Quite how I'm not sure
For the past 9 years, myself, my Dad and my bro and his wife have always met up at 11am for a Christmas breakfast. Perfectly normal behaviour...

Except when you come in and hear the music playing.

Yes for nine years in a row, our yuletide festivities have always been accompanied by the sounds of Radiohead's album "The Bends".

This has now got to the point where "Street Spirit" has now become the first track that comes to mind whenever anyone mentioned christmas music.. hmm.
( MCQ Cartoons n' shit: bagowank.com, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 15:07, Reply)

Eh?
A rather odd QOTW, but there you go....

My ex had this odd tradition in her family that, if you opened a bottle of champagne for a celebration of some event or milestone, you had to keep the cork and stick a coin in it. Never seen this anywhere else.
(The Moai, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 15:06, Reply)

A Silly one
...from childhood.

When my family went on any long journeys, we'd play with the bridges. Anyone who failed to duck when we went under one had their head knocked off, and anyone who failed to lift their feet whilst going over them had their feet chopped off.

I still do this now, despite getting around on a motorbike.
(jamesthegill opens new tabs with his scroll wheel, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 15:01, Reply)

Length
This is the best question ever... By the way I do the 'Norbert Dentressangle' thing too.

When you're on holiday you have to spot Renault Twingos. You have to shout Twingo when you see one, you get points. Then you win.

When you've finished a boiled egg, turn it upside down in the egg cup and give it to your dad/mum/sister whoever, they think it's a new egg, and HILARIOUSLY try to open it - yes, this has been funny for all 23 years of my life and it still cracks me up.

Superstition stuff - I used to do lots of debating at school (insert your lame pun here) and was rather good at it. However I could ONLY win a competition if I was wearing John Lewis 20 denier nearly black tights. Any other tights would bring doom upon my perfomance, my school, and possibly the whole world. I also had to eat a McDonalds apple pie, but this was more to do with the sugar high giving me the arrogance necessary to destroy any point some arrogant suit-wearing floppy-haired public schoolboy might raise... They thought they could out-argue me because daddy owned half of Lincolnshire... My sugar high says silence, fool!

Actual tradition - I went to Cambridge and got scholared - I had to wear a gown and stand in a long line in a room with no electricity before swearing to lead 'a life of innocency and diligence' in Latin whilst kneeling in front of a man in a Henry the 8th hat. Then - and this the 'on thursdays' part - we got seed cake and madeira - at 3 in the afternoon. Like, what??? Seed cake??? 'Oooh, you're really clever, have some sponge cake with budgie food in it?' This said, I thought it was awesome. It did make an impression on me which is the point of traditions I suppose... Ritual and Romance.

Right, this is my second ever post, sorry for it being excessively long and full of typos. I'll go now. In fact I haven't had McDOnalds apple pie for about 6 years so I think I know where I'm going, too...
(Mademoiselle_violette, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 15:00, Reply)

I own a disabled dog...
Whenever I hear "My Generation" by The Who, or if I see an ad for the RSPCA, I sing:

"PEOPLE TRY TO PUT HER DOWN...TALKING 'BOUT MY BLIND ALSATION".

If she's in the room at the time, I sneak up on her and we have a wrestle.

Apologies to anyone reading this in Braille.
(skindley, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:56, Reply)

Weird Tradition
Go to bed on Xmas otherwise the Xmas Monster will get you - and take you away . All well and good to try and make Rockster's brother and cousins go to sleep on Xmas Eve until Mother came bursting in one Xmas eve to tell us to be quiet, and my brother shit the bed in terror...still we killed that tradition - they can be killed!!!

Ducking under bridges on Motorways

Playing bastard shitting Rummikub on Boxing day (causes mass family rucktions when I refuse and go out) I do not know why they replaced Monopoly with that freak game.
(Rockster77, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:55, Reply)

Touchy touchy feely feely
Whilst on every Ski holiday (esp in France) all the group plays a novel game called touchy touchy feely feely - Now, the French have a certain perchant for wearing some hideous all in one Ski outfits, bumbags, silly hats and (hopefully) monoski's or the like.

The Game is this: Spot any of the mentioned items on a skier, you then attempt to get as close to them as possible - You then have to "stroke" the garment, points awarded for style, manner and the pleasure on your face when performed. This sometimes involves hacking your way down a slope after one of the all-in-oner's, or best a group. Also involves fighting thru the ski life queue to get one.
Best effort was a man decked in full all-in-one day glo yellow nastiness, a bumbag...and the first mono-skies of the holiday! My friend acquired double points by shuffling up to him, gave him a bear-hug and said he wanted some meaningful huggles in his best french. They were both men.
( -:Coop:-, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:54, Reply)

Call me old fashioned
But I am a very traditional kind of lover. When I meet a nice girl, I like to buy her flowers, take her for a nice meal, then bone her on the first date.
( Captn Hood-Butter is not dead yet., Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:54, Reply)

Same as kmlabs
making silly phrases using the letters on a cars registration plate has got to be done.
( Bongmaster Is a Junglist Soldier., Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:53, Reply)

I lived here...
Devon Dan, i take it your an ex-leopard then?

My own personal tradition is one of having to secretly write my name somewhere on a building i've lived in. My first flat has written on the brickwork underneath the windowsill (flat was on the third floor, GF had to hold my legs whilst I worte it...) name and dates that I lived there. Next place, lifted up the carpet in one room loosened a floorboard, wrote name and dates on it and replaced it. Flat i'm currenlty selling has signature and date in teeny tiny writing on the bottom of a a skirting board, currently covered by carpet.

Not really sure why I do it, guess it's my low-tech unfamous equivalent of one of those blue plaques.
(Moonfrog1, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:48, Reply)

Strange child
As a child the following were essential to stress-free living:

1) Never flushing the toilet until the last second before leaving the bathroom (otherwise you will get sucked in- obviously)

2) If you are playing outside, and a plane goes overhead, then you must run and stand indoors- or at least stand in a doorway so that the lintel is above your head (otherwise the plane will fall on you- obviously)

3) Always take the biggest step that you can from farthest away from the bed to get into bed (so anything nasty under it won't grab your ankles- obviously)

In addition we had to:

4) Every Sunday night, at dinner round at your grandmothers, put on a 'show' with your cousin and sister for the grown-ups which usually involved some dancing, some singing, etc. (none of us were particularly talented so this must have been fairly tortuous to everyone- obviously. Thank god there were no camcorders then)

5) Say 'It's taken boggart' when the angel chimes on the table at Christmas dinner did that thing where they suddenly go mentally fast as enough heat as built up. Something to do with an old Yorkshire relative (obviously)

6) Try and be the first to shout 'I can see the sea!' when driving to holidays in Cornwall. This was no fun, Mum always won. Obviously- she sat in the front and is nearly 6' tall

Now, about my only tradition is cackling like a hag when ever I fart in a noxious way that is becoming disturbingly more common as I grow older.

edit: Oh yes, and we do the champagne cork/silver coin thing thing as well. So far I have them from my 18th, my 21st, and my engagement. People used to do it with sixpences apparently, we now do it with 20p's. The silver is for luck. Obviously.
(clapper, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:46, Reply)

Never had any...
When I ended up at Uni, I thought it would be full of old traditions and bizarre rituals (Animal House is one of my favourite films...) but unfortunately it wasn't.

So instead we invented our own: Stealing the Dean's car park sign (whilst drunk), Monday Night Punch* Night (more drunkeness), compulsory 24-hour drinking during the summer/winter ball (drunkeness) ... can you see the pattern here?

Best bit was that we did pass them on to the next intake.

[edit: just for sprout that one - us at UCL were only jealous...]


*fiver in each and buy as much booze as possible. Pour into bucket. Drink. Disney Karaoke. No standing on the floor. etc. No wonder my liver is fucked.

(antonye, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:45, Reply)

Weeeeeeeeee bonk road
We have a road near us (a slip road onto the A1 near Morpeth) where the road does a kind of big circular swoop to get onto the carriageway. Our family has a tradition of shouting weeeeeeeeeeee while we go round the circular bit and then BONK when we hit the A1.
(darkmavis86, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:45, Reply)

Oldest educational institution in England
so we are inevitably going to have thousands of stupid traditions. A few crackers are:

Every 100 years, the fellows of All Souls have to chase a wooden duck around the quad and sing a silly song about it.

Every year, when daylight savings time is applied, everyone at Merton has to dress up in sub fusc and walk backwards round the main quad drinking port, in order to preserve the space/time continuum, or something

Christ Church has its own time zone, 5 minutes ahead of the rest of the country

Come May Day, just about everyone in the universtiy goes down to Magdalen bridge, gets stupidly drunk, and breaks both legs jumping off into 3 feet of filthy water.

All this from arguably the greatest university in the country. I dread to think what madness the filthy tabs get up to.
(Sprout, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:43, Reply)

Eggs.
My brother-in-law loves eggs, so mum always makes sure that some boiled ones are ready for him when the family descends for tea... Then we all make stupid jokes up "Egg-cellent", "The yolks on you", etc. until we are all in tears with laughter... It's guaranteed to be brought up every time we all get together, so I guess that's tradition. Also, when we were children, if we became a touch rowdy, mum would always say "There will be tears before Bedtime" - I still think it applies now we are all over 30 and have kids of our own.
(surfergirl is riding the wave of luurvveee, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:40, Reply)

Coins
It's been my tradition/habit since I was about 18 (almost 20 years ago) to always turn coins Queen face down. Two reasons:
1) I despise the royal money-sponging waste-of-space bastards
2) Freddie was a far superior Queen! I idolised him so I hid the fakes!
I still do it to this day even though I'm not really a Queen (the band) fan anymore.
( Father_Ted Drink!, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:32, Reply)

Christmas.
It's fucking rubbish; nobody ever buys me anything I want and my nan always does a poo somewhere inappropriate.
( grey kid is breakdancing to save a community centre, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:29, Reply)

Footie "Tradtion"
Whenever someone whacks a shot waaaaay over the bar, I automatically shout,

"Redhill".

Fuck knows why. Probably cos my Dad does it too and it's stuck. Bizarrely enough, it's where I live, but that's no excuse, surely?
( milkybarnick is calming down Boris on, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:27, Reply)

Fairy Bridge
There's a bridge on the Isle of Man, on the Douglas-to-Castletown road - a tiny humpback bridge - under which the wee folk of Mananan live. No, really.

They like nothing better than polite people, but despise the curt or rude. Seriously. Whenever one crosses the bridge, one must say "Hello fairies" (preferably in Manx Gaelic), and the wee folk will grant you a wish - because they can. And these wishes come true. Honest. I always wished for world peace, and see - it *has* happened, hasn't it?

But should you fail to greet the fairies when crossing the bridge, they'll curse you! Oh yes. Terrible things have befallen the rude travellers who failed to hail the good wee folk of Mananan. Dreadful, sinister things. Like, er... um... well, I lost my car keys - for almost an hour! Er...
( no cake for the impuritay Patrick Stewart hasn't aged since, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:20, Reply)

I'm obsessive compulsive, with anxiety and other phobias (according to my NHS Mental Health TEAM ( /!!/ GO MENTAL HEALTH TEAM /!!/ ))..
At school I was very.. bad;

Night before;
- Kick a pink tennis ball against the left radiator pipe seven times

- Wash, Brush teeth, get drink, sleep - always in that order; else I'd do it again

- Count from 1-60 (seconds) during the 13th minute of whenever I went to sleep

- If I opened my eyes I'd say "1,2,3" and shut them again

- Has a near-script I'd say to my Mum every night

- Add 10% onto a "luck scale" thing every week, which would be said aloud before I went to sleep. Hard to explain. I got to about 5000%. Extra 10% on Wednesdays.

- Wednesdays were unlucky days (namely because I got my head pushed through a display cabinet, kicked down the stairs, and chased around the school in two weeks ALL ON WEDNESDAYS :O!)

- Always sleep on my right side

- Only have ONE sip of water; no matter how thisty I was

- If I got into bed and it was say; 10:20, I'd wait until 11:13 so I could count it through and then go to sleep

...

In the mornings;

- Early days: Sing "I believe I can fly" at 07:11 (I don't know why O.o)

- Stand completely still and constantly say "quit that" - as if to end the thought incase it came true - at 7:13, and 7:14 just incase ( yes! )

- Kick that pink tennisball around infront of me the whole time I was getting ready

- Goodbye script again to my Mum

..

And many many more! But that was just for School. I'm at uni now (ART PHOTOGRAPHY /!!/) and am quite a bit better. But I still find myself doing random stuff now and then.

So uh, yeah. I don't know if that's amusing or not - but I think in terms of weird tradiations and routines; I have quite a few.

x

edit: and piles of paper (or things on desks) that aren't perfectly straight edged with each other annoy me more THAN ANYTHING ON GOD'S DAMN GREEN EARTH :@
( stevierar, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:19, Reply)

standard ones: right shoe first time, saluting magpies
not so standard i think: 2 decades ago me and my firends in primary school started one, every 1st of the month you chant 'Pinch Punch, Can't get me back till the start of next month' as you pinch and punch your victim (lightly!). They then have to try and catch you out a month later, and the cycle continues...

It now survives in adulthood oddly enough as seeing who can be the first to text/mail it to the other... running still between both me and the girlfriend, and with my brother. And I still take an inordinate amount of pleasure out of winning it...

length/girth/etc jokes are now a tragic tradition. please let it die.
( WhoElse I'm what Willis was talking about, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:16, Reply)

weird traditions..!
Like there aren't enough weird traditions in England already! What about that annual festival involving rolling a cheese down a hill and dashing after it, at potential risk of limb?
(loup-garou, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:15, Reply)

My old school had some rules/traditions which were left over from centuries ago
School monitors were allowed to have beards and smoke pipes and the head of school was allowed to keep a goat on the main field. No idea what caused them to be in place.
Obviously, if the rules say you can smoke a pipe and grow a beard, you have to smoke a pipe and grow a beard. No one likes breaking from tradition
( Devon Dan without geometry, there would be no point, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:13, Reply)

oooh!
every time you drive through a tunnel you have to try and hold your breath the whole way through

also, the game of "yellow car" where whenever you see one you have to say "yellow car!" and hit whoever you're with.

there was also a tradition at my primary school in cornwall where on the last day when all the year 6 kids would be never coming back, everyone in the school would line up in 2 lines either side of the school gates and the year 6 kids would walk down the middle to say bye to everyone
(harrietthespy, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:09, Reply)

thou shallt not suffer a witch to...
...use your empty egg shell as a boat.
All empty egg shells in our household had to be smashed, or - if they were in egg-cups - you poked the bottom out with your teaspoon.

So the witches couldn't use them as boats.

How the merry feck are they meant to do that? I mean, are witches very small? Do they make the egg shells bigger?
I've pondered this for many many moons now.
( no cake for the impuritay Patrick Stewart hasn't aged since, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:08, Reply)

Younger
When we were younger my bro and I would walk to my Nan's, I once asked why we never walked on the otherside of the road, and my brother said we were going the quickest way because of how the road bent. From then on, every time we walked down that road, one of us would have to declare "We'd still be walking round that bend now". This went on for many years. And still does now.

Oh, and Yellow Car game, punch as hard as you can the person closest, tractors - build a spliff...the car games are endles...

Lenght/girth? The Bigger The Better in my opinion...
(wormeater, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:07, Reply)

Nothing overly exciting...
Take a pack of playing cards whenever I go on holiday. I half believe it wards off terrible things happening such as the plane falling out of the sky.

When I was a student to run the naked 400m at Loughborough uni. running track after a great deal of booze.
(DrGonzo, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:05, Reply)

It's a Tradition that I win EVERY argument
I think it's because I am always right.


also g/f has tradition of making a wish when she puts her knife into a new tub of margarine. Never have got a reason why out of her. Odd though.
(CerberusDog woof, Thu 28 Jul 2005, 14:04, Reply)