Another family tradition
is to always use Pump 8 at our local Texaco. It's the best pump by miles. I got a new car with the filler cap on the wrong side, and I put up with having to stretch the big pipey thing over my roof just so that I can still use pump 8.
(jimbo_smiff, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 14:26, Reply)

Snipers
The theory goes that you don't light 3 cigarettes with one match. The flare from the cigarette being lit is a signal as such.
1st - Attracts attention
2nd - aims his sights
3rd - pulls the trigger
(/lurks], Fri 29 Jul 2005, 14:23, Reply)

New Year
My housemate's nan and mum won't wash clothes on the 1st of January. Apparently the ol' 'Wash on New Year's Day, wash your family away' rule applies. I stick to it just to be on the safe side.

Also I have to crush eggshells into bits particularly if it's a boiled eggs. According to my nan's lunacy witches will make boats out of them. Be warned people!

Oh and you have to have new 'jamas on Christmas Eve. It's the law.
(Bunnygirl, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 14:19, Reply)

Rachelswipe/ Throbbe
Because the lit cigarette was held in a cupped hand when being smoked so as to disguise the glowing tip.
( M o D, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 14:18, Reply)

Rabbits...
My family say that at the beginning of the month as well, but it's 'white rabbits'. And, according to my gran, it has to be the FIRST thing you say when you wake up on the 1st.

For some reason.
(scunnydelight, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 14:16, Reply)

peas
unholysmoke- my dad just waits until someone drops a pea off their plate and shouts 'STOP PEEING ON THE TABLE!' Gets me every time i swear.

And is mine the only family that says 'rabbits' on the first of the month? i've said it to a couple of friends and received strange looks.
( rosie posie tingly bongly, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 14:10, Reply)

Boxing Day
Every year (even b4 i was born) my family have gone down to my Nan and Grandads house for boxing day. Italian family...loads of people..very traditional. Every year i went...except the Christmas just gone.

oh...and wot made me break this well established tradition of the previous 25 years....my boyfriends birthday. Me...bein the goodacting girl that i am decided to have a birthday party for him instead. I thought that in our third christmas I really should celebrate his birthday how he wanted to. So down our local. All our mates. Great laugh. Hmph...not so effing great now is it. Recently split up.

note to self...stick with tradition..it only ends in tears.
(Oops....did I say that out loud cos I really bloody want to., Fri 29 Jul 2005, 14:06, Reply)

speed bumps
Whenever I go over a speed bump, I must let my hands come off the steering wheel as I hit it, then flop back into the seat like a rag doll.

When my friends are in the car, we all do this automatically, without uttering a word.

We've done it for so long, it is impossible to go over a speed bump without doing it.
(nonstopdancer, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:58, Reply)

Possible threat to life but....
On the way back from the pub or where ever at night, i always walk in the road rather than on the pavement. I think this comes from when i used to live in a more rural area n didnt fancy getting dragged in the bushes from some weirdo.

Dont let anyone tell u speed makes u paranoid.......
(Oops....did I say that out loud cos I really bloody want to., Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:51, Reply)

I only do the upside-down fag thing...
...if I have a vacant moment and try to light the filter end so, I stick it back in the pack upside down, thereby earmarking it as skinup material for later - waste not want not ;)
(thatblokeoverthere not quite as much an arsehole as I thought, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:40, Reply)

Shag
Everyone in my family has the nickname "Shag". My dad and mum call each other Shag. My dad calls myself and my brother Shag. He calls mum's brother Shag. Quite embarrassing when you've got your mates over as an adolescent and he's hollering it up the stairs (to summon mother). But quite sweet really, I understand it's a type of duck (as well as being an activity carried out in the dark in wet and sticky conditions).
(Vernie, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:39, Reply)

My sister's traditions
Two that I remember and revenge for them...

She's an odd one... She gives you a punch on the arm every time a Beetle goes past... Painful if a lorry load of them passes you.

Back when she was 12 every time you said 'What?' in her presence you got a punch on the arm.

In retaliation we picked up on the amount of times she said 'I'm not bothered' and repeated it back every time she said it.
( beefandcheese, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:34, Reply)

throbbe
i always wondered about that ww1 thing. i mean, why would the snipers not be able to take aim from the presumably equally visible lit cigarette ends glowing merrily away in the darkness...
( rachelswipe with a fork, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:34, Reply)

Every August for the last 15 years
me and a bunch of mates sit in a field in the middle of Oxfordshire, listening to some music whilst getting shitfaced.
(Doctor Evil, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:34, Reply)

I have a really weird tradition/habit...
... of repeating my posts to QOTW.
( ogwen69 has returned from Reddit, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:33, Reply)

I have a really weird tradition/habit...
... of repeating my posts to QOTW.
( ogwen69 has returned from Reddit, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:33, Reply)

I have a really weird tradition/habit...
... of repeating my posts to QOTW.
( ogwen69 has returned from Reddit, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:32, Reply)

I
always poo in the disabled cubicle at work.....Don't really know why, just do. (It's bigger with its own sink and everything!!)

Ooooh, I never walk under ladders either, even now at 30 years of age. Nearly get run over in the process, but at least that wouldn't be bad luck or anything.........
( D3xt3r Don't take any guff from these fucking swine...., Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:27, Reply)

Whenever my sister and I...
...greet each other on the phone we do it in either one of two ways.

Sister who made the call: 'Yo mamaaaaaaa!'
Other sister: 'Your daddy smells of biscuits!'

or

Sister who made call: 'Ooooh REALLLLLLLY?!'
Other sister: 'Up your butt with a coconut!'

It is sad, seeing as we are 26 and 24. I still have no idea how it started, but we have been greeting each other like that for about 3 years now...
(LadyIsATramp, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:22, Reply)

eggy
always break empty eggshells. or witches will use them as boats.
(tinatwoturners, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:19, Reply)

high school drama club.
Once upon a time, when it was but my first year in the drama club, a talented, prominent, and slightly insane upperclassmen made a photocopy of his penis and hung it on the ceiling just inside the main curtain. At the end of every play it became tradition, after curtain call, for everyone to simultaneously step backward and salute the cock. Even after the building was refurbished and the cock removed.
(save a quarter, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:17, Reply)

traditional or just plain wierd?....
when driving over a cattle gird...i am now in the well established habit of saying 'frooooooooom'
(Oops....did I say that out loud cos I really bloody want to., Fri 29 Jul 2005, 13:10, Reply)

DRSOLOMANIAC
My mate does that funny upside fag thing.....she has a go at me when i smoke it.

...she will be glad shes not the only one to do that....

Length and girth...ha ha...only said that to keep the tradition and annoy others.
(Oops....did I say that out loud cos I really bloody want to., Fri 29 Jul 2005, 12:40, Reply)

Texan Traditions
On one of my frequent trips across the atlantic to visit familiy in the states, i was exposed to an odd tradtion involving a fictional bird and a pillow case. My uncle (trailer dwelling, red-neck, evangelical baptist) took my brother and i (both 8 yrs old) out into the woods at night fall, under the pretense that we were hunting small yet tastey nocturnal birds called Snipes. This involved holding the pillow case open in the pitch black, poisonous bug/snake infested darkness and immitating the call of the Snipe. After preforming the Snipe call for a while, my brother and i realised that my uncle had disappeared. We proceeded to run wildly in the direction we thought we had come from screaming for help.
Apparently it is traditional to inflict this hilarious rouse on new comers...well, it beats a good old fashion linching.
(sterlingsmithe, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 12:30, Reply)

lucky petrol pump.
I've got a lucky petrol pump at my local Esso station. Pump number 8, if you fill up there your guaranteed to have a good night, wherever your off to. :o)
(Dubplate, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 12:17, Reply)

Traditions
A mate of mine, lets call him Eric, replies to every question you ask him by proclaiming 'Time you got a watch'. eg
Q 'How you doing Eric'
Ans 'Time you got a watch'
Never seemed to harm his social life...weird.
P.s. dont know if this strictly counts as a tradition, QOTW should have been based on recounting friends' eccentricites...
(sterlingsmithe, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 12:12, Reply)

hotdog
I do that, nothing strange about keeping on the good side of magpies as they can bring terrible curses if they wish, Also upon entering devon everyone in the car must say "men of devon brave are we" and when traveling in a car the first person to see the sea must say "I see the sea, the sea sees me with cadburys dairy milk".
( Vultan the real one I threw my little yellow shoe, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 12:10, Reply)

erm ......... no subject DOH
birthdays consist of tequilla, ever since we were 15 the only drink you celebrate your own birthday with is tequila, that way when you puke it's that much worse.

at christmas leaving a mince pie, a carrot and some sherry for father christmas (even though my brother and sister are 39 and 34 respectivly)

(insert lenght/girth/cherry double entendre)


At school we used to have to give over ONE trainer when we were caught wearing them, and at the the end of the day go a get it, and go through the ritual of the detention teacher slowly writing out the concern slip for parent to read/sign so that we'd miss the bus.
Also another tradition from school of when fighting in the changing rooms pushing people into the showers and turning them on.

finally, E no more than twice a year, for sanity's sake
(Bored, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 12:08, Reply)

some the same, some different
they might not be different, i didnt finish reading all the previous posts

1. the pinch and punch for the first day of the month thing, also a flick in the ear for being so queer and a punch and a kick for being so quick, but if you said "white rocks" before anyone got you you were immune til next month

2. there is a girl and boy side of the backseat of the car (girls on the left, boys on the right - in righthand drive cars anyway)

3. when drunkenly playing around-the-world (darts) all numbers become -ses. as in oneses, twoses, threeses etc

4. punch buggy games, though when simple "punch buggy, no returns" accompanied with the punch was to obvious, it morphed into "punch buggy, what colour is it" followed by punching until the punchee gets the right colour (yellow becomes canary, red becomes vermillion etc)

the rest might just be me:
5. when the only person sleeping on a bunk bed set, you *have* to sleep on the top bunk so as to easily keep an eye on the empty bottom bunk

6. when someone makes a pun you must shout PUN! loudly at them in congratulations

7. burgers have to be eaten with the seeded side of the bun up. if someone is eating their burger upside-down, right it for them

ooh i think this is the first time ive had any length to apologise for
(dawa, Fri 29 Jul 2005, 12:04, Reply)