If your mother has ever said all she wants for Mother’s Day is time in the backyard, Emma Thompson, Tina Fey and Amy Poehler want to set the record straight.
“When you ask your mother what she wants to do for Mother’s Day and she says: ‘just relax in the backyard, maybe a massage,’ what she’s actually asking is, ‘how does one buy weed?'” the trio joked in a Mother’s Day segment on Saturday Night Live.
The gag saw host Thompson joined by Fey and Poehler to share a little bit of “motherspeak 101” to help viewers decipher what their moms are really thinking.
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Thompson, herself a mother of two, brought on the two SNL alumni and fellow parents for the show’s opening monologue.
In it, they poked fun at some of the cliches around motherhood including picking a favourite child, book clubs and a particular fondness for wine.
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For example, when moms say things like “I like that shirt,” they noted, what they really mean is more like, “I think I bought you that shirt.”
Likewise, comments as simple as “splendid” can take on a whole range of meanings for British mothers.
“I’m sad, I’m happy, how are you, you embarrass me, I’m crazy, you’re drunk,” Thompson explained as the uses. “Splendid is sort of our ‘aloha.'”
Sometimes though it can still be hard for mothers to express how they really feel.
“Conflict can be fraught for mothers,” Thompson added, with Fey and Poehler chiming in that moms sometimes say things like “you’re driving me crazy” or “why do you have to be so stubborn?”
But even when they do, the real meaning is simple, they continued.
“What she really means is, ‘I love you.'”