Just so you don't think I'm biased against Mark's mom, Warty, here's an entry about my parents' visit.

My parents arrived early in the morning and took a taxi from the airport to the hotel down the street from our house. My dad phoned saying they were in the lounge having coffee so Bert & Mark & I walked over. My dad has a special power with babies and Bert LOVED him.

My dad: Hello, Bert, nice to meet you. How you doin'?
Bert: LOLOLOLOL!
My dad: How you doin'?
Bert: HAHA!
My dad: HOWYOUDOIN'?
Bert: Hee hee!
My dad: How YOU doin'?
Bert: ROFL!
...and so on. I have NEVER heard Bert laugh like that before. I'm not even sure I heard him laugh before! It's great -- he laughs all the time now. I had him laughing for ages this afternoon.

My mom: Hey, let's go up to the room. George, you can get me an overpriced wine from that 'honour-system' wine bar downstairs -- it's after 5pm somewhere.
(It is 11am.)
Me: Mom, it's early, surely you don't need to drink this early!
My mom: I'm on vacation.

[Sidenote: "I'm on vacation" is what a few people who have come to visit have used as an excuse to be a drunk asshole. If coming to visit me is "vacation" and necessitates a lot of drinking, you are actually a sad sad drunkard, not a fun person who "usually doesn't drink this much."]

So for most of the time, things were okay, but my mom is a mean drunk and she did a few things that annoyed me. Bert is in the middle of a growth spurt and has been nursing a lot (until today, actually). Among other things, my mom said he needs a wet nurse, a pacifier (aka dummy), and should start on baby rice in a couple weeks (when he is 3 months old) because it will fill him up.

Nothing against pacifier users, but I'm not using one for my kid. My mom is SO MAD about that. She got all drunk one night and said I should be using one instead of "giving my baby drugs." I give Bert anti-colic drops that have done wonders for his gas -- he was having trouble sleeping it was so bad and a health visitor recommended it. Mean while, my mom is a pill-popping drunk.
Speaking of pills, my parents take these pills that stop you from digesting fat and you just poop it all out. Sounds good, except apparently, you also get wet oily farts that are hard to manage. I'd rather be fat than constantly be afraid of pooping in my pants, thanks! ;D
Back to the pacifier/dummy issue: I'm in Edinburgh after a particularly rough afternoon. Bert was screaming and crying and I was trying to adjust the ring-sling I had him in to nurse him and he kept making himself all stiff and almost falling out and I'm trying to stop him from falling onto the concrete and not expose my boob to the people of Edinburgh while he is screeching and she shouted, "this is why you need a fucking pacifier!!!" it was the last straw in a day full of drunk baiting (among about a dozen other things, she kept trying to get me to feed him a "french fry"). I said "fuck you!" [not the wittiest comeback, but hey, I was MAD] and told her to stop telling me how to raise my damn baby and a pacifier is a really stupid thing to give a really hungry baby. And then probably everybody got a glimpse of my boob and Bert stopped crying.
(She sent my dad over to my flat the next day to apologise for her. That's a first.)

Later that evening, she was all drunk in a Tesco Metro and I heard her say, "why don't they have cheese popcorn here? This country SUCKS!!"

Other random quotes:

"Barack Obama is totally a Muslim and is going to turn the US into a Muslim state. I know this because my dentist told me."

"Do you have any birth control? Even though I'm 54 and haven't had my period in a year, I think I'm ovulating and I don't want to get pregnant. . . .No, not condoms, like foam or something. . . .You're allergic to foam? Good, let me have yours!" (As if I would have foam, even though I was allergic to it -- peeing after putting in foam hurts as badly as pushing out a baby!)

"I love your friend Cristina and she is your first normal friend, but she totally had a nose job. Italians -- even half-Italians don't have noses like that. I mean, they did a good good job, you totally can't tell." (She totally didn't have one.)

"You don't hunch over now that you have Bert. You're WAY less of a hunchback."

"I don't want to bring that record player back to your sister, that record player is STUPID!"

"I'm so proud of your boobs -- I mean, because you're breastfeeding!"

"You can't use a girdle! Your muscles will learn to depend on it and stop working!"

"I need to use the toilet now!! You know, my fat-pills!!" *later* "Nevermind. It's too late. Just don't walk behind me, okay?"

There were a lot of other mean comments and annoying things, too (for instance, if you burp, stutter, or mispronounce anything, she will call you on it at the top of her lungs; also, she had this really creepy way of rocking Bert; also, she babysits for these kids and I learned she picks at the baby's cradle cap and smoked around her -- even if it was outside -- and said she called the cigarettes fagarillos, in case the girl started talking one day and mentioned them to her mom; also, I lost a few fake gems from a fake gem brooch and she was all, "oh, that's a pity," but it turns out she was talking about a painting of a massacre behind me and when she realised I thought she was being sympathetic, she was all, "OH BOO FUCKING HOO, THERE'S A PAINTING OF A MASSACRE AND DEAD BLOODY BODIES, AND YOU THINK I'M SORRY YOU LOST A FAKE JEWEL FROM YOUR TACKY FAKE PIN?!?!!!!!! OH, GIVE ME A FUCK-ING BREAK!!! JESUS CHRIST, HOW SELF-CENTERED ARE YOU?!").

Also, this is hilarious, she was SOBBING at the bus station the day they left (that's not the funny part) and she said, "I'd be crying even if I weren't drunk!" and "There's this syndrome old people have -- unless they're Jewish -- where they get so sad THEY DIE!"