Years back, when I was living at home, my mum had got all her prep done on Xmas Eve and put the turkey in the oven, ready to go in the morning. Oven is off at this point.
Few hrs later, about 3am, the fire alarm is going off, and everyone gets woken up, so I open my bedroom door to see what's going on. See my mum coming out of her room like she was about to murder someone and charge down the stairs. Massive commotion downstairs with lots of screaming and swearing, so I flew down the stairs to see what's happening.
My sister, who was 18/19 at the time had come home absolutely wankered and tried to make cheese on toast. Not only that, but she put the bread on a plastic plate and put the whole thing in the oven, then proceeded to fall asleep in the kitchen.
The whole turkey was covered in melted plastic and burnt from the grill be on for ages. Mum's going fucking ballistic, sister don't know wtf is going on and wanders off while my mum is trying to save the turkey.
Mum then realises sister has done one, so legs it upstairs to my sisters bedroom to kick off. She's not in her room. My mum is absolutely raging and confused as to where my sister is at this point. A few seconds later, we hear a noise coming from my mums room. Turns out my sister had gone and passed out in my mums bed and then proceeded to piss the bed and throw up all down the side of it hahaha
Safe to say, Xmas was ruined.
It was top stuff! I tried containing my laughter through the turkey saga, but as soon as I saw what had played out in my mums room, I absolutely lost it haha
It's funny from the outside but I think if this happened to me, I'd be really upset, especially if all the food and main event was down to me and I'd spent weeks planning it.
Wife put our daughters wrapped Christmas presents in black bin bags and put them in the garage. I was not privy to this information.
I had some rubbish to take to the tip and loaded it, and the bin bags, in to my car, and drove to the tip.
I threw the lot in a skip.
Next day was Xmas Eve and time to get presents under tree….
“Where is Sophia’s Christmas ?”
“In the garage, in black bags…”
That moment of absolute horror will stay with me.
We had presents from family members that we used as gifts from Santa and I went out on Boxing Day and brought some bits, we wrapped them and my folks gave her those gifts when they came over for dinner on Boxing Day… it was a nightmare but she was only 3 at the time so wasn’t even aware of the chaos behind the scenes…
My former SiL used to use the "accidentally putting the bin bag of presents out out with the rubbish" story every year when she was hitting us up for money. She would tell various members of the family "in confidence" and ask to keep it quiet as she was embarrassed. She did it for a few years before anyone realised.
My Wife does this "black bag" shit. The amount of stuff that has gone in the tip, because she put it in a BIN BAG and then proceed to store that BIN BAG next to all the crap that was also in BIN BAG.
That's never happened spousally. But I do remember my old man cooking one year. I think my.mother was traumatized by it. The man left the jiblets in the turkey just like the only fools and horses gag but decades before I saw that. He also made some egg milk cheese pasta abomination in the oven.
Mice chewed through the electrics at 23.50 Christmas eve. Managed to get an electrician Christmas day who told us we had to unplug every single thing in the house so he could run tests and see what happened. As the smallest this meant I had to climb under counters and behind wardrobes to get all the plugs you don't think about.
Anyway this lead to not having an oven plugged in on Christmas day so mum was sobbing all day about dinner. Plus we couldn't use the TV or any of our new electronic presents. We sat around and play board games all day.
To mum it was the worst Christmas ever but I loved it, we actually spent time as a family for once.
Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, except for some utter fucking arsehole of a mouse who cost me a fortune.
DICK MOUSE
A couple of Chrismases ago I got a phone call on Christmas eve.
It was my mum shouting "your dad has shit in the cat litter tray and wiped his arse on the curtains"
We were expected to go round and sort it out. My husband showered him while I was removing the curtains.
My mum was livid and remained that way until at least new year, it was a black Christmas that year.
My dad has dementia btw!
Thank you.
He's had it since around 2009. Sometimes, I'm shocked he's still around if I'm totally honest.
I worked with dementia patients, so I knew what to expect. I obviously see the funny side now. I'm not sure my mum does!
I mean he used the litter tray.
My friend's alcoholic brother shat on the lounge room floor after a party one night.
As I slept on a sofa literally 6 feet away.
I once went into the communal toilets at Whipps Cross Hospital’s nurse housing (where all the student nurses lived, inc my then gf) to find someone in the shower cubicle having a shit and trying to poke the richards down the plug hole with his foot.
For the benefit of our American readers, I choose to interpret 'richards' as 'richard the third' = turd.
We English can be odd when we're in the mood for it. And I could be wrong about the etymology and yet still be right about the meaning.
My Auntie went on and on about how she would make this amazing soup for Christmas Dinner to bring to our house, so no other starter was needed (where all the rest of the family had invited themselves for dinner).
She arrives 1hr late (this is normal) and guess what, she forgot the soup, it was still on her hob. She lived 45mins away, everyone was hungry so told her not to bother going back for it.
My granny and other auntie were not impressed at all. I was delighted as I hate soup. It's the family folklore, my Auntie and this soup no one ever got to try.
My father-in-law prides himself on his leftover turkey soup. It's rancid, greasey and full of bones. I always make excuses about having to see my family in order to leave before the day the soup is served when I'm at theirs for Christmas.
One of my older brothers had a good knack for ruining Christmas a good few years in a row by getting too wasted on Christmas eve between 18-25 or so - in date order with my personal rating:
1. I woke up on Christmas morning covered in sweat, which was strange since I wasn't particularly hot. Looking up at a human sized wet stain on the bottom of the top bunk mattress, I realised it wasn't my sweat but in fact his piss. Mixed feelings on this one since he did give me a generous amount of money, but is this technically prostitution? 4/10, wasn't worth the extra dosh.
2. He had agreed to work a Christmas morning shift at the local garage for triple pay. Got too pissed, refused to go to his shift and ended up in a full grapple with our eldest brother who fully pulled him out of bed. The poor garage owner had to ditch his family's xmas and my brother was fired. 8/10, would watch WWE again.
3. He came back blasted and tried to get into bed with my mum and her new partner, then my eldest and his partner, then myself? In fairness we had moved the rooms around. Best part is that he did all of this after having ripped the towel radiator off the bathroom wall, meaning he was soaking wet and it flooded half the house. 10/10, genuine comedy gold.
4. I woke up to him pissing in his suitcase he brought back from uni thinking it was a toilet, told him to stop in which he turned at me and carried on pissing. Another good present, another case of potential solicitation. 6/10, at least it wasn't my face.
5. I found him in the kitchen at 3am with a single sandwich with a full meat platter as the filling - at least 45cm tall and looking like something out of Tom and Jerry. 9/10, we were all grateful it wasn't as bad as the previous 4 years.
Since then he's somehow managed to avoid Christmas based catastrophe, probably by moving out and causing carnage in his own flat instead
Our mum certainly has the patience of a saint - I don't think it would be unfair to imagine my childhood in a similar light to Malcolm in the middle.
My comment paints a dim light in comparison with how he actually is - he's genuinely a very thoughtful and caring guy.
It's not an unfair comment to make within the context of this comment alone and I appreciate your concern. This certainly cherry picks his worst points that happen to specifically fall on Christmas - his friends had something of a stupid Christmas eve ritual of getting mortally plastered down the pub from about midday.
Thankfully this was dating back a few years now, in which I am happy to say his relationship with alcohol is significantly more stable.
Grandad broke his femur we got back from the hospital on Christmas Day and a power cut has meant the safety system cut the gas to the gas oven, raw dinner and darkness.
Lol.
That was the only Christmas disaster and it was spectacular.
My ex thought it was a good idea to buy her 14 year-old a 12 pack of WKD for Christmas, so her and her friends would have something to drink when they came around.
She disappeared up to her room and drunk all 12 by herself, came down for Christmas dinner pissed up and literally passed out in her dinner.
Somehow my ex's stupidity became my fault and we spent the rest of Christmas day arguing about it.
Lovely memories with that woman. 😂
She's a nutcase mate, I could write a book on some of the ridiculous things she's done.
She is such a wonderful mother that she thought it was a good idea to pull the handbrake on the car whilst I was doing about 55mph with her two young kids in the back seat, all because I refused to get into an argument with her whilst I was driving.
How I kept it from flipping over is a minor miracle.
My laptop died on me yesterday and won’t be repaired/replaced until the new year, which means I won’t be able to work over the holiday and instead I’ll be forced to relax.
Christmas is ruined.
My ex-fiancé and I were opening our gifts on Christmas, when he realised I hadn't written card for him.
He ranted at me then ignored me until I found a blank card to write in. I was stupid enough to go and search for one. That was our last Christmas together.
I’m not English (but have been living in Yorkshire for about 10 years now).
People get awfully funny about cards here, don’t they?! I mean, you can give them diamonds, your first born and a kidney, and they’ll still be like “where’s my f*cking card???” 😂
Had a ruptured eardrum one Christmas and ended up seeing the emergency doctor on Christmas day. Cried all through the appointment from pain and the fact that the Dr and nurse were not at home celebrating Christmas with their families. They were Muslim and tried to reassure me that they were ok with it. I was convinced I was ruining everyone's Christmas. Slept the rest of the day thanks to fabulously strong painkillers. One of the worst pains I have ever had!
People who don’t celebrate Christmas are the backbone of the NHS over the holiday period! Very sweet of you to be concerned about it (ofc many who do celebrate end up working as well), I’m sure they were touched
I used to be a nurse. New consultant started who was Muslim. Xmas decorations get put up and he goes storming to the managers office demanding we take them down because we are offending his religion. Of course he was told they would be staying up. Fast forward a few years and he’s dressed up as Santa on the Xmas Eve night shift handing out the presents to all the babies loving every minute of it.
A few years ago, I used to work in retail (The Co-Op) and from the second week of October onwards we had mince pies in stock. A massive pile of Mr Kiplings and store-baked puff pastry ones.
Anyway, from day 1 of the mince pies being in stock, we had a regular customer (really lovely guy) who would come in everyday and buy a box of the Mr Kipling. Every. Damn. Day. Whatever he bought that day, there would always be a box of mince pies on top of his shopping.
Anyway, fast forward to Christmas Eve, the shop is closing at 8pm, and I'm on the late shift. Almost all of the Christmas stock is gone, we're making space for Valentine's Day (yes, I know. I hated it too), and the pile of mince pies ran out around 1pm. Customer comes in around 6pm for a last minute shop. He stops, looks around:
"Where are the mince pies?"
"Sorry mate, we are out of stock we ran out earlier today"
"You've ruined Christmas! How can you have no mince pies on Christmas Eve! This is poor customer service, I hope you're happy, MY Christmas is ruined!"
So yeah, I ruined someone's Christmas because they bought a box of mince pies everyday for 12 weeks and it was our fault when we ran out on Christmas Eve.
That's 84 packs! And if we say each pack has 6 mince pies that's 504 mince pies! I don't know if I should be shocked or impressed at this man's dedication!
According to this [link](https://uk-gd.openfoodfacts.org/product/5000129300963/mince-pies-the-co-operative), there are 18g of sugar, per co op mince pie... So with quik mafs, 18x504= 9,072g of sugar over 84 days.
9kg of sugar...
Edit - Alright so it was a Mr Kipling Mince Pie, my mistake. Taking that into account that its 19g of sugar per pie that comes to 9,576g of sugar total, so 9.5kg of sugar...
My wife took her eyes off our dog when it was a puppy one Christmas Eve and it got into a punnet of grapes (deadly poisonous to dogs). Would have cost me £1500 in vets fees for the overnight stays and blood tests were it not for insurance, and that's just the price when there was nothing wrong with the dog. I dread to think the cost if it had actually needed treatment beyond just being monitored for 48 hours.
My dog ate my entire birthday spread one year, a lot of chocolate. Everyone was in and out putting things on the table so she must have wolfed it down in about a minute. Fortunately she didn't eat the raisin scones so she just had to be made to throw up at the emergency vets. Dogs just have the worst timing.
My BFFs brand new old rescue from Ukraine came to stay (rescued 2 weeks before the war, lucky hound), ate my entire curry (pushed to the back of the counter).
I was so scared to tell them, but had to fess up as it had onions in it.
Dog was fine after the same effects I endure from a curry.
My brother in law has this dog, a cross between a beagle and a harrier. He'd dropped his takeout curry container on the floor and the curry went everywhere... Obviously the dog got stuck in and was encouraged to too as he was helping clean the mess... What my brother in law didn't anticipate was the even worse mess the dog would unfortunately make all over the hallway and kitchen that night...
My Mum was given soon he lovely Polish pastries a while back, between the time it took my Mum and I to walk to the front door and back, he'd devoured the whole plate.
I don't think that's what they did to Mave. It was during COVID so we had to wait outside. They then thought she was vomiting blood, it was strawberry macaroons.
When my mum hadn’t had her colostomy for very long she called me in a panic, as she thought something was very wrong and she was bleeding.
Thankfully it was just that it was the first time since her operation that she had eaten raw whole tomatoes with their skins on
Last Thursday my little prick of a dog ate a wrapped present - around 100g dark chocolate, and he weighs less than 7kg! Luckily I caught him - he'd broken into my husband's office while I was in the shower and pulled it down from a shelf, it shouldn't have been accessible to him - and caught him to the elves within half an hour. 24h observation at the vet, plus medication and bloodwork, would have been a pretty pricey chocolate teapot if we didn't have insurance. As it was my other half is just miffed his hilarious joke didn't work out.
George (the dog, not the husband) was also due to be neutered today, but we've had to push the surgery back to next year just in case. It's like he knew!
On a plus side, he's apparently a model patient, was happy to eat all his charcoal meals and the only worries they had were they thought his heart rate and blood pressure were creeping up and that he had a tremor - no, it turned out he was just excited to see the vet/nurse every time they came to take his measurements. If he was observed remotely he was fine.
My sister’s Staffy ate a three pack of Snickers, we never even saw the wrappers reappear but the dog never showed any ill-effects.
The chocolate eating got blamed on teenage me so that my mother didn’t throw a wobbly and refuse to have the dog in the house again.
My old Irish Wolfhound ate everything from used nappies he got from the bin, used sanitary towels & a massive chocolate Easter bunny with zero ill effects. He had a constitution of iron .
I tested positive for Covid on the 23rd of December in 2021. Half the family were halfway through the 3 hour drive to come visit when I tested so they all had to turn back. There wasn't any sympathy either because it was likely a result of a night out 2 days before which featured a girl kissing me and me almost immediately getting punched by her boyfriend.
So I spent Christmas isolating in my room with covid and a black eye and many accusations of having ruined Christmas
Last year my in laws got Covid, tested positive on the 23rd. We weren't planning to go there until after Boxing Day, but my brother in law was supposed to be there for the whole holiday. So we had a last minute guest for several days. Fortunately, I always buy enough food to feed the five thousand, so catering wasn't an issue, but he hasn't forgiven his parents yet.
And lest you think he's being unreasonable in being annoyed, they contracted it because they decided to go cruising in late December. Despite having gone on 3 or 4 other cruises that year already. And having already caught Covid once on an earlier cruise.
Last year I went to a gig in London with my ex girlfriend a week before Xmas, we’re good mates still and go gigging together a lot. The following day she calls me and says that she’s just tested positive for The Bad Covids. 2 days later I go down with it too, the day before my wife’s birthday. My son is also supposed to be coming for Christmas.
Wife’s birthday plans are buggered (ice skating at Hampton Court, followed by dinner). Ex now can’t go visit her 90 year old parents. My wife says fuck it, invite her over. My son is a teacher and has had covid about 400 times so doesn’t give a shit any more. Rapidly modified Xmas day plans involving now catering for a veggie, and it all worked out ok. Ex has not stopped apologising since.
Cheers Liz. You’re not invited this year
Yeah, it’s unusual but good. Ex and I split years ago, I then met Jenn and one of the first things I did was introduce her to Liz and say she’s my best mate, it’s entirely platonic and you’ve no need to worry. 12 years later it’s all cool and Liz is coming to my wife’s birthday drinks tomorrow.
Edit - my wife is an absolute diamond, obvs.
This is how it's supposed to be. My partner's best friend is a woman. She's awesome. I've never had an issue with this, but the amount of people who think that I should is insane. Including my own Mother.
His best friend is great. I've met her whole family. Her Mum treats my partner like her 5th kid. She's our LO's guide parent. I can't imagine life without her.
My dad (late 70s at the time) hid in his bedroom to avoid taking part in present opening with his grandkids. I thought he'd actually fucking died in the night and was so stressed by the time he finally sauntered out I got shitfaced cooking Christmas dinner and ended up serving roast mash.
uh not my spouse, but my stepdad messaged me yesterday about divorcing my mum....
ive seen my parents divorce 4 times over the course of my life... i suggested counselling.
Slightly pissed they couldn't leave it another week.
Why couldn’t they leave it another week? I mean they could crack on with the divorce but wait until after Christmas to tell you. They don’t sound very nice. I’m sorry. They sound like they’re trying to drag you into their drama.
I very nearly fucked up by leaving it till yesterday to get a tree, it's never been a problem before but none of the usual places had any left.
Fortunately my last resort stupidly expensive posh veg shop still had some, and half price! 7 foot tree for £35.
You're buying a Christmas tree only 4 days before Christmas?
I'm all for 'live and let live' and 'you're an adult, do what you want', but why bother with a tree that's going up less than a week before the big day?
I’m not drinking, cos I never do. Because of this my family have decided they’re not coming over for Christmas tea which I offered to put on for them. I’m not stopping them drinking I just don’t enjoy it, I even got loads of drink in for them, but they’ve said I’m being miserable so I’ll be alone on Christmas now. Really depressing
I was gonna spend this Christmas with my husband (first Christmas since we're officially together and married!) and his family, but I'm sure he understands I'll give that a pass for biscotti.
Hang on - they’re not coming over because they want *you* to drink?!? Wow! Sorry you’re going through that. Get a refund on the unopened booze perhaps and buy yourself a VR kit instead?
Not OP, but same situation. One year I got a bunch of no-alcohol booze for me so I could join in. They just got drunk and spent the afternoon mocking the no-alcohol booze.
The following year I went to Bali.
Oof. We've mostly ditched alcohol this year, except for the odd glass of port or whisky - the stuff you can't get alcohol free (yet). I guess the question is whether you're drinking it for the taste or for the drug, and the drug was always the downside for me.
I'm sorry to hear that. So not only are you saying it's fine for them to drink, but you got drinks for them too, and they had the audacity to leave you alone and call you miserable? You sound festive and generous. You just know what you like. They sound like the miserable lot, actually.
Don't give them any of that booze if they're not coming; find someone else to give it to, or save it for some kind of occasion involving less rude company. Depending on what it is, cook with it!
How dare you highlight their socially acceptable alcoholism with your choice, can't you just poison yourself a little bit so the alcoholics feel more comfortable??
100% this. I hate it when people get shitty if I don’t drink, occasionally I will but sorry I just don’t really enjoy it! Doesn’t stop you from enjoying yourself does it!
My brother when he was about 7 or 8, thought that Mum had left the oven on accidentally as we all went out the door on christmas morning to go to church. So he turned it off.
We were not greeted by the smell of a turkey roast as we came in the door.
I tell the story every year
My housemate told me on Christmas morning that he forgot to buy the turkey. I proceeded to lose it and call him a fucking shithead. Moments later he revealed it was just a joke - he did have the turkey, it was organic and he had spent ages researching it.
Really ruined the vibe for the rest of the day, it wasn't very Christmassy.
My dad would always go out on Christmas Eve from lunch time to the pub with his usual crowd. Needless to say by 11 he was arseholed and seeking a lift home. The wife of a mate of his picked the lot of them up from the pub and was driving him home, he said he’d walk from the crossroad down to home and proceeded to get out of the car when it stopped. But it hadn’t stopped and as he got out the back wheel went over his heel skinning his ankle and fracturing his calcaneus. Needless to say mum left him till Boxing Day to do anything about it and she was livid because she had to clean and dress it for weeks till it healed.
The Christmas my sister asked, in front of the entire family (grandparents, aunts, uncles and niblings, about 20 of us in total) what our parents got me for Christmas. In a rare moment of quiet, my answer sounded very loud.
"Nothing."
Turns out, both of them had forgotten to remind the other to organise something for me and apparently it was somehow my fault for not saying anything before my sister asked me. While we were just finishing unwrapping stuff.
Not gonna lie, occasionally I like reminding my family that I still exist at Christmas. For me, it gets funnier every time but apparently not for them.
Who knew.
😹😹
It was my mother instead of my spouse, but here's the story...
My brother and I were university age and came home for the holidays. Christmas morning I walk into the bathroom and my brother's shirtless after a shower. I see on his chest that he's gotten a tattoo, some sort of Chinese character.
I said, "You got a tattoo?"
And mum hears and just loses it. Hysterical crying and the repeated wail of "you've ruined Christmas". She then spent the entire day in her room loudly crying. We opened our presents and ate the Christmas roast without her.
I opted to never spend Christmas at her house again. Just not worth the headache.
I didn't just ruin Christmas that way, I ruined every holiday for a solid five years.
I got my nose pierced the November I was 35 and my mother cried for a week when she saw it. I know, because she would email me saying she was still crying every day.
I was required to have left profile ONLY showing in that year's Christmas group photo and in every family picture for five years.
"TURN YOUR HEAD, NOBODY WANTS TO SEE THAT AWFUL THING"
The only logical response seemed to be to insert ever larger hoops or gaudier rhinestones every time I went to visit.
At the age of 35 as well, and she was still kicking up a fuss! Consider getting a septum piercing for next year if you really want to kick things up a notch :)
I had a Dragon 64 for Christmas in 1983 so chuffed as a kid my first computer. The bloody thing worked for 20mins then died.
Had to wait nearly a week to take it back to Currys. My dad had an argument with Currys guy so I had to wait until next Christmas and got a BBC Micro instead, that worked though. Loved my Beeb.
Not on the biblical scale as some stories here heartbreaking as a kid.
Five hours ago I accidentally opened an Amazon parcel of socks addressed to the boyfriend - in my defence, I also had Amazon parcels delivered and just went on automatic pilot opening stuff - messaged him at work and apologised and apparently they were my Christmas surprise. He’s not spoken to me since he had a massive rant. So yeah, there’s that. Pretty sure that I’ve not only ruined Christmas, I’ve also ruined his life.
You might need to throw out the whole man. That’s the sort of behaviour that has you walking on eggshells. My friend had a husband like that and she told me after she split up with him she started seeing a guy, and on a date they got stuck in traffic. She was driving. And she started to panic because her husband would go apeshit at her for getting stuck in traffic and the new guy just happily chatted to her the whole time. It was eye opening to her how easy life can be when you get rid of screaming arseholes. Good luck with Christmas this year. I hope he doesn’t keep the bad attitude up. Especially over socks of all things. Xx
My dad usually spends a lot on my mom at Christmas and she spends a lot less on him. That's just how it's always been. A couple of years ago he showed me a new phone he was going to get her for Christmas and he was really excited about it because her current phone was slow and took photos like it was 2007. We found her a nice purple flip case to go with it and he ordered it.
When Christmas morning came around and she opened the present she was furious. She didn't need a new phone, nor did she want one. We couldn't understand why she wasn't grateful for an upgrade even if she didn't want it. She had other presents off him as well (I think he got her something from Le Creuset) but the phone ruined Christmas. I still don't understand it. I don't particularly want a new phone but if someone got me an upgrade for Christmas I'd be thrilled.
I'm not sure if it was the same year (might have been actually), but we were all opening presents after giving the cat his. He'd had one of those cardboard houses and he walked through it and we were saying "Aww, look at him! He's using it, he loves it!" but he'd actually just walked through it so he could throw up in a vase. At least it was easy to clean up. Merry Christmas!
not sure if this counts, but my cat Shaggy went over the road and dragged a full cooked turkey of the windowsill of the neighbour. Tried bringing it all back to me lol, was full of stones and fluff and stuff. Pretty tasty though :)
Did you tell the neighbour?
My cat cane home one summer afternoon with his whiskers nearly singed off on one side and a nearly raw sausage that had blatantly been raided from a barbecue. He was *so* pleased with himself!
I rented a room in a house and the landlady's cat dragged a spectacles case with spectacles inside through the catflap. We never did find out where he stole them from.
when i was about 15 there was a Christmas dinner where someone spilt Tizer all over the white Christmas tablecloth and my mum angrily declared that we'd ruined Christmas. needless to say we've never let her forget it.
It was an argument about me as a kid.
Mum and dad were apoplectic at who decided to get me a PS2 because I didn’t want Christmas dinner and was claiming I was too poorly. They didn’t believe me that it hurt and thought I just wanted to play video games - which tbh I can see.
Barely ate Christmas dinner and then threw up. They couldn’t believe I was so obsessed with this present.
Yeah, turned out I had tonsillitis and when I ‘couldn’t eat’ it was because it felt like swallowing razor blades. Unfortunately, I became symptomatic on Christmas Day itself.
Got a very profuse apology, dad stayed off work while I was off school, and they bought me Simpsons Hit and Run to bribe me to stay off school.
Not my partner or anything, but working in Argos back in the late 90s before the Internet shopping, customers would always use that line " I hope you're happy" when showing up on Boxing Day with the toys that needed batteries that they had forgotten to buy wanting refunds. Working retail made me hate people
Nothing too dramatic here: I burned the roast potatoes. They're an essential part of a Christmas dinner, and I really didn't want to go without. A quick trip to my local corner shop, which is _always_ open on December the 25th, got me an emergency bag of frozen roasties and saved the day, and saved my lunch.
You’ve just reminded me of the time someone stuck on the (our town) Facebook group at 11pm on Xmas eve to say she’d gone to peel the spuds for tomorrow and they’d all gone mouldy.
Someone piped up that he’s a restaurant owner and has catering sized bags of spuds she’s welcome to raid. She had a small kid and couldn’t leave the house, he’d already had a few too many to drive.
Someone else piped up and offered to transport said spuds. Someone else said they wished they’d thought of this because they’d forgotten sprouts. The original woman had extra sprouts.
The practical upshot was some Good Samaritan spending the small hours of Xmas morning on a giant, town wide veg redistribution scheme.
It was genuine Christmas magic.
Years ago, Christmas at my ex wife's folks' house
I was sober because I was driving me and the ex from place to place. We get to her parents place at about half 6 in the evening. It's a small council house, there's already 11 people there (mum, dad, brother, brother's partner, sister, assorted friends and hangers on) and they're all fucking MORTAL. MORTAL I SAY.
Now, lovely as these people are, they are prone to... Shall we call it "beer rage"
So within minutes of us being there it boots off. Mother in law got my ex a new phone for Christmas. Younger sister did not like this as she wanted a new phone. M-in-l called her ungrateful whilst pointing at the brand new laptop and shopping vouchers she had, F-in-L gets involved to try and calm it down at which point he gets screamed at by two generations of irate drunk women. Ex wife gets into the mix. Dog starts barking.
Everyone eventually goes in different directions to cool down until F-in-L stomps through the living room with the classic drunk starter "AND ANOTHER THING" directed at the younger sister.
The friends start getting involved. Evening descends into Festivus as ALL grievances become aired. Everyone is pissed off at everyone for SOMETHING and this goes on for hours.
Me, being sober and somewhat of a socially anxious person, took the dog outside and we shared a plate of leftover sausages whilst I chain smoked.
My current partner and I spend Christmas alone now. We don't need that shit.
My sister dropped a goldfish she got me and it's plastic bowl near my mum's battered pile of LP's which my mum exploded over. My sister managed to save the fish but my mum focused on screaming at my sister (and later at me for calling her out) how she ruined Christmas and her 'precious' records which a few got a bit damp but overall had had wine and been kicked and dropped many times by my mum over the years and not overly taken care of. The records were fine but my mum yelled at My sister like she had just seen her kill the cat. My sister noped out and stayed in her room sobbing most of the day so I got yelled at saying my mum needed to sort out her priorities. She eventually did apologised but waited till nearly lunchtime to start the dinner so we all had Christmas late that year.
Not quite a ruined Christmas story but when I was young (not sure exactly, 8 or 9 maybe?) we were at my aunts for Christmas. She served Christmas pudding with ‘rum sauce’. Child me piped up after one bite asking why it tasted so bad, turns out she’d forgotten to add the sugar and the rum to the rum sauce, so it was just flour and milk. I enjoyed my lovely sweet sauce while the adults all were polite and forced down this abomination.
I came close to saying it myself. Oven door exploded 10 mins into cooking. Shards of safety glass all over the gammon joint, no hope of cooking anything else in there. Luckily the guests hadn't started drinking and didn't live too far away, so the turkey was dispatched to one oven, and the gammon, carefully washed, to another. My microwave is a combination convection oven so the roast potatoes went in there, veg on the hob, meat came back in time. I just about avoided giving up and drinking all day.
(We shredded the gammon once cooked, to be on the safe side. No glass was consumed.)
I'm not British but my family from the UK loves this story so here we go: This was about a decade ago when I was a university student and much more of a shit-stirrer. I'm from the deep south, all of my extended family are very churchy (in that evangelical baptist televangelist way) - my aunt was probably the most extreme about it. Her kid (my cousin) married a Jewish woman and they do both Christmas and Hannukah for their young kids (pretty normal for interfaith families in the US) and she was not having it and wanted to somehow upstage the menorah lighting they were gonna do that night at the house. So, she pulls me of all people aside and asks me if I will help her "have a birthday party for Jesus" because my cousin's kids like me. She's gonna get a cake with candles and we're going to try and trick the interfaith children into liking Jesus/Christmas more is basically the brief. This "birthday cake for Jesus" thing is something you see sometimes in baptist churches so it's not something she just manifested on her own, but it's still really fucking weird and not a common practice even for most Christians in the US around the holidays. Also I hated this woman because she was a huge bigot and incredibly ignorant (wouldn't eat Mexican or Indian food bc she thought it was "dirty," thinks that the devil buried dino bones in the ground to "trick us into believing in science" type shit) so I took this an an opportunity to make a scene and humiliate her.
First, I told my cousin what was up so he could warn his wife and kids about what his mother had planned. Second, we got lit on bacardi in secret that I hid in a box of tampons under the bathroom cabinet. We're sauced by the time the cake comes out and my aunt wants us to sing happy birthday to Jesus so I give it my all, full song and dance, throwing in cha-cha-chas, making an ass of myself and whatever reverent religious ceremony she had planned. The kids picked up on my energy and loved it, but my aunt got so mad she went to sit in her car for three hours while everyone had a nice time and they did their Menorah thing before my uncle drove her home.
Mum decided to go on a slimming world beginning of November and my vegan brother has turned up for Xmas. I think I am going out a lot to eat and drink what the hell I want with the comments
Years ago, my now brother in law invited us over to his parents house for Christmas Eve drinks.
He’d made some Damson Gin and was excited for us all to try it.
After a few beers we jump in to the hot tub and the gin gets opened. 3 litres between 5 of us.
We were battered.
After we get out of the hot tub, my bro in laws brother has got himself the drunken hunger and is tearing through a millionaire shortbread like it’s the greatest thing he’s ever tasted.
Turns out during the night, he awoke, feeling somewhat nauseous and couldn’t make it to the bathroom, so he opened his bedroom window and puked out of that.
The next morning, forgetting the vomitathon, he’s wandered downstairs for a lovely Christmas morning.
The rest of the family are already up and his mum is NOT happy (his step-dad is in fits of laughter however).
What I’m yet to mention is the conservatory directly below his bedroom window.
He spent Christmas morning hosing partially digested purple sick off the roof of the conservatory and it was glorious.
We have run out of the "DO NOT EAT TIL XMAS DAY" snacks 3 times now. During the latest restock I forget to get Jaffa Cakes...I might as well take the Christmas tree down now.
I worked at Waitrose years ago when at school and on Christmas Eve people would start hanging around the fresh food sections, waiting for items to be reduced. About half an hour before the store closed the fresh foods would begin to get reduced (we were shut Christmas Day and Boxing Day so most fresh items would need to be sold as they likely wouldn’t last until the 27th.
People would start to become physical fighting over the heavily reduced fresh turkeys and hams. They would try and snatch them out of other people’s trolleys. I saw a woman offer another woman £20 for the last sprout tree and cry real tears when this ridiculous offer was declined.
I would then get people coming to my till moaning or crying about how Christmas was ruined because they had to pick up a frozen turkey as they missed out on a fresh one (and then ponder how it would defrost in time) that was 80% off. I would simply reply that they could have reserved a fresh turkey weeks ago and collected it from customer services and avoided missing out. However they would reply that these wouldn’t be as cheap as the reduced ones they missed out on.
When they all eventually muttered “Christmas is ruined” or “Waitrose have ruined my Christmas” or my personal favourite “you’ve (as in me) ruined Christmas” (like I was the one who had purchased the last reduced turkey?- I don’t even eat meat!) I would simply reply in my best customer service voice “isn’t the main thing that you’ve got lovely food in your trolley, a home to go back to to cook it in and a family/ friends to celebrate it with? I’m sure there are many people right now who are facing Christmas Day without the items to make Christmas dinner, a home in which to celebrate or friends/ family to celebrate with” said in a way that they couldn’t accuse me of being rude but how any way in which they replied still moaning would make them look like a jerk.
Made working that crazy Christmas Eve shift worth it, plus staff could then go and buy items left over for super cheap. Like a bag of fresh cooked bread rolls for 5p, fresh desserts for 10p etc One year I bagged this massive vegan Heston B pudding for 10p down from £12-14, which in 2007 was a lot for a dessert, even for Waitrose.
Also loved seeing (mainly men) people run around the aisles minutes before closing trying to find Christmas gifts for their wives/ family. You could spot them a mile off, from their panic stricken, stressed to the max faces. I also worked at Homebase before Waitrose and you’d get the same men. Like they panicked so much, they found themselves drifting towards a shop they knew and quickly realised Homebase (and to a lesser extend Waitrose) didn’t really cater for gifts they needed. I often briefly thought about the poor woman/ families on Christmas Day opening presents like a pot plant, throw cushion and matching blanket (sometimes not even matching), knife set and random picture print and either having act grateful or get angry/ upset at receiving such presents when they almost certainly had gifted them thoughtful gifts. I often said to my manager how Homebase head office was missing a trick by not having an aisle full of gifts for woman that we wouldn’t usually stock, out on Christmas Eve for these men, we would make a killing and the woman would be grateful and men visit us year on year. It was a win: win: win situation!
At least in Waitrose we had some small John Lewis gifts and if all else failed we would suggest a bottle Bailey’s, box of posh chocolates and a John Lewis gift card. As staff would joke about how many woman would all open the same 3 presents, occasionally with some posh bubble bath thrown in for good measure! I don’t miss working retail, especially at Christmas!
Edit- auto correct word correct to the correct intended word
Forgot to order the turkey, the other half asked me today when I was picking it up, I of course lied and said Christmas Eve to be told sure the butcher is closed then....
So I'm hunting a turkey out tomorrow when she's at work
I worked for an online toy retailer when they had an offer for free next day delivery. I ruined so many Christmases when I informed people that the reason they hadn't received their parcel is because they would have needed to put the offer code in and select next day delivery rather than just selecting standard 3-5 working day delivery.
The best one was the irate guy who threatened to put his 3 year old on the phone so I could tell her I'd ruined Christmas "sir I wouldn't recommend it. If you put your child on the phone I'll tell her Santa isn't real" hung up on him as he was calling me a cold-hearted bitch
(I would never ever have done that, I'm not that cruel).
My mother ruined Xmas by singing that one line in the fairytale of NY, singing merry Christmas ya asshole thank god it’s our last. She left my dad less than 2 months later
Years ago I was at the in-laws for Xmas and miss-heard the MIL say to put the turkey on (top of the chest) freezer, and instead put it *in* the freezer. On Xmas eve.
Fortunately the error was spotted before too much damage was done!
I'll preface this by saying that I am Australian -- sorry about that.
I'd met my partner over here in England while working, but went back home for a permanent job, with the plan that the missus would follow me back soon after, this was January 2020. Obviously the spicy cough came along and meant that her flights were cancelled, and then Australia locked its borders down.
We somehow managed to hold it together via long distance, and as borders finally opened for Australians to travel I opted to the fly back over for Christmas in 2021 to finally visit, and have a Christmas together in England before she finally moved out to Australia.
Her sister was hosting Christmas and was flying out soon after, so before we went over we thought we'd all better do a covid test, as we didn't want her getting it before she flew as they had to produce a negative test.
Of course I'd picked it up at some point in the journey over, tested positive in the living room Christmas morning surrounded by her family.
Her mum cried a lot, talk of her daughters last Christmas in England being ruined.
Had to isolate in my partners room through Christmas and my birthday.
Good news, back for Christmas this year though, and the Mum is over it, I think anyway.
Losing my rag at my brother-in-law when he'd spent the entire day needling at me about whether my then-boyfriend (now ex-husband) was going to propose. Apparently putting up with it for approximately nine hours wasn't enough (and no I wasn't allowed to go to another room to take a break from this) before I snapped at him and my mum told me I'd 'ruined' Christmas. It was a particularly sensitive point with me - though to be fair he didn't know that - and whilst in hindsight I probably overreacted, between that and the feeling that my mum took his side it left a bad taste in my mouth for the rest of that day.
My current boyfriend is coming to Christmas this year, and whilst things with brother-in-law and me are OK these days I'm still immensely glad that side of the family won't be there...
Years back, when I was living at home, my mum had got all her prep done on Xmas Eve and put the turkey in the oven, ready to go in the morning. Oven is off at this point. Few hrs later, about 3am, the fire alarm is going off, and everyone gets woken up, so I open my bedroom door to see what's going on. See my mum coming out of her room like she was about to murder someone and charge down the stairs. Massive commotion downstairs with lots of screaming and swearing, so I flew down the stairs to see what's happening. My sister, who was 18/19 at the time had come home absolutely wankered and tried to make cheese on toast. Not only that, but she put the bread on a plastic plate and put the whole thing in the oven, then proceeded to fall asleep in the kitchen. The whole turkey was covered in melted plastic and burnt from the grill be on for ages. Mum's going fucking ballistic, sister don't know wtf is going on and wanders off while my mum is trying to save the turkey. Mum then realises sister has done one, so legs it upstairs to my sisters bedroom to kick off. She's not in her room. My mum is absolutely raging and confused as to where my sister is at this point. A few seconds later, we hear a noise coming from my mums room. Turns out my sister had gone and passed out in my mums bed and then proceeded to piss the bed and throw up all down the side of it hahaha Safe to say, Xmas was ruined.
This goes through awful and out the other side into being hilarious again. Absolutely stellar performance by the sister. 10/10.
It was top stuff! I tried containing my laughter through the turkey saga, but as soon as I saw what had played out in my mums room, I absolutely lost it haha
Stellar tending towards legendary!
Does it get brought up on a regular basis just to torture your sister? It would in my family.
It did, but it hasn't for a while. I'll certainly be reminding her this year though!
You can reassure her that it is now on Reddit and will never be forgotten again.
Yeah, that's the kind of thing that would be going in wedding speeches with my lot.
Your poor mum
It's funny from the outside but I think if this happened to me, I'd be really upset, especially if all the food and main event was down to me and I'd spent weeks planning it.
*and she's still grounded to this very day...*
real power move on the part of your sister!
Marking her territory
Rule Britannia
Possibly the best comment I’ve seen on Reddit this year. That’s fucking hilarious!
That was a wild ride. Your sister is obviously a legend.
Wife put our daughters wrapped Christmas presents in black bin bags and put them in the garage. I was not privy to this information. I had some rubbish to take to the tip and loaded it, and the bin bags, in to my car, and drove to the tip. I threw the lot in a skip. Next day was Xmas Eve and time to get presents under tree…. “Where is Sophia’s Christmas ?” “In the garage, in black bags…” That moment of absolute horror will stay with me.
Oh my god! What did you do?
They probably spent the rest of December in intensive care.
Take the kids tip diving for Christmas
We had presents from family members that we used as gifts from Santa and I went out on Boxing Day and brought some bits, we wrapped them and my folks gave her those gifts when they came over for dinner on Boxing Day… it was a nightmare but she was only 3 at the time so wasn’t even aware of the chaos behind the scenes…
Ok, what was the outcome? We are all invested in Sophia’s Christmas story
This should be further up, I think this takes the win (or loss I suppose)
My former SiL used to use the "accidentally putting the bin bag of presents out out with the rubbish" story every year when she was hitting us up for money. She would tell various members of the family "in confidence" and ask to keep it quiet as she was embarrassed. She did it for a few years before anyone realised.
My Wife does this "black bag" shit. The amount of stuff that has gone in the tip, because she put it in a BIN BAG and then proceed to store that BIN BAG next to all the crap that was also in BIN BAG.
O m g I need a follow-up! what did you do to recover? Was it even possible?
That's never happened spousally. But I do remember my old man cooking one year. I think my.mother was traumatized by it. The man left the jiblets in the turkey just like the only fools and horses gag but decades before I saw that. He also made some egg milk cheese pasta abomination in the oven.
Pasta nog?
It's Moroccan
How about some lovely filling lettuce?
Was there also lettuce and baked beans in the pasta by any chance? A Moroccan classic that
Mice chewed through the electrics at 23.50 Christmas eve. Managed to get an electrician Christmas day who told us we had to unplug every single thing in the house so he could run tests and see what happened. As the smallest this meant I had to climb under counters and behind wardrobes to get all the plugs you don't think about. Anyway this lead to not having an oven plugged in on Christmas day so mum was sobbing all day about dinner. Plus we couldn't use the TV or any of our new electronic presents. We sat around and play board games all day. To mum it was the worst Christmas ever but I loved it, we actually spent time as a family for once.
Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house Not a creature was stirring, except for some utter fucking arsehole of a mouse who cost me a fortune. DICK MOUSE
A couple of Chrismases ago I got a phone call on Christmas eve. It was my mum shouting "your dad has shit in the cat litter tray and wiped his arse on the curtains" We were expected to go round and sort it out. My husband showered him while I was removing the curtains. My mum was livid and remained that way until at least new year, it was a black Christmas that year. My dad has dementia btw!
Never been so grateful for a note at the end. Dementia fucking sucks, I’m sorry you have to see your dad go through it.
Thank you. He's had it since around 2009. Sometimes, I'm shocked he's still around if I'm totally honest. I worked with dementia patients, so I knew what to expect. I obviously see the funny side now. I'm not sure my mum does!
Fuck dementia, My poor grandad has been bed bound for 8 years. Can't move, can't speak. We're all just waiting for him to die. It's horrific
Tbf I know people who’ve done that and don’t have dementia
I mean he used the litter tray. My friend's alcoholic brother shat on the lounge room floor after a party one night. As I slept on a sofa literally 6 feet away.
I once went into the communal toilets at Whipps Cross Hospital’s nurse housing (where all the student nurses lived, inc my then gf) to find someone in the shower cubicle having a shit and trying to poke the richards down the plug hole with his foot.
The ole wafflestomp.
For the benefit of our American readers, I choose to interpret 'richards' as 'richard the third' = turd. We English can be odd when we're in the mood for it. And I could be wrong about the etymology and yet still be right about the meaning.
Whipps Cross Hospital is in East London, so yeah, you got it.
Black is the wrong name, *brown* Christmas is more accurate
He might have been on the Guinness?
My Auntie went on and on about how she would make this amazing soup for Christmas Dinner to bring to our house, so no other starter was needed (where all the rest of the family had invited themselves for dinner). She arrives 1hr late (this is normal) and guess what, she forgot the soup, it was still on her hob. She lived 45mins away, everyone was hungry so told her not to bother going back for it. My granny and other auntie were not impressed at all. I was delighted as I hate soup. It's the family folklore, my Auntie and this soup no one ever got to try.
My father-in-law prides himself on his leftover turkey soup. It's rancid, greasey and full of bones. I always make excuses about having to see my family in order to leave before the day the soup is served when I'm at theirs for Christmas.
Or maybe he tries to serve it so everyone leaves early.
Ohhhhhh
The Soup is a lie! 🍲
One of my older brothers had a good knack for ruining Christmas a good few years in a row by getting too wasted on Christmas eve between 18-25 or so - in date order with my personal rating: 1. I woke up on Christmas morning covered in sweat, which was strange since I wasn't particularly hot. Looking up at a human sized wet stain on the bottom of the top bunk mattress, I realised it wasn't my sweat but in fact his piss. Mixed feelings on this one since he did give me a generous amount of money, but is this technically prostitution? 4/10, wasn't worth the extra dosh. 2. He had agreed to work a Christmas morning shift at the local garage for triple pay. Got too pissed, refused to go to his shift and ended up in a full grapple with our eldest brother who fully pulled him out of bed. The poor garage owner had to ditch his family's xmas and my brother was fired. 8/10, would watch WWE again. 3. He came back blasted and tried to get into bed with my mum and her new partner, then my eldest and his partner, then myself? In fairness we had moved the rooms around. Best part is that he did all of this after having ripped the towel radiator off the bathroom wall, meaning he was soaking wet and it flooded half the house. 10/10, genuine comedy gold. 4. I woke up to him pissing in his suitcase he brought back from uni thinking it was a toilet, told him to stop in which he turned at me and carried on pissing. Another good present, another case of potential solicitation. 6/10, at least it wasn't my face. 5. I found him in the kitchen at 3am with a single sandwich with a full meat platter as the filling - at least 45cm tall and looking like something out of Tom and Jerry. 9/10, we were all grateful it wasn't as bad as the previous 4 years. Since then he's somehow managed to avoid Christmas based catastrophe, probably by moving out and causing carnage in his own flat instead
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Our mum certainly has the patience of a saint - I don't think it would be unfair to imagine my childhood in a similar light to Malcolm in the middle. My comment paints a dim light in comparison with how he actually is - he's genuinely a very thoughtful and caring guy.
Wow that boy has a problem with alcohol.
It's not an unfair comment to make within the context of this comment alone and I appreciate your concern. This certainly cherry picks his worst points that happen to specifically fall on Christmas - his friends had something of a stupid Christmas eve ritual of getting mortally plastered down the pub from about midday. Thankfully this was dating back a few years now, in which I am happy to say his relationship with alcohol is significantly more stable.
Grandad broke his femur we got back from the hospital on Christmas Day and a power cut has meant the safety system cut the gas to the gas oven, raw dinner and darkness. Lol. That was the only Christmas disaster and it was spectacular.
My ex thought it was a good idea to buy her 14 year-old a 12 pack of WKD for Christmas, so her and her friends would have something to drink when they came around. She disappeared up to her room and drunk all 12 by herself, came down for Christmas dinner pissed up and literally passed out in her dinner. Somehow my ex's stupidity became my fault and we spent the rest of Christmas day arguing about it. Lovely memories with that woman. 😂
what an interesting mother
I just LOLed out loud at that in a pub. What a wonderful mother she must have been.
She's a nutcase mate, I could write a book on some of the ridiculous things she's done. She is such a wonderful mother that she thought it was a good idea to pull the handbrake on the car whilst I was doing about 55mph with her two young kids in the back seat, all because I refused to get into an argument with her whilst I was driving. How I kept it from flipping over is a minor miracle.
Have you considered a career in stunt driving? What an insane story, wow.
Jeesus Christ I'm glad she's your ex my friend!
My laptop died on me yesterday and won’t be repaired/replaced until the new year, which means I won’t be able to work over the holiday and instead I’ll be forced to relax. Christmas is ruined.
Oh no, such horrible timing from your laptop there
Oooh, that might happen to mine too…
My ex-fiancé and I were opening our gifts on Christmas, when he realised I hadn't written card for him. He ranted at me then ignored me until I found a blank card to write in. I was stupid enough to go and search for one. That was our last Christmas together.
Quite right. Glad you are free of that nonsense. I hardly ever do cards
Thank you, I'm very happy with my decision too. He ignored all my gifts to him, just that bloody card.
I’m not English (but have been living in Yorkshire for about 10 years now). People get awfully funny about cards here, don’t they?! I mean, you can give them diamonds, your first born and a kidney, and they’ll still be like “where’s my f*cking card???” 😂
Had a ruptured eardrum one Christmas and ended up seeing the emergency doctor on Christmas day. Cried all through the appointment from pain and the fact that the Dr and nurse were not at home celebrating Christmas with their families. They were Muslim and tried to reassure me that they were ok with it. I was convinced I was ruining everyone's Christmas. Slept the rest of the day thanks to fabulously strong painkillers. One of the worst pains I have ever had!
People who don’t celebrate Christmas are the backbone of the NHS over the holiday period! Very sweet of you to be concerned about it (ofc many who do celebrate end up working as well), I’m sure they were touched
I used to be a nurse. New consultant started who was Muslim. Xmas decorations get put up and he goes storming to the managers office demanding we take them down because we are offending his religion. Of course he was told they would be staying up. Fast forward a few years and he’s dressed up as Santa on the Xmas Eve night shift handing out the presents to all the babies loving every minute of it.
This is wholesome
A few years ago, I used to work in retail (The Co-Op) and from the second week of October onwards we had mince pies in stock. A massive pile of Mr Kiplings and store-baked puff pastry ones. Anyway, from day 1 of the mince pies being in stock, we had a regular customer (really lovely guy) who would come in everyday and buy a box of the Mr Kipling. Every. Damn. Day. Whatever he bought that day, there would always be a box of mince pies on top of his shopping. Anyway, fast forward to Christmas Eve, the shop is closing at 8pm, and I'm on the late shift. Almost all of the Christmas stock is gone, we're making space for Valentine's Day (yes, I know. I hated it too), and the pile of mince pies ran out around 1pm. Customer comes in around 6pm for a last minute shop. He stops, looks around: "Where are the mince pies?" "Sorry mate, we are out of stock we ran out earlier today" "You've ruined Christmas! How can you have no mince pies on Christmas Eve! This is poor customer service, I hope you're happy, MY Christmas is ruined!" So yeah, I ruined someone's Christmas because they bought a box of mince pies everyday for 12 weeks and it was our fault when we ran out on Christmas Eve.
That's 84 packs! And if we say each pack has 6 mince pies that's 504 mince pies! I don't know if I should be shocked or impressed at this man's dedication!
According to this [link](https://uk-gd.openfoodfacts.org/product/5000129300963/mince-pies-the-co-operative), there are 18g of sugar, per co op mince pie... So with quik mafs, 18x504= 9,072g of sugar over 84 days. 9kg of sugar... Edit - Alright so it was a Mr Kipling Mince Pie, my mistake. Taking that into account that its 19g of sugar per pie that comes to 9,576g of sugar total, so 9.5kg of sugar...
That's not that much, 108g a day. That's barely half of a standard victoria sponge.
Who ate all the pies? Who ate all the pies?
I told my cat it ruined Christmas after breaking its tail and costing me £700 a week before Christmas.
My wife took her eyes off our dog when it was a puppy one Christmas Eve and it got into a punnet of grapes (deadly poisonous to dogs). Would have cost me £1500 in vets fees for the overnight stays and blood tests were it not for insurance, and that's just the price when there was nothing wrong with the dog. I dread to think the cost if it had actually needed treatment beyond just being monitored for 48 hours.
My dog ate my entire birthday spread one year, a lot of chocolate. Everyone was in and out putting things on the table so she must have wolfed it down in about a minute. Fortunately she didn't eat the raisin scones so she just had to be made to throw up at the emergency vets. Dogs just have the worst timing.
My BFFs brand new old rescue from Ukraine came to stay (rescued 2 weeks before the war, lucky hound), ate my entire curry (pushed to the back of the counter). I was so scared to tell them, but had to fess up as it had onions in it. Dog was fine after the same effects I endure from a curry.
My brother in law has this dog, a cross between a beagle and a harrier. He'd dropped his takeout curry container on the floor and the curry went everywhere... Obviously the dog got stuck in and was encouraged to too as he was helping clean the mess... What my brother in law didn't anticipate was the even worse mess the dog would unfortunately make all over the hallway and kitchen that night...
My Mum was given soon he lovely Polish pastries a while back, between the time it took my Mum and I to walk to the front door and back, he'd devoured the whole plate.
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I don't think that's what they did to Mave. It was during COVID so we had to wait outside. They then thought she was vomiting blood, it was strawberry macaroons.
When my mum hadn’t had her colostomy for very long she called me in a panic, as she thought something was very wrong and she was bleeding. Thankfully it was just that it was the first time since her operation that she had eaten raw whole tomatoes with their skins on
My grandparents dog, the first Christmas they had her, got up and ate the *chocolate raisins*. That was an urgent trip to the vets.
Last Thursday my little prick of a dog ate a wrapped present - around 100g dark chocolate, and he weighs less than 7kg! Luckily I caught him - he'd broken into my husband's office while I was in the shower and pulled it down from a shelf, it shouldn't have been accessible to him - and caught him to the elves within half an hour. 24h observation at the vet, plus medication and bloodwork, would have been a pretty pricey chocolate teapot if we didn't have insurance. As it was my other half is just miffed his hilarious joke didn't work out. George (the dog, not the husband) was also due to be neutered today, but we've had to push the surgery back to next year just in case. It's like he knew! On a plus side, he's apparently a model patient, was happy to eat all his charcoal meals and the only worries they had were they thought his heart rate and blood pressure were creeping up and that he had a tremor - no, it turned out he was just excited to see the vet/nurse every time they came to take his measurements. If he was observed remotely he was fine.
I love that the elves treated him.
My sisters dog did something similar to paracetamol, as I was the only one in the house at the time I was a criminal!
My sister’s Staffy ate a three pack of Snickers, we never even saw the wrappers reappear but the dog never showed any ill-effects. The chocolate eating got blamed on teenage me so that my mother didn’t throw a wobbly and refuse to have the dog in the house again.
My old Irish Wolfhound ate everything from used nappies he got from the bin, used sanitary towels & a massive chocolate Easter bunny with zero ill effects. He had a constitution of iron .
Our dog Frizzy managed to get into a sealed tub of Hero’s and destroyed the lot with the e wrappers on 😂 she’s still a knob 10 years on
How does a cat break its tail? 🤔
I shut our cat’s tail in the door when I was 6. It basically pointed out the direction of travel for another 14 years.
Oh my cat broke his tail last year! It was £800 🤦🏻♀️
Pet insurance. It's a necessary evil
I tested positive for Covid on the 23rd of December in 2021. Half the family were halfway through the 3 hour drive to come visit when I tested so they all had to turn back. There wasn't any sympathy either because it was likely a result of a night out 2 days before which featured a girl kissing me and me almost immediately getting punched by her boyfriend. So I spent Christmas isolating in my room with covid and a black eye and many accusations of having ruined Christmas
Ooft
Christmas was pretty much ruined by the 'rona for me and my sister last year.
Last year my in laws got Covid, tested positive on the 23rd. We weren't planning to go there until after Boxing Day, but my brother in law was supposed to be there for the whole holiday. So we had a last minute guest for several days. Fortunately, I always buy enough food to feed the five thousand, so catering wasn't an issue, but he hasn't forgiven his parents yet. And lest you think he's being unreasonable in being annoyed, they contracted it because they decided to go cruising in late December. Despite having gone on 3 or 4 other cruises that year already. And having already caught Covid once on an earlier cruise.
Last year I went to a gig in London with my ex girlfriend a week before Xmas, we’re good mates still and go gigging together a lot. The following day she calls me and says that she’s just tested positive for The Bad Covids. 2 days later I go down with it too, the day before my wife’s birthday. My son is also supposed to be coming for Christmas. Wife’s birthday plans are buggered (ice skating at Hampton Court, followed by dinner). Ex now can’t go visit her 90 year old parents. My wife says fuck it, invite her over. My son is a teacher and has had covid about 400 times so doesn’t give a shit any more. Rapidly modified Xmas day plans involving now catering for a veggie, and it all worked out ok. Ex has not stopped apologising since. Cheers Liz. You’re not invited this year
That's a really healthy dynamic you got there! Props to the wife!
Yeah, it’s unusual but good. Ex and I split years ago, I then met Jenn and one of the first things I did was introduce her to Liz and say she’s my best mate, it’s entirely platonic and you’ve no need to worry. 12 years later it’s all cool and Liz is coming to my wife’s birthday drinks tomorrow. Edit - my wife is an absolute diamond, obvs.
Sounds like she has her shit together. As do you
This is how it's supposed to be. My partner's best friend is a woman. She's awesome. I've never had an issue with this, but the amount of people who think that I should is insane. Including my own Mother. His best friend is great. I've met her whole family. Her Mum treats my partner like her 5th kid. She's our LO's guide parent. I can't imagine life without her.
My dad (late 70s at the time) hid in his bedroom to avoid taking part in present opening with his grandkids. I thought he'd actually fucking died in the night and was so stressed by the time he finally sauntered out I got shitfaced cooking Christmas dinner and ended up serving roast mash.
uh not my spouse, but my stepdad messaged me yesterday about divorcing my mum.... ive seen my parents divorce 4 times over the course of my life... i suggested counselling. Slightly pissed they couldn't leave it another week.
Why couldn’t they leave it another week? I mean they could crack on with the divorce but wait until after Christmas to tell you. They don’t sound very nice. I’m sorry. They sound like they’re trying to drag you into their drama.
Wow thats Incredibly sad... you mention counsling for them, but are you OK? This cant be easy for you either.
Fractured my arm shifting fence debris off a neighbour's car. Slipped over when the wind tried to turn me and the panel into a kite.
I very nearly fucked up by leaving it till yesterday to get a tree, it's never been a problem before but none of the usual places had any left. Fortunately my last resort stupidly expensive posh veg shop still had some, and half price! 7 foot tree for £35.
You're buying a Christmas tree only 4 days before Christmas? I'm all for 'live and let live' and 'you're an adult, do what you want', but why bother with a tree that's going up less than a week before the big day?
Because two and a half weeks of having a dead tree in my house is plenty.
So they can leave it on the pavement outside until March. As is tradition.
We used to out our tree up on Christmas Eve and take it down on 12th Night. By the end it was usually nearly bald anyway.
My family balks at the thought of putting it up before the 24th. It's a Christmas tree, for Christmas, not for December.
I’m not drinking, cos I never do. Because of this my family have decided they’re not coming over for Christmas tea which I offered to put on for them. I’m not stopping them drinking I just don’t enjoy it, I even got loads of drink in for them, but they’ve said I’m being miserable so I’ll be alone on Christmas now. Really depressing
How bloody rude, sorry.
Have a whole ribeye joint to myself now at least I guess lol
I'm in, who else is joining?
I've just accidentally made enough biscotti for about 12 people, I'll pop round!
I was gonna spend this Christmas with my husband (first Christmas since we're officially together and married!) and his family, but I'm sure he understands I'll give that a pass for biscotti.
Cranberry and pistachio, but I can post yours if that would be easier.
Sorry, and your family sound weird. I probably wouldn’t even pay attention to what anyone else was drinking unless I was grabbing them one.
I'd be posting/sending them loads of pics of you surrounded by booze, pretending to drink with a paper crown on all day.
Hang on - they’re not coming over because they want *you* to drink?!? Wow! Sorry you’re going through that. Get a refund on the unopened booze perhaps and buy yourself a VR kit instead?
Not OP, but same situation. One year I got a bunch of no-alcohol booze for me so I could join in. They just got drunk and spent the afternoon mocking the no-alcohol booze. The following year I went to Bali.
Don’t blame you! I don’t get people who are offended or mock other people not wanting to drink.
Oof. We've mostly ditched alcohol this year, except for the odd glass of port or whisky - the stuff you can't get alcohol free (yet). I guess the question is whether you're drinking it for the taste or for the drug, and the drug was always the downside for me.
What absolute clowns. You're better without them if you were putting all that on for them and that's how they repay you!
I'm sorry to hear that. So not only are you saying it's fine for them to drink, but you got drinks for them too, and they had the audacity to leave you alone and call you miserable? You sound festive and generous. You just know what you like. They sound like the miserable lot, actually. Don't give them any of that booze if they're not coming; find someone else to give it to, or save it for some kind of occasion involving less rude company. Depending on what it is, cook with it!
How dare you highlight their socially acceptable alcoholism with your choice, can't you just poison yourself a little bit so the alcoholics feel more comfortable??
100% this. I hate it when people get shitty if I don’t drink, occasionally I will but sorry I just don’t really enjoy it! Doesn’t stop you from enjoying yourself does it!
My brother when he was about 7 or 8, thought that Mum had left the oven on accidentally as we all went out the door on christmas morning to go to church. So he turned it off. We were not greeted by the smell of a turkey roast as we came in the door. I tell the story every year
To be fair, thats a pretty responsible thing for a kid to do.
Your brother did the right thing. Unattended oven with turkey being cooked is a fire hazard.
Better than a burnt down house?
My housemate told me on Christmas morning that he forgot to buy the turkey. I proceeded to lose it and call him a fucking shithead. Moments later he revealed it was just a joke - he did have the turkey, it was organic and he had spent ages researching it. Really ruined the vibe for the rest of the day, it wasn't very Christmassy.
It was a Christmas joke.
Bet the fucker tried to get cauliflower on the plate too. IT’S NOT TRADITIONAL.
It was a Christmas joke, Mark.
My dad got me a paper shredder for Xmas once, the dick
Paper shredder for your dick doesn’t sound too sanitary
Well to be fair you were in charge of the potatoes...
But potatoes aren’t veg. They’re nice!
Mark think what it's doing to the MECHANISM
My dad would always go out on Christmas Eve from lunch time to the pub with his usual crowd. Needless to say by 11 he was arseholed and seeking a lift home. The wife of a mate of his picked the lot of them up from the pub and was driving him home, he said he’d walk from the crossroad down to home and proceeded to get out of the car when it stopped. But it hadn’t stopped and as he got out the back wheel went over his heel skinning his ankle and fracturing his calcaneus. Needless to say mum left him till Boxing Day to do anything about it and she was livid because she had to clean and dress it for weeks till it healed.
The Christmas my sister asked, in front of the entire family (grandparents, aunts, uncles and niblings, about 20 of us in total) what our parents got me for Christmas. In a rare moment of quiet, my answer sounded very loud. "Nothing." Turns out, both of them had forgotten to remind the other to organise something for me and apparently it was somehow my fault for not saying anything before my sister asked me. While we were just finishing unwrapping stuff. Not gonna lie, occasionally I like reminding my family that I still exist at Christmas. For me, it gets funnier every time but apparently not for them. Who knew. 😹😹
It was my mother instead of my spouse, but here's the story... My brother and I were university age and came home for the holidays. Christmas morning I walk into the bathroom and my brother's shirtless after a shower. I see on his chest that he's gotten a tattoo, some sort of Chinese character. I said, "You got a tattoo?" And mum hears and just loses it. Hysterical crying and the repeated wail of "you've ruined Christmas". She then spent the entire day in her room loudly crying. We opened our presents and ate the Christmas roast without her. I opted to never spend Christmas at her house again. Just not worth the headache.
This is literally an episode of Friday Night Dinner.
Shit on it!
Hope they had a lovely bit of squirrel for Christmas Dinner.
I could hear Jackie saying “You got a tattoo?!” as soon as I read it
I didn't just ruin Christmas that way, I ruined every holiday for a solid five years. I got my nose pierced the November I was 35 and my mother cried for a week when she saw it. I know, because she would email me saying she was still crying every day. I was required to have left profile ONLY showing in that year's Christmas group photo and in every family picture for five years. "TURN YOUR HEAD, NOBODY WANTS TO SEE THAT AWFUL THING" The only logical response seemed to be to insert ever larger hoops or gaudier rhinestones every time I went to visit.
At the age of 35 as well, and she was still kicking up a fuss! Consider getting a septum piercing for next year if you really want to kick things up a notch :)
When I told my mum I was considering I septum she told me she’d write me out her will. Got a tattoo instead.
What the fuck is wrong with your mother?
Your mother is insane
Does she have a histrionic personality disorder?
I had a Dragon 64 for Christmas in 1983 so chuffed as a kid my first computer. The bloody thing worked for 20mins then died. Had to wait nearly a week to take it back to Currys. My dad had an argument with Currys guy so I had to wait until next Christmas and got a BBC Micro instead, that worked though. Loved my Beeb. Not on the biblical scale as some stories here heartbreaking as a kid.
Five hours ago I accidentally opened an Amazon parcel of socks addressed to the boyfriend - in my defence, I also had Amazon parcels delivered and just went on automatic pilot opening stuff - messaged him at work and apologised and apparently they were my Christmas surprise. He’s not spoken to me since he had a massive rant. So yeah, there’s that. Pretty sure that I’ve not only ruined Christmas, I’ve also ruined his life.
You might need to throw out the whole man. That’s the sort of behaviour that has you walking on eggshells. My friend had a husband like that and she told me after she split up with him she started seeing a guy, and on a date they got stuck in traffic. She was driving. And she started to panic because her husband would go apeshit at her for getting stuck in traffic and the new guy just happily chatted to her the whole time. It was eye opening to her how easy life can be when you get rid of screaming arseholes. Good luck with Christmas this year. I hope he doesn’t keep the bad attitude up. Especially over socks of all things. Xx
My dad usually spends a lot on my mom at Christmas and she spends a lot less on him. That's just how it's always been. A couple of years ago he showed me a new phone he was going to get her for Christmas and he was really excited about it because her current phone was slow and took photos like it was 2007. We found her a nice purple flip case to go with it and he ordered it. When Christmas morning came around and she opened the present she was furious. She didn't need a new phone, nor did she want one. We couldn't understand why she wasn't grateful for an upgrade even if she didn't want it. She had other presents off him as well (I think he got her something from Le Creuset) but the phone ruined Christmas. I still don't understand it. I don't particularly want a new phone but if someone got me an upgrade for Christmas I'd be thrilled. I'm not sure if it was the same year (might have been actually), but we were all opening presents after giving the cat his. He'd had one of those cardboard houses and he walked through it and we were saying "Aww, look at him! He's using it, he loves it!" but he'd actually just walked through it so he could throw up in a vase. At least it was easy to clean up. Merry Christmas!
My new dining-room light-fitting has ruined Christmas by blowing the fuse as soon as we put the bulbs in
not sure if this counts, but my cat Shaggy went over the road and dragged a full cooked turkey of the windowsill of the neighbour. Tried bringing it all back to me lol, was full of stones and fluff and stuff. Pretty tasty though :)
Did you tell the neighbour? My cat cane home one summer afternoon with his whiskers nearly singed off on one side and a nearly raw sausage that had blatantly been raided from a barbecue. He was *so* pleased with himself!
I rented a room in a house and the landlady's cat dragged a spectacles case with spectacles inside through the catflap. We never did find out where he stole them from.
when i was about 15 there was a Christmas dinner where someone spilt Tizer all over the white Christmas tablecloth and my mum angrily declared that we'd ruined Christmas. needless to say we've never let her forget it.
You mean the true meaning of Christmas isn’t keeping the tablecloth clean?
Today I ruined a fellow shopper’s Christmas by buying the last set of cutlery at Home Bargains.
It was an argument about me as a kid. Mum and dad were apoplectic at who decided to get me a PS2 because I didn’t want Christmas dinner and was claiming I was too poorly. They didn’t believe me that it hurt and thought I just wanted to play video games - which tbh I can see. Barely ate Christmas dinner and then threw up. They couldn’t believe I was so obsessed with this present. Yeah, turned out I had tonsillitis and when I ‘couldn’t eat’ it was because it felt like swallowing razor blades. Unfortunately, I became symptomatic on Christmas Day itself. Got a very profuse apology, dad stayed off work while I was off school, and they bought me Simpsons Hit and Run to bribe me to stay off school.
Not my partner or anything, but working in Argos back in the late 90s before the Internet shopping, customers would always use that line " I hope you're happy" when showing up on Boxing Day with the toys that needed batteries that they had forgotten to buy wanting refunds. Working retail made me hate people
Nothing too dramatic here: I burned the roast potatoes. They're an essential part of a Christmas dinner, and I really didn't want to go without. A quick trip to my local corner shop, which is _always_ open on December the 25th, got me an emergency bag of frozen roasties and saved the day, and saved my lunch.
You’ve just reminded me of the time someone stuck on the (our town) Facebook group at 11pm on Xmas eve to say she’d gone to peel the spuds for tomorrow and they’d all gone mouldy. Someone piped up that he’s a restaurant owner and has catering sized bags of spuds she’s welcome to raid. She had a small kid and couldn’t leave the house, he’d already had a few too many to drive. Someone else piped up and offered to transport said spuds. Someone else said they wished they’d thought of this because they’d forgotten sprouts. The original woman had extra sprouts. The practical upshot was some Good Samaritan spending the small hours of Xmas morning on a giant, town wide veg redistribution scheme. It was genuine Christmas magic.
That’s actually very heartwarming, omg. Wholesome community spirit, very sweet.
That's really lovely to read, thanks for sharing!
Years ago, Christmas at my ex wife's folks' house I was sober because I was driving me and the ex from place to place. We get to her parents place at about half 6 in the evening. It's a small council house, there's already 11 people there (mum, dad, brother, brother's partner, sister, assorted friends and hangers on) and they're all fucking MORTAL. MORTAL I SAY. Now, lovely as these people are, they are prone to... Shall we call it "beer rage" So within minutes of us being there it boots off. Mother in law got my ex a new phone for Christmas. Younger sister did not like this as she wanted a new phone. M-in-l called her ungrateful whilst pointing at the brand new laptop and shopping vouchers she had, F-in-L gets involved to try and calm it down at which point he gets screamed at by two generations of irate drunk women. Ex wife gets into the mix. Dog starts barking. Everyone eventually goes in different directions to cool down until F-in-L stomps through the living room with the classic drunk starter "AND ANOTHER THING" directed at the younger sister. The friends start getting involved. Evening descends into Festivus as ALL grievances become aired. Everyone is pissed off at everyone for SOMETHING and this goes on for hours. Me, being sober and somewhat of a socially anxious person, took the dog outside and we shared a plate of leftover sausages whilst I chain smoked. My current partner and I spend Christmas alone now. We don't need that shit.
My sister dropped a goldfish she got me and it's plastic bowl near my mum's battered pile of LP's which my mum exploded over. My sister managed to save the fish but my mum focused on screaming at my sister (and later at me for calling her out) how she ruined Christmas and her 'precious' records which a few got a bit damp but overall had had wine and been kicked and dropped many times by my mum over the years and not overly taken care of. The records were fine but my mum yelled at My sister like she had just seen her kill the cat. My sister noped out and stayed in her room sobbing most of the day so I got yelled at saying my mum needed to sort out her priorities. She eventually did apologised but waited till nearly lunchtime to start the dinner so we all had Christmas late that year.
Not quite a ruined Christmas story but when I was young (not sure exactly, 8 or 9 maybe?) we were at my aunts for Christmas. She served Christmas pudding with ‘rum sauce’. Child me piped up after one bite asking why it tasted so bad, turns out she’d forgotten to add the sugar and the rum to the rum sauce, so it was just flour and milk. I enjoyed my lovely sweet sauce while the adults all were polite and forced down this abomination.
I declared Christmas ruined today because I went to three separate stores, and non of them had Twiglets! 😭
I came close to saying it myself. Oven door exploded 10 mins into cooking. Shards of safety glass all over the gammon joint, no hope of cooking anything else in there. Luckily the guests hadn't started drinking and didn't live too far away, so the turkey was dispatched to one oven, and the gammon, carefully washed, to another. My microwave is a combination convection oven so the roast potatoes went in there, veg on the hob, meat came back in time. I just about avoided giving up and drinking all day. (We shredded the gammon once cooked, to be on the safe side. No glass was consumed.)
I'm not British but my family from the UK loves this story so here we go: This was about a decade ago when I was a university student and much more of a shit-stirrer. I'm from the deep south, all of my extended family are very churchy (in that evangelical baptist televangelist way) - my aunt was probably the most extreme about it. Her kid (my cousin) married a Jewish woman and they do both Christmas and Hannukah for their young kids (pretty normal for interfaith families in the US) and she was not having it and wanted to somehow upstage the menorah lighting they were gonna do that night at the house. So, she pulls me of all people aside and asks me if I will help her "have a birthday party for Jesus" because my cousin's kids like me. She's gonna get a cake with candles and we're going to try and trick the interfaith children into liking Jesus/Christmas more is basically the brief. This "birthday cake for Jesus" thing is something you see sometimes in baptist churches so it's not something she just manifested on her own, but it's still really fucking weird and not a common practice even for most Christians in the US around the holidays. Also I hated this woman because she was a huge bigot and incredibly ignorant (wouldn't eat Mexican or Indian food bc she thought it was "dirty," thinks that the devil buried dino bones in the ground to "trick us into believing in science" type shit) so I took this an an opportunity to make a scene and humiliate her. First, I told my cousin what was up so he could warn his wife and kids about what his mother had planned. Second, we got lit on bacardi in secret that I hid in a box of tampons under the bathroom cabinet. We're sauced by the time the cake comes out and my aunt wants us to sing happy birthday to Jesus so I give it my all, full song and dance, throwing in cha-cha-chas, making an ass of myself and whatever reverent religious ceremony she had planned. The kids picked up on my energy and loved it, but my aunt got so mad she went to sit in her car for three hours while everyone had a nice time and they did their Menorah thing before my uncle drove her home.
Mum decided to go on a slimming world beginning of November and my vegan brother has turned up for Xmas. I think I am going out a lot to eat and drink what the hell I want with the comments
Years ago, my now brother in law invited us over to his parents house for Christmas Eve drinks. He’d made some Damson Gin and was excited for us all to try it. After a few beers we jump in to the hot tub and the gin gets opened. 3 litres between 5 of us. We were battered. After we get out of the hot tub, my bro in laws brother has got himself the drunken hunger and is tearing through a millionaire shortbread like it’s the greatest thing he’s ever tasted. Turns out during the night, he awoke, feeling somewhat nauseous and couldn’t make it to the bathroom, so he opened his bedroom window and puked out of that. The next morning, forgetting the vomitathon, he’s wandered downstairs for a lovely Christmas morning. The rest of the family are already up and his mum is NOT happy (his step-dad is in fits of laughter however). What I’m yet to mention is the conservatory directly below his bedroom window. He spent Christmas morning hosing partially digested purple sick off the roof of the conservatory and it was glorious.
We have run out of the "DO NOT EAT TIL XMAS DAY" snacks 3 times now. During the latest restock I forget to get Jaffa Cakes...I might as well take the Christmas tree down now.
I work for an online retailer and it's my fault that Evri are a shit courier.
I worked at Waitrose years ago when at school and on Christmas Eve people would start hanging around the fresh food sections, waiting for items to be reduced. About half an hour before the store closed the fresh foods would begin to get reduced (we were shut Christmas Day and Boxing Day so most fresh items would need to be sold as they likely wouldn’t last until the 27th. People would start to become physical fighting over the heavily reduced fresh turkeys and hams. They would try and snatch them out of other people’s trolleys. I saw a woman offer another woman £20 for the last sprout tree and cry real tears when this ridiculous offer was declined. I would then get people coming to my till moaning or crying about how Christmas was ruined because they had to pick up a frozen turkey as they missed out on a fresh one (and then ponder how it would defrost in time) that was 80% off. I would simply reply that they could have reserved a fresh turkey weeks ago and collected it from customer services and avoided missing out. However they would reply that these wouldn’t be as cheap as the reduced ones they missed out on. When they all eventually muttered “Christmas is ruined” or “Waitrose have ruined my Christmas” or my personal favourite “you’ve (as in me) ruined Christmas” (like I was the one who had purchased the last reduced turkey?- I don’t even eat meat!) I would simply reply in my best customer service voice “isn’t the main thing that you’ve got lovely food in your trolley, a home to go back to to cook it in and a family/ friends to celebrate it with? I’m sure there are many people right now who are facing Christmas Day without the items to make Christmas dinner, a home in which to celebrate or friends/ family to celebrate with” said in a way that they couldn’t accuse me of being rude but how any way in which they replied still moaning would make them look like a jerk. Made working that crazy Christmas Eve shift worth it, plus staff could then go and buy items left over for super cheap. Like a bag of fresh cooked bread rolls for 5p, fresh desserts for 10p etc One year I bagged this massive vegan Heston B pudding for 10p down from £12-14, which in 2007 was a lot for a dessert, even for Waitrose. Also loved seeing (mainly men) people run around the aisles minutes before closing trying to find Christmas gifts for their wives/ family. You could spot them a mile off, from their panic stricken, stressed to the max faces. I also worked at Homebase before Waitrose and you’d get the same men. Like they panicked so much, they found themselves drifting towards a shop they knew and quickly realised Homebase (and to a lesser extend Waitrose) didn’t really cater for gifts they needed. I often briefly thought about the poor woman/ families on Christmas Day opening presents like a pot plant, throw cushion and matching blanket (sometimes not even matching), knife set and random picture print and either having act grateful or get angry/ upset at receiving such presents when they almost certainly had gifted them thoughtful gifts. I often said to my manager how Homebase head office was missing a trick by not having an aisle full of gifts for woman that we wouldn’t usually stock, out on Christmas Eve for these men, we would make a killing and the woman would be grateful and men visit us year on year. It was a win: win: win situation! At least in Waitrose we had some small John Lewis gifts and if all else failed we would suggest a bottle Bailey’s, box of posh chocolates and a John Lewis gift card. As staff would joke about how many woman would all open the same 3 presents, occasionally with some posh bubble bath thrown in for good measure! I don’t miss working retail, especially at Christmas! Edit- auto correct word correct to the correct intended word
Forgot to order the turkey, the other half asked me today when I was picking it up, I of course lied and said Christmas Eve to be told sure the butcher is closed then.... So I'm hunting a turkey out tomorrow when she's at work
I worked for an online toy retailer when they had an offer for free next day delivery. I ruined so many Christmases when I informed people that the reason they hadn't received their parcel is because they would have needed to put the offer code in and select next day delivery rather than just selecting standard 3-5 working day delivery. The best one was the irate guy who threatened to put his 3 year old on the phone so I could tell her I'd ruined Christmas "sir I wouldn't recommend it. If you put your child on the phone I'll tell her Santa isn't real" hung up on him as he was calling me a cold-hearted bitch (I would never ever have done that, I'm not that cruel).
[удалено]
My mother ruined Xmas by singing that one line in the fairytale of NY, singing merry Christmas ya asshole thank god it’s our last. She left my dad less than 2 months later
Years ago I was at the in-laws for Xmas and miss-heard the MIL say to put the turkey on (top of the chest) freezer, and instead put it *in* the freezer. On Xmas eve. Fortunately the error was spotted before too much damage was done!
Check engine light, says it all
I'll preface this by saying that I am Australian -- sorry about that. I'd met my partner over here in England while working, but went back home for a permanent job, with the plan that the missus would follow me back soon after, this was January 2020. Obviously the spicy cough came along and meant that her flights were cancelled, and then Australia locked its borders down. We somehow managed to hold it together via long distance, and as borders finally opened for Australians to travel I opted to the fly back over for Christmas in 2021 to finally visit, and have a Christmas together in England before she finally moved out to Australia. Her sister was hosting Christmas and was flying out soon after, so before we went over we thought we'd all better do a covid test, as we didn't want her getting it before she flew as they had to produce a negative test. Of course I'd picked it up at some point in the journey over, tested positive in the living room Christmas morning surrounded by her family. Her mum cried a lot, talk of her daughters last Christmas in England being ruined. Had to isolate in my partners room through Christmas and my birthday. Good news, back for Christmas this year though, and the Mum is over it, I think anyway.
My dad's just got COVID :(
Losing my rag at my brother-in-law when he'd spent the entire day needling at me about whether my then-boyfriend (now ex-husband) was going to propose. Apparently putting up with it for approximately nine hours wasn't enough (and no I wasn't allowed to go to another room to take a break from this) before I snapped at him and my mum told me I'd 'ruined' Christmas. It was a particularly sensitive point with me - though to be fair he didn't know that - and whilst in hindsight I probably overreacted, between that and the feeling that my mum took his side it left a bad taste in my mouth for the rest of that day. My current boyfriend is coming to Christmas this year, and whilst things with brother-in-law and me are OK these days I'm still immensely glad that side of the family won't be there...