This Christmas, give the gift of honesty

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November 30th, 2010 · 93 comments

While helping her dad clean out her grandmother’s old apartment, Amanda says she found this incredible “love note” tucked in a bottom drawer. “All my dad could say was, ‘Well, romance wasn’t always your grandfather’s strong suit.’”

FILED UNDER: Christmas · holiday spirit · love & marriage · old folks · smoking

93 responses so far ↓

#1 Party in my pants

Nothing says “Merry Christmas, I love you!” like a carton of cigs. I love the fact that he took the time to type the note.

Nov 30, 2010 at 6:10 pm rating: 90

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- #1.1 Resident Grammarian esq
  
  Yeah and it’s in ’88 so he used a typewriter so some effort went into it.
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 10:49 pm rating: 90
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#2 Mad As Hell

Who says chivalry is dead? If he’s the role model for the men who came after him, it doesn’t surprise me that I can’t even find a man to open the door for me.

Nov 30, 2010 at 6:11 pm rating: 90

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- #2.1 ofthrees
  
  i have a feeling guys like this had less to do with the death of chivalry than did the whole feminist movement… call me crazy.
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 6:20 pm rating: 90
- #2.2 HandyMarigolds
  
  Well, if by “feminists” you mean “women who yell at you for holding a door, because it’s easier than championing reproductive freedom or pay equity,” you may have a point.
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 6:34 pm rating: 90
- #2.3 Shawnschexy
  
  Yes… What were women thinking? When they had “chivalrous” men to obey and cater to why oh WHY would they want to bother their pretty little heads with silly things like “voting” and “human equity”. I mean… those ovaries clearly lower their IQs and the ability to make their own decisions.
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 6:44 pm rating: 90
- #2.4 Canthz_B
  
  *backs slowly away from the pms corner*
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 7:58 pm rating: 90
- #2.5 notolaf
  
  *cowers behind Canthz B*
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 8:01 pm rating: 90
- #2.6 pony girl
  
  Um, can one of you stop cowering and open this damn door for me, please?
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 1:54 am rating: 90
- #2.7 Canthz_B
  
  I still have a few chivalrous bones in my body, PG.
  Here, let me get that door for you. Hand me your wrap, and please take this seat I’m holding out for you.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 4:37 am rating: 90
- #2.8 kmd
  
  If any proof were still needed of the actual dynamics between men and women being still patriarchal, this thread is it. Women talking about pay equity=”pms,” and women who cater to male desires are always rewarded.
  
  Also, “HandyMarigolds” ftmfw.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 7:46 am rating: 90
- #2.9 The Elf
  
  What is it with the door thing? Tell ya what. If you get to the door before me, or if you see I’ve got my hands full, hold the door for me. I’ll do the same for you if I get there first or if I see you have your hands full. Do we really have to make this complicated? It’s a DOOR.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 8:23 am rating: 90
- #2.10 HandyMarigolds
  
  Totally agree. I am female, narrow-shouldered, and short. I hold doors for whoever. I can’t stand when men scoff at me for it, or when women sail through without saying “thanks.”
  
  People who let the door slam on people behind them are neither ladies nor gentlemen.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 9:30 am rating: 90
- #2.11 Woman on the Verge
  
  That whole “equality” thing is awesome when applied to equal pay and shit, but come on… I like chivalry. Put me on a pedestal, boys. I like it up there.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 11:02 am rating: 90
- #2.12 pony girl
  
  @CB, thank you!
  @WotV, agreed!
  @HandyMarigolds, agreed! (both times)
  @The ELf, agreed!
  
  Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have some cookies to bake. (and a lawn to mow, so there!)
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 11:52 am rating: 90
- #2.13 April
  
  Yes I am with Women on the Verge about liking men to be polite and help me with carrying heavy things or help me change a tire, etc. I am a woman and I slightly more delicate one than the majority. I need chivarly. Feminism at least how many act about it today irks me. I want voting rights and equal rights and all that. I don’t hate men. I like being a stay at home mom which I did by choice even though I have two college degrees. I don’t need feminists telling me I am oppressed. Feminism means women should be able to do whatever they want if they have the talent and the will, that includes being subservient to men should they choose to do so.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 12:12 pm rating: 90
- #2.14 Mo®
  
  Dear Wo, PG, and others,
  I will continue my habit of being a Gentle(hu)man by respecting you and being of assistance wherever I can.
  
  Love Mo®
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 12:20 pm rating: 90
- #2.15 Mina
  
  So, reading this thread trying not to reply because talking about feminism on the internet usually only breaks my heart. But I was too amused by April’s comment.
  
  My best friend in the world CRIED when – at 20something – she hit 115 pounds, the heaviest she’s ever been in her life. Her hobby? Cars. She loves guys giving her attention, too, but I remember when I blew a tire… She finally decided it didn’t matter how cute the two boys who stopped to help were, she shooed them off before they broke another one of my lug nuts and just did it herself, because, seriously. It’s a tire. It doesn’t require any sort of penis to operate. Somehow, being thin and girlie hasn’t stopped her from learning how to fix cars.
  
  She also got into GA-Tech as a mechanical engineer and loves math. All this made it very confusing when she told me that she thought men were biologically programmed to be better at math and science, and women’s brains were designed by evolution to make them want to be stay at home moms. How the hell does one reap so many benefits from feminism only to say, “ehh, but it’s just not NATURAL for women to be scientists!”
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 7:12 pm rating: 90
- #2.16 Canthz_B
  
  Can I say there’s a difference between good manners and paternalism that some women just don’t seem to get?
  Or would that make me a chauvinist pig?
  
  I’ll open the car and restaurant doors for a lady.
  I’ll pull out her chair and rise for her when she leaves and returns to the table.
  But, I would never presume to order her meal for her.
  
  I don’t do these things to offend or to imply you are incapable of opening a door or pulling out a chair, it’s just how my mother taught me a lady should be treated.
  
  No need to cop an attitude about it, a simple “Thank you” will suffice.
  That’s how Mom taught my sister a gentleman should be treated.
  
  Frankly, I don’t think I could be attracted to a woman who can’t appreciate being treated like a lady, and also respected as a woman, but that’s just me.
  
  Dec 2, 2010 at 12:45 am rating: 90
- #2.17 The Elf
  
  The tire thing….. Ladies, changing a tire is not difficult. If I can do it, anyone can. They don’t get more mechanically challenged than me. When you don’t know how to change your tire you either end up paying a lot for a tow or relying on strangers who may not know what they are doing or may seek to take advantage of you.
  
  My parents wouldn’t let me get my driver’s license until I could change a tire and check/refill all the fluids. In other words, they wanted me to be able to handle the typical roadside emergencies. I thought they were too strict way back when, but when I bought my first car – a beater – and the tire got a flat, I thanked them. I changed the back tire of a Camaro (in a skirt and heels!) and still made it to work on time, tyvm.
  
  CB, I have no problem with you holding the door or pulling out a chair. But I don’t think I could be attracted to a man who had a problem with me doing the same.
  
  Dec 2, 2010 at 6:38 am rating: 90
- #2.18 Byatch
  
  @ April
  
  Sounds like you didn’t study much feminist theory during your two college degrees if you think that it’s about hating men!
  
  And feminism “irks” you? How do you think you have had the choice to go to college, to vote, to earn a decent wage, to choose whether to marry and have children, if not due to feminism?
  
  Women like you really p*ss me off. You take all the benefits of the struggle for equal rights and then undermine the need for affirmative action from your position of privilege, totally ignoring the real and serious issues facing women all over the world and the need to address them with some modicum of solidarity. Wake up to yourself, maybe do some research on the subject and stop adding to the misrepresentation of feminism as anything other than the discourse of equal rights and choices for men and women.
  
  Dec 9, 2010 at 1:53 am rating: 90
- #2.19 Canthz_B
  
  Tone it down, Byatch…my wife reads this!
  
  j/k
  
  Dec 9, 2010 at 3:08 am rating: 90
- #2.20 Kate from Iowa
  
  Well, Elf, it’s not always that simple. Imagine…3″ heels + 21″ pencil skirt + slick or gravelly road verge…Yeah, it’s possible to change the tire. It’s even possible to change the tire with no serious injuries to yourself or incidents of falling on your ass out into traffic. But honestly, if a man is in the car (in that situation) he should be the one to change the tire. Or if one drives by and stops (and doesn’t completey creep you out.) It’s not a question of “can’t” all the time, sometimes it’s a question of appropriate attire for changing the tire.
  
  Maybe you have the balance necessary. Maybe many women do. But not everybody, and it’s not always a spot where you’re not at risk if you have that difficulty. Road conditions, weather conditions, traffic conditions should all be taken into account as well as different skill (and preparedness levels) of the driver. Imagine a larger woman trying to change a tire in the breakdown lane at rush hour. Is that a good idea? Or an older woman with bad knees. Is that a good idea? Maybe it shows that I’m unreasonable but your statement “Ladies it’s not that hard, I can do it in heels and be at work on time” seems a little thoughtless and callous to me. (And I’m a larger woman who loves my heels and can change a tire and all of my auto fluids as well. It’s nothing special.)
  
  Dec 16, 2010 at 5:14 pm rating: 90
- #2.21 oi
  
  $50/year for road side assistance FTW.
  
  Dec 16, 2010 at 6:35 pm rating: 90
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#3 farcical aquatic ceremony

“Nope, your gran’pa didn’t do that whole ‘romance and assisted suicide’ thing–that was your great-aunt Connie’s department.”

Nov 30, 2010 at 6:12 pm rating: 90

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#4 Gotta23Skidoo

Wow, that last paragraph is a real doozie. Is he suggesting he’d like her to die? Also, I really wanna know what exactly she did for her mother. Angel of mercy perhaps?

Nov 30, 2010 at 6:14 pm rating: 90

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- #4.1 Elwing
  
  I read the last paragraph as that grandmother nursed her own mother on her deathbed – and that her husband wasn’t willing to do the same thing for her. Does that make sense?
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 6:12 am rating: 90
- #4.2 April
  
  Oh good point. I did not think of it that way. I was thinking more like taking care of you while you decay away in pain from lung cancer or whatever. I guess both would work.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 12:14 pm rating: 90
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#5 shwo!

I have the uncomfortable feeling that what she did for her mother was plug her tracheotomy tube…

Nov 30, 2010 at 6:16 pm rating: 90

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#6 [email protected]

There is definitely something ominous and probably best left private about that last paragraph.

Nov 30, 2010 at 6:26 pm rating: 90

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- #6.1 Michelle
  
  Agreed. I was expecting to laugh, but this entry was actually chilling.
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 11:26 pm rating: 90
- #6.2 The Elf
  
  It was both chilling and funny. Who says you can’t laugh at mercy killings? Takes all the fun out of the family reunion.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 6:57 am rating: 90
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#7 berge

I am a little confused by the last paragraph also… so the process he is trying to hurry along is death? Makes me think what she did for her mother was something like changing bedpans…

Nov 30, 2010 at 6:29 pm rating: 90

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- #7.1 HandyMarigolds
  
  Maybe we’re overthinking this. Maybe the process is some other side effect of smoking — like, skin aging, and he’s just really into wrinkly types.
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 6:36 pm rating: 90
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#8 Kay

Merry fucking Christmas. Smoke yourself to death.

Although hilarious in its typed form, this is unfortunately common type of exchange between smokers and their loved ones. There is no acknowledgement or understanding that it is a powerful addiction. The addict often hides in shame. There is no offer of assistance to quit (“What can I do to help you?”), merely an offer of more shame as punishment. We have not come as far as we think in the compassionate treatment and understanding of mental health issues of since ’88 or ’58 or ’28 for that matter. It made me laugh, but then it made me sad.

Nov 30, 2010 at 6:30 pm rating: 90

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- #8.1 Roxanne
  
  It would have been easier for me to have compassion for my smoking-addicted mother if she hadn’t spent my childhood smoking in my presence, and then accused me over and over of faking my allergic reactions to the smoke. Right now she’s lying in a hospital bed gasping for breath. I just helped the nurse change her dirty diaper. Is that compassionate enough for you?
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 6:57 pm rating: 90
- #8.2 Kay
  
  It is true, Roxanne. It would have been easier if all those things were not true.
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 7:06 pm rating: 90
- #8.3 notolaf
  
  I thought it was about her sneaking and stealing HIS cigarettes.
  
  Anyway, I can honestly say nothing my spouse has ever done in the way of substance abuse has ever hurt me so much as being lied to about it.
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 8:04 pm rating: 90
- #8.4 oi
  
  I failed to find funny in that note, in commentary sure. It is dark and threatening. The cold and emotionless typed form does not help either.
  What is this? Smoking special holidays at PAN?
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 8:08 pm rating: 90
- #8.5 The Elf
  
  Kerry can’t serve us a virtual smoked turkey for Christmas, but she sure is trying to find the next best thing!
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 7:00 am rating: 90
- #8.6 Clumber
  
  Interesting that I didn’t notice the “holidays : Smoking” as being odd. Starting when I was in 5th grade and continuing for a bit over 10 years, someone in my father’s family died over the holidays every. damn. year. A couple of weeks into November my dad would start smoking again, after quitting for the rest of the year. So I tend to associate the holidays with smoking and death and having to attend memorials and funerals.
  
  Go Kerry! (though I hope you don’t have the same association….)
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 8:19 am rating: 90
- #8.7 April
  
  Oh come on! Smoking is not a mental health issue. It is an addiction that someone chose to start and continues it by choice. I am addicted to chocolate which makes my have a big tummy and I become a bitch from hell if I don’t get some every day, but I don’t blame anyone else for that. I just eat my damn chocolate or decide to cut myself off which happened by accident once and after a week I ended up cured. I by choice ate in again and got addicted again.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 12:18 pm rating: 90
- #8.8 Miz
  
  April: Magnesium and B12 can help you get off chocolate. Seriously. Magnesium deficiencies cause chocolate cravings. A bottle of Nature’s Gate is just a few bucks–worth a try.
  
  I know I sound crazy but I started magnesium for an entirely different reason and was amazed… I have had an open box of Oreos AND an open bag of chocolate chips in my house for two months. Impossible? I thought so.
  
  Seriously. I don’t work for Nature’s Gate, really, LOL. Good luck on quitting–chocolate is much more enjoyable when you’re not addicted, and I know this from personal experience.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 2:03 pm rating: 90
- #8.9 April
  
  Thanks. I will look into that. I actually have a very bad diet in general and also a vegetarian so you might be on to something. I do get anemic and have to take iron pills.
  
  Chocolate lovers run in our family for generations to where we just eat the hell out of it. None of us are like fat either, just normal sized with maybe a little extra around the middle at most. My 3 year old is already become chocolate obsessed. He hears the word and his eyes like light up and he starts coming to try to get some.
  
  Thanks for the tip. I will try it. I really do almost have a real addiction to it because like you no way a box of oreos or chocolate chips would last around me. I have to just not buy it or I will just keep eating it till it is all gone. Stress makes it worse. I don’t overeat anything else though. I will actually give up real food to just eat chocolate. I eat like a 5 year old who makes their own choices. It is terrible.
  
  I will give it a shot!
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 8:49 pm rating: 90
- #8.10 Canthz_B
  
  As long as you’re taking shots, heroin is great for making you forget about chocolate!
  
  Actually, smoking is a recognized mental health issue, tobacco dependence (code 305.1), listed under MENTAL DISORDERS (290-319) in the ICD-9.
  
  Dec 2, 2010 at 8:46 pm rating: 90
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#9 Odious

Well, at the least there are two obvious questions after reading this.

Nov 30, 2010 at 6:44 pm rating: 90

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#10 dina

It’s actually very sad. Exasperation when someone you love won’t stop destroying themselves. Been there.

Nov 30, 2010 at 6:45 pm rating: 90

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- #10.1 farcical aquatic ceremony
  
  I’m sorry you’ve “been” in the position of watching someone you love destroy themselves. I don’t think you or the rest of us here need feel sorrow for this situation, however, because the note includes the line: “I really don’t give a damn if you smoke a carton a day, and as a matter of fact if you will return the empty I will buy you another”. I am all about feeling sad for sad things, it’s just that–in this world we live in–we don’t need to LOOK FOR things to be morose about. Chin up!
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 6:56 pm rating: 90
- #10.2 park rose
  
  I had a friend who was trying to give up smoking. Whether she did or didn’t was her business. However, she’d throw a pack in the bin, not destroy the cigarettes, go through it later, get them out. If she had actually destroyed them, she’d go down the shops for some “butter” or “milk”. The thing was, it was great if she gave up, but I never pressured her to do so, so I don’t know why she felt she had to lie to me when she went out to get her fix. Guess it’s a little similar to what is stated in Kay’s comment, it was an addiction and I guess she felt bad that she couldn’t break it, but I don’t think I added to that bad feeling. Like grandpa above, I would have added her cigarettes to the shopping list if she’d given me the money and wanted me to pick them up, but was just as happy to leave them off.
  
  The last paragraph above is definitely tar-laden humour though!
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 9:42 pm rating: 90
- #10.3 April
  
  I have to say I also have little sympathy when someone smokes themselves to death or does any kind of bad behavior like not wearing a seatbelt and it lead to their death. I feel like it is such a waste and just selfishness. Now all their loved ones have to be sad and grieve. I don’t of course express this to the loved ones and I am very supportive of everyone but I definitely think this on the inside.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 12:21 pm rating: 90
- #10.4 HandyMarigolds
  
  @April: Well, props for being polite about it.
  
  Last I checked, though, almost everyone I know has a weak spot. Got your sunscreen on? Ever ride your bike against traffic? Me, I eat a LOT of cheese. I’m putting off an appointment to check a suspicious mole. I jaywalk on my way to church.
  
  Most of us get tripped up somewhere. If you’re really living risk-free, I salute you.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 12:40 pm rating: 90
- #10.5 Miz
  
  I don’t salute risk-free living.
  
  I drink copious amounts of coffee and you know what?
  
  I don’t give a hoot if I die sooner. I enjoy coffee!!!
  
  More space for someone else who is being born right now. Give me 60 years and I’m pretty good.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 2:06 pm rating: 90
- #10.6 Canthz_B
  
  I’ll probably die five years sooner because of smoking, but I didn’t have any big plans for those last five years anyway.
  
  Dec 2, 2010 at 8:39 pm rating: 90
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#11 Patti

Connie Corleone?

Nov 30, 2010 at 6:48 pm rating: 90

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#12 smokers delight

I’m really curious about that last paragraph. What the heck does that mean?

Less important:
It’s typed!

Nov 30, 2010 at 7:05 pm rating: 90

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#13 patr

$15.00 for a carton of cigarettes! That really would be a Christmas present!

Nov 30, 2010 at 7:20 pm rating: 90

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#14 Sed

PS: Please smoke on the balcony – everyone’s apartment smells of cigarettes because someone is chain-smoking all day long. Please be considerate of your neighbours.

Nov 30, 2010 at 7:26 pm rating: 90

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#15 sduck

My grandfather hid and lied about his smoking for years. But instead of confronting him about it, my grandmother pretended not to know. Her logic: as long as he continued to smoke in “secret,” he’d probably smoke less.

Today we call that enabling.

Nov 30, 2010 at 7:28 pm rating: 90

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- #15.1 orangebandanna
  
  I agree! The same thing happens in my family, with my father. Rather than confront him, my mother pretends not to notice. It’s tragic, really.
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 8:43 pm rating: 90
- #15.2 pony girl
  
  So, adults were ‘allowed’ to make decisions regarding their own lives.
  And that’s enabling and tragic ?
  
  And here I thought that was free will.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 1:47 am rating: 90
- #15.3 Mel K
  
  I think that language is evolving in a passive aggressive sort of way.
  
  It now contains information and judgement.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 5:11 am rating: 90
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#16 Divvitar

I remember when I could get a carton of cigarettes for $15.00. Now, that’s the price of two packs! I’m so glad I quit 11 years ago! Maybe Aunt Connie donated a lung?

Nov 30, 2010 at 7:30 pm rating: 90

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#17 MJA

The fact that the submitter found this while cleaning out “her grandmother’s old apartment” makes me wonder if she hadn’t outlived him after all?

Nov 30, 2010 at 7:38 pm rating: 90

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#18 punkypower

You know what I got for Christmas? It was a banner year at the old Bender family. I got a carton of cigarettes. The old man grabbed me and said “Smoke up, Johnny!”

Nov 30, 2010 at 8:07 pm rating: 90

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- #18.1 sleeps
  
  Screws fall out all the time, the world’s an imperfect place.
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 9:08 pm rating: 90
- #18.2 Kore
  
  Okay, fine, but I didn’t dump my purse out on the couch and invite everyone into my problems.
  
  Nov 30, 2010 at 9:50 pm rating: 90
- #18.3 HandyMarigolds
  
  How come Andrew gets to get up? If he gets up, we’ll all get up! It’ll be anarchy!
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 11:00 am rating: 90
- #18.4 Mo®
  
  I’m in the physics club too.
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 12:32 pm rating: 90
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#19 Canthz_B

Free cigarettes!! I doubt she even bothered to read the note in her excited state!

Nov 30, 2010 at 8:11 pm rating: 90

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#20 BrookeDiz

“if you will return the empty I will buy you another”

I remember the good old days when cigarettes were $1.50, but I sure as heck don’t remember them coming in returnable or recyclable packs.

Nov 30, 2010 at 10:31 pm rating: 90

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- #20.1 Canthz_B
  
  I remember cigarettes costing even less than that (45¢ a pack, though I was just a kid then, not a smoker), but I sure as heck don’t remember them ever coming in variety pack cartons.
  
  In olden-days, kids could buy cigarettes, so adults would send us to the store with about 60¢ or so and have us buy their cigarettes and keep the change for ourselves. A great deal for a kid in the days of half-cent candy and 50¢ a week allowances!!
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 4:48 am rating: 90
- #20.2 Canthz_B
  
  All of that changed in the mid to late 70′s or so when smokes went up to 65¢ to 70¢ and adults got stingy because gasoline had hit 85¢ a gallon from about 35¢ a gallon in the early 7o’s and they were hurting…yeah, right. They hadn’t seen REAL inflation yet.
  
  But, I can’t blame them. I was more than highly upset when gasoline passed 95¢ and cigarettes passed $1.00, and I used them both by then on a pay of $3.15 an hour…working a part-time job!!
  
  Crap, I’ve gone and dated myself…but it wouldn’t be the first time. Those were some lonely times, but I’m on wife three now!
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 5:19 am rating: 90
- #20.3 HandyMarigolds
  
  Did the first two marriages last longer than that cigarette story?
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 11:04 am rating: 90
- #20.4 Canthz_B
  
  Sure they did. It didn’t take my story four years to get you on my nerves (1st), or for you to drop dead (2nd).
  
  Dec 2, 2010 at 7:21 pm rating: 90
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#21 Jason

that note is pretty hardcore.

Nov 30, 2010 at 11:19 pm rating: 90

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#22 Mel K

I think the last para meant that she cared for her mum when her mum was dying and that the note writer refuses to go through that and whomever Connie is, she will be enlisted to help.

Too many childhood years of eavesdropping at the top of the stairs finally come to good use.

Dec 1, 2010 at 1:11 am rating: 90

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- #22.1 Slap Stick
  
  Wow you really cracked that case before anyone else. How’s the pay these days when you work in rocket science?
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 8:10 am rating: 90
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#23 WMDKitty

That last bit sounds waaaaay too much like a death threat…

Dec 1, 2010 at 3:31 am rating: 90

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#24 Grant

Aw! And grandma kept the note. There’s love for you.

Dec 1, 2010 at 4:15 am rating: 90

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#25 divaandwriter

If they were cleaning out Grandma’s old apartment, it looks like she, the smoker, outlived Grandpa, the anti-romantic.

Dec 1, 2010 at 9:20 am rating: 90

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#26 SqueakyWheel

I remember smoking with the family … sort of.

See, I started when I was 16, and my older sister was 17. Neither old enough to buy. But I’d always steal one of the two packs in her dresser drawer.

Come to find out, she stole two packs from the three in dad’s dresser drawer. Dad, in turn, stole three packs from the five in Grandpa’s desk drawer. Grandpa stole five packs from the ten in Grandma’s carton.

We finally stopped and fessed up when Grandma told us she thought she had Alzheimer’s, cause she didn’t remember smoking all of those cigarettes.

–

On a less light note (cause underage family smoking is so funny!), the note actually kind of exemplifies “PAN”. There’s no direct confrontation (ie, in person) about the lying and smoking. Just the “gift” and the note attached, with plenty of guilt.

Grandpa, whoever he was, obviously did care for her, enough to be hurt by her dishonesty with him.

Dec 1, 2010 at 10:30 am rating: 90

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- #26.1 farcical aquatic ceremony
  
  : ) death by carcinogens notwithstanding, that is HILARIOUS!!! I can’t help but picture all of you sneaking around like cartoon characters–hands held up, bent at the wrist just so, little mincing footsteps–complete with cartoony ‘sneaky-music’!
  
  p.s. I hope you and all your loved ones managed to quit in time to save your health, but I know this is not likely to be the case : (
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 10:57 am rating: 90
- #26.2 SqueakyWheel
  
  Yeah, it went on for about six months. Even now, we laugh about it sometimes. I keep thinking I want to draw a comic about the life I grew up in – we had a lot of those moments.
  
  As far as quitting – I’m the only one who still smokes, and I go through about a pack a month. They’re my stress reliever. I’ve found on really bad days, I can smoke half a cig and feel soooo much better. More than half, and I’m puking it up. So, it balances out, I suppose?
  
  Dec 1, 2010 at 3:04 pm rating: 90
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#27 paranoidandroid

$15.00 for 2 packets of cigarettes is hell cheap!! I’m a non smoker, but I have friends who smoke. One bought a carton last week and it cost $125…(australian dollars)…thats a weeks work of shopping for me!!

I also found the last paragraph a little too…creepy…sooo glad he’s not my husband!

and smokers, if you’re gonna light up, by all means do, just make sure you’re not right out side the entrance of shops or under a “this is a non smoking area” cos you’re gonna cop a mouthful from me. Neither me or my kids want to inhail your carcinogens.

Dec 1, 2010 at 11:15 am rating: 90

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#28 pony girl

@27,

I have friends that smoke, and they don’t pay anywhere near that for a carton.
Next time I go to Australia, I’m bringing some cigs to sell, jeez.

Dec 1, 2010 at 11:56 am rating: 90

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#29 April

This note reminds me of the old “In Living Color” skit where the too old people try to kill each other and then would be like “And we Still together!”

Dec 1, 2010 at 12:25 pm rating: 90

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#30 Miz

You gotta love the fact that this guy is totally passive-aggressive in this note, she’s just sneaking ciggies, and yet people are using this to debate whether or not women who don’t like doors held open for them are bitches.

If the woman had written this, she would have been written off as a bitch, end of story.

Dec 1, 2010 at 1:55 pm rating: 90

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#31 Somethingtosay

Haha.

Dec 1, 2010 at 4:45 pm rating: 90

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#32 Kittymama

Oh, my goodness. Most family members who’d like a loved one to quit smoking have already tried everything, including helping. It’s one of the strongest addictions there is. So I figure this note follows all the years of everything else having being tried, and G’pa’s just at the end of his patience. That said, it cracks me up, and it also sounds a lot like my husband, who thinks everything should be fair.

Dec 2, 2010 at 5:28 pm rating: 90

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#33 juniper

Well, I think we can safely say that the aggression in this one makes it some way past the passive mark.

Dec 4, 2010 at 6:19 am rating: 90

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#34 Painful Honesty « Copywrite1985

[...] This Christmas, give the gift of honesty (passiveaggressivenotes.com) [...]

Dec 8, 2010 at 8:25 am rating: 90

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#35 valerie

awww, this is actually really sad

Dec 25, 2010 at 11:40 am rating: 90

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#36 How’s that for compromise? | PassiveAggressiveNotes.com

[...] related: Give the gift of honesty [...]

Nov 29, 2011 at 7:33 pm rating: 90

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