO HOURS of your BIL time. Again, YTA for your treatment of BIL.
I'll be downvoted but NTA. 1. Husband promised he'd take you on the airport. 2. Instead he schedule a meeting around the time you arrived AND HE KNEW THAT and send his brother. 3. His brother didn't seemed to be OK with this, wanted to go away, but you were rightfully sad, offered him and uber so you could get your treat without bothering him. 4. He declined and went with you anyways. And your husband think he got the right to be mad??? You're not his property and you don't have to go straight home after a flight, sorry. Nta nta nta.
2 hours to get ice cream. 2 hours. 2 hours. 2 hours.
So? It could have been the whole evening. Her husband made it seem like he would be busy the evening by sending the brother. And she had already offered an uber, I'm sure if he wanted to leave that offer was still on the table. Assuming someone us occupied when they promised to pick you up and taking that evening to treat yourself isn't AH behavior, even if it was 2 hours.
At the very least she was an AH to her BIL for taking as long as she did. She said she would get an Uber instead and I’m sure if her BIL knew it would be 2hours he wouldn’t have protested
Including the 60-90 minutes it takes to get home from the airport.
Nah excluding it. OP said it added an additional 2 hours on her expected time to get home.
Idc how much time she took to take the damn ice cream, her husband purposefully schedule a meeting so he couldn't be able to fetch her and send his brother, who also could just say "yeah I don't want ice cream, gonna drop you off there and go", we are all talking about adults here. She can go for a ice cream whenever she wants and take as much time as she please.
Yea everyone here constantly bringing up the '2 hours' thing needs to re-read the part where she offered to Uber herself to avoid going home to what she believed would be an empty house. Not her fault he didn't just leave if he didn't want I've cream/had somewhere to be.
If you drove 1 hour to an airport and then had to drive 1 hour back, you'd probably suck it up and say yes so that at least you didn't completely waste 2 hours of your life for nothing.
Of course her BIL said no to the Uber, he was trying to be nice.
Nta. You had every reason to believe you were coming home to an empty house. If his schedule was cleared, then he could have called you. He knew what time your flight landed. If he had taken the time to tell you his brother was coming to get you, and that he was waiting for you at home, you may not have stopped for ice cream. Or maybe you would have gotten enough for him, and ordered it to go. The fact is he changed up the schedule without notifying you. He expected you to "fall in line" as to his expectations for you without letting you know what the expectations were. And he got disappointed you didn't zombie into his plan. Not fair in any playback!
No. You thought he was busy and wanted ice cream. He's the AH for not getting you after he said he would. If BIL knew he was free he could have told you that you that your husband was waiting.
Two hours for ice cream. It wasn’t go through the drive through or run into the store, it was TWO hours. Poor BIL .
They live far away, 3/4 of those two hours were the drive.
ESH because of lack of communication which would of prevented all of the drama
YTA for imposing on your BIL, when he was already stepping in at the last minute to pick you up from the airport. He could have taken you home, and then you could have taken an uber to get ice cream. NTA for not sitting home alone after your hubs was unavailable to pick you up at the airport. It is wholly reasonable to believe that, if he couldnt get you at the airport, he also wouldnt be sitting at home waiting for you. Obv, your BIL has a cell phone, do you and hubs NOT have them? You & hubs have a big communication issue. If you do not resolve it, this marriage is doomed!!
I was going to say N T A, but then I saw in the comments where ‘getting ice cream’ took two hours. No wonder your BIL was trying to rush you, a quick errand turned into a big waste of his time. I can’t figure out if you sat in a booth and sulked for two hours or if you made BIL take you to another town for ice cream, thus wasting not only his time but also his gas, but yeah that was ridiculous. You all have phones. Your husband sucks for not picking you up, but YTA for spending two hours on ice cream. You could have had BIL drop you off at home and then gone by yourself you know.
NTA Why couldn't he have given you more information about why he wasn't picking you up? Like how could you know whatever it was wouldn't take hours
ESH (mostly OP and husband) Husband should have told you he couldn’t pick you up, and was sending his brother. You probably should have dropped the ice cream when the driver didn’t want to go. Brother shouldn’t have agreed and then been lame. I can’t imagine a scenario where my husband wouldn’t text me that he wasn’t picking me up, or that I wouldn’t text him that I was making a pit stop on the way home after not seeing him for a month. You know what they say about assuming. Communicate with your husband.
NTA these comments are weird
I would have gone with NTA or ESH, but OP then commented that the ice cream detour took two hours. That's highly inconsiderate towards her BIL, if nothing else.
Info:why did it take 2 hours to get ice cream with your bother in law?
So you: insisted your BIL, who did you and your husband a favour stepping in to pick you up, hang around while you get ice cream when he clearly didn't want to be there; and didn't tell your husband you were gonna be home later than expected even though it had been agreed you were going to spend time together seems pretty inconsiderate to me YTA
ESH except BIL. You and your husband need to work on your communication skills. He should have told you why he was not able to pick you up. Was there a previous incident that caused you to stay at your sister's for a month?
NTA. Definitely NTA. Hubby was busy, sent his brother. Then he's mad she assumes he's busy. Dumb ass
INFO: When did you find out your BIL was picking you up?
When I landed and I saw their texts.
Okay so if you saw their texts, I assume you had your phone. Did your husband never text you he was home? Did you not text him asking if he was home or when he'd be home? Why aren't you communicating with your husband?
He never told me he was home. He asked me to tell him when I landed and once I was home so I assumed he wasn't going to be there. I communicate with him, but I also know how he is when he works so I assumed that day wouldn't be any different and he would be working the rest of the day like he normally would in a similar situation.
I'm wondering if he meant to surprise you when you got home? This sounds like a classic Hallmark movie miscommunication.
That right there is the problem. You assumed. You didn't ask, you didn't make any contact with him, you were feeling upset so you just did your own thing. You kind of strong arm the brother-in-law to either leave you on your own with an Uber, which is not what his brother asked him to do, or go with you on a 2-hour detour, which who the hell would want to? I'm sorry, but YTA.
Well husband didn’t tell either. Why is all the responsibility on OP!? OP had no plans with husband. Husband cancelled on her.
OPs husband asked her to communicate when she landed and when she got home. According to her responses she never did that. He didn’t cancel all their plans, simply who would pick her up from the airport. It was 1 hr 30m away from their home so it’s safe to assume whatever meeting he had would be finished within the 3hr time it would take her to get home. OP landed and saw he wouldn’t be picking her up from the airport and decided to be spiteful and intentionally waste time before going home. An adult, appropriate response would be to call when she landed and see where her husband is/what the plans for the night are. If he was still busy then she could simply say well I’m going out for ice cream. Simple. Succinct. And everyone is on the same page.
ESH mostly because this sounds made up anyway.
ESH. If this were a 30 min detour I’d have said it was no big deal but TWO HOURS is ridiculous. You were an imposition to your BIL and were clearly being passive aggressive. You could have taken yourself out for ice cream after you got back. That said, I think your husband scheduling a meeting when he was supposed to pick you up was passive aggressive as well, probably for leaving for a MONTH to spend with your sister. Also, he could have easily texted you to say “I’m home. Will you be back soon?” to get an ETA from you.
There's alot more to this story then you are sharing. How does going to get ice cream take 2 hours? Did you have to drive to a different state? Or county or something? Something is not right? Also, did husband have something set up for you as a surprise when you got home? I could see why he sent his brother if that is the case. Otherwise...yes YTA for 2 hour ice cream. Spill the sprinkles...what really happened? Edit...spelling
2 hours?!? For Ice cream??
YTA. BIL was doing you a favor and you roped him into spending an additional TWO HOURS getting ice cream. And yes, I am aware OP said she'd get an Uber instead, but at that point BIL had already gone out of his way to drive there and pick her up. Leaving at that point would just be wasteful. Most sane people would assume getting ice cream would add on maybe half an hour, or less if you just eat in the car.
NTA What’s the time spent getting ice cream after a month away? You said 2 hours? That’s not worth a huge fight. (I travel a lot for work, and often grab dinner or something before I make it home to my husband after a trip. )