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20th December 2016
12:18am GMT
Here are 21 phrases that will tap into the very essence of what makes this strange but wonderful breed tick – and will leave you looking like the BEST son or daughter in the whole wide worlds.
A throwaway line like this is MAMMY HEROIN.
She’d sooner let a hole in the ground swallow her up than actually admit it, but Mam loves to know – or think – that she’s the singular biggest influence on everything about you.
Your gluten-free high-lactose low-GI diet can go on hold for a day. Mammy wants you to have some more of her creamy, floury potatoes with a cowload of butter; so eat up.
She won’t accept help unless you dress it up in such a way that she feels like an honourable war hero – the martyr card is golden.
Are you…
… sensing a theme here?
See point 1 – throw this into a conversation about a situation you’re trying to deal with in work, and watch the poorly suppressed smile peek through.
There are two types of friends in the world: those who mammy loves, and those who mammy is fully convinced serve no other purpose than to lead you into a life of sin and debauchery.
An easy way to win approval both for yourself and your other half? Say that it was one of the former category who brought ye together.
She always told you that literally EVERYONE on those internet dating yokes is out to harvest your organs and make a suit out of your skin – after all, she never really recovered from the time she accidentally watched Silence of the Lambs on RTÉ One thinking it was a film about a flock of little baby sheep who couldn’t baa.
Show you’ve been listening all along, and you’re in the good books.
How all Tinder dates end, according to Mammy
She’s heard stories.
Distance yourself immediately.
One of the aforementioned Debaucherous Friends. You may well spend pretty much every weekend in the company of Maura – but she does NOT need to know this.
She doesn’t need to know what the merger project is; she just needs a line that she can grow into a story about how you’ve been asked to take over the entire company, and use to impress her friends.
You in work, according to Mammy
She won’t like that you used ‘holiday’ as a verb. But she’ll appreciate the sentiment: that your friends are lovely and all, but there’s nobody’s company you’d like more.
Although you might be better off saying...
It’s all about sensing the tone, really.
This one is the golden ticket; and it can be applied to nearly any situation.
Use liberally and generously, for it will never get old.
Look, she’ll be mad for a few minutes – but the sense of vindication over the barefaced lies that she’s known about for YEARS will make her the happiest woman on the planet.
She knows you're safe for the night, AND you’ve chosen her company above the pub.
ALL the Mammy points.
Mammy will never force her will on anyone else, so don't put her in a position where she needs to – the Late Late Show it is, and none of this 'Net Flicks' rubbish to contend with.
This may come back to haunt you – in the form of a gig – but all that stuff you said about how lame he was when you were a teenager? That cut her deep.
She’ll see this admission as a sign that you’re maturing into… well, Mammy, basically.
Always, ALWAYS do what your mammy says.
Apart from when she tells you not to get her anything for Mother's Day/her birthday/Christmas/her anniversary with da.
This gives her something she can drop into conversation with her friends to show how brilliantly she raised you. A potent currency.
You’ve shown it, but you’ve never said it.
So say it. Gwan.
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