The towel apocalypse

Aaron’s mum  (YaYa as she is now known when Hannah is present.  Hannah has a lot of grandparents, so we have to differentiate somehow) is coming tomorrow to visit for Christmas.  Sounds exciting right?  Well, it is, until Grandma turns into a shaking little ball of stressed out craziness.  Grandma has this overwhelming urge to make everything perfect for anyone and everyone who comes to visit.  She has this need to feed people until they almost explode.  I suppose that comes from being married to a greek for so many years.  Or maybe that’s just Grandma.  I’m not too sure.  She made “salmon” patties and some eggplant and tomato thing just so YaYa can “open the fridge and have a snack whenever she wants.”  It’s like  she is expecting the queen to come and grace our presence while tasting Grandma’s abundance of food. Stress is oozing out of Grandma, in the form of yelling and short-temperedness.  You can feel the stress from about 10 feet away.

Before we moved in with Grandma, we stopped telling her we were coming for a visit and started just showing up instead.  If we let Grandma know we were coming first, she’d spend all day cleaning and then greet us with a roast chicken, roast potatoes, sweet potatoes, bread rolls, pasta salad, regular salad, gravy, boiled vegetables, and of course, pavlova for desert.  We don’t care if the house is dusty, some dishes are in the sink, and mess is on the floor.  We’re family.  We just want to have a nice time together.  Same goes for when YaYa visits.

Grandma keeps bags and bags of “bedclothes” (as she calls them, aka sheets etc.) in the top of the linen press (linen closet) just for when YaYa comes to visit.  Aaron climbed up the ladder to reach them, pulling out bag after bag of, well, I’m not sure really.

“What’s in this bag Grandma?”  Aaron asked.

“Towels.  Good ones, brand new ones.”  Grandma said.

“So why don’t you use them?”

“I already have plenty of towels.”

“Umm…So why don’t we give them away to the needy?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, I’ll need them sometime.”

“What if I have to go in a home?  I’ll need to bring my own linen and towels!”  Oh Grandma….

(Laughing) “Grandma!” Aaron exclaimed.

 

Some of the bags at the top of the linen press

“But I’m poor, and I have enough towels to last me the rest of my life!”  She was starting to get really cranky now.  It’s like she thinks there will be a towel apocalypse and she must keep every towel she comes in contact with or else she will be wet and cold and may not survive.

 

“You’re not poor anymore Grandma, we’re here!”

“You never know what can happen, you never know what things you’ll need.  If you keep something long enough, you’ll find a use for it.”  Sigh. This is a prime reason for Grandma’s hoarding.

We didn’t persuade Grandma into getting rid of anything in the linen press,

Bring it on, we're ready

even though she has an entire shelf full of towels, another full of sheets, and of course, the top section full of plastic bags which are full of new all of the above.  Aaron, Hannah and I have one half of one shelf.  Total.  Bring on the towel apocalypse, we’re ready.

 

The Stubborn Grandma

Grandma: “Look at this stinging nettle I got out of the back yard.”

Me: “That’s a thistle.”

Grandma (grumpily): “No, it’s a stinging nettle.  I’m just trying to help you so Hannah doesn’t get stung.”

Me: “Regardless of what it’s called, I know Hannah shouldn’t touch it.”

Grandma (getting increasingly annoyed): “It’s a stinging nettle. I’ve lived my whole life in the bush, I know what a stinging nettle is!”

Me: “Well growing up, my Mom told me that those were thistles.  Stinging nettles are the ones that don’t look like they’d hurt you, they don’t have spikes on them, but then  you touch them and they sting.”

Grandma: “They both sting.  Touch this.  Come on, touch it, I promise it will sting you.”

Me: “I know it would hurt if I touch it, it’s spiky! That doesn’t mean it’s a stinging nettle.  It’s a thistle.  Maybe I’m wrong, maybe my Mom was wrong, I’m just going on what my Mom told me.  Maybe you’re wrong.”

Grandma: “It’s a stinging nettle.”

Grandma went outside and then came back, bearing non prickly, leafy, harmless plant.

Grandma: “This is a thistle.”

Me: “That’s not a thistle.  I don’t know what that is, but it’s not a thistle.”

Grandma: “How do all the rabbits eat thistle then?”

Me: “They don’t.”  I don’t know if they do or not, but I can’t imagine that they’d want to eat something that would likely poke their eyes out while giving them a lip piercing.

Me: “I’m going to look it up.”

Grandma (thoroughly annoyed): “Fine, but this is a thistle”

A few hours later (I hadn’t told Grandma that I looked it up hours ago):

Grandma, bearing a large spiky plant: “Look at this big…we’ll just call it Thing…that I found in the side yard.”

Me: “It’s a thistle.  We looked it up.”

Grandma (stubbornly): “Whatever.”

Then there was silence.  I wonder if Grandma will ever speak of said plants to me ever again, if she will still call them stinging nettles, or if she will now call them thistles???????????  Only time will tell….

UPADATE: Over a year later and she still refuses to call them thistles. She gets all flustered and says “You know, those stinging things…” HA!

This is a stinging nettle

This is a thistle