Must be awfully icy in Hell right now.

   Son & Girlfriend recently had a party for Granddaughter's second birthday.  Girlfriend created a Facebook event and invited all of their guests.  The Ex never responded one way or the other; given that Grandson is 3 years old and The Ex has attended his very first birthday party but not the others, I didn't know if she was going to attend or not.

  About 2 weeks before the party, The Ex had planned a couples' weekend and invited her best friend, the best friend's boyfriend, and also Daughter and her new boyfriend.  The friend ended up backing out but Daughter and her boyfriend went.  Daughter said she also pre-warned her boyfriend that Ned is extremely awkward, that he had a staring problem, and that he's a terrible driver; her boyfriend later told her that he thought she was kidding about all of it but she was, in fact, warning him about the truth.  Apparently, Ned will just stare right at you and not say a single word; if you look back at him, he doesn't look away.  The funny part about this is that at some point during the weekend, Ned asked either Daughter or her boyfriend "when he was going to come out of his shell." (Daughter's boyfriend is a very quiet person by nature.  Also, it's hard to "come out of your shell" when someone that you just met is silently staring you down.)

  In addition to Ned's oddities, Daughter told us that she and her boyfriend were bringing up Husband just to irritate The Ex and see how she reacted.  Daughter said that one night after The Ex had a few drinks, Daughter mentioned Husband and The Ex responded with, "He can eat shit!!" (Remember this particular instance because I'm referencing it later.)

  A week before the party, Girlfriend posted and asked everyone to please RSVP so they could get a final headcount and get the proper amount of food.  I said we'd all be there and asked her to let me know if I could bring anything to help.  The next day, Girlfriend's mom posted and reiterated that they were ordering food, they needed a final headcount, and asked everyone to respond that night whether they were attending or not.  Girlfriend ended up commenting, "[The Ex] 4" because I guess The Ex was far too busy to spend 0.5 seconds clicking the "Going" button by herself to let anyone know that she'd be attending.  Shortly after this, Girlfriend's mom messaged me and asked if I could make a taco pizza for the party; I told her that wouldn't be a problem and also offered to bring cups, plates, etc.  Girlfriend's mom said that would be great and thanked me.

  The day after this, Girlfriend messaged me with two screenshots of an Amazon order for a crap-ton of Frozen party decorations and wrote, "So I guess [The Ex] ordered this for [Granddaughter's] party *upside down smiley face emoji*" and "Like I don't want to sound ungrateful but what am I suppose to do with mine. I told her I got pink decorations already idk" (This is true.  Girlfriend had messaged me a few weeks prior with a picture of the decorations she'd bought for the party, I told her they were adorable, blah blah blah.) I told Girlfriend that even if she and Son had money to waste on decorations that they weren't going to use, she'd already purchased what she wanted for her daughter's party.  I pointed out that she didn't ask The Ex to buy decorations; The Ex had bought them all on her own.

  Girlfriend said that Son told her that The Ex was just being nice; Girlfriend said she didn't know what to do, she felt like The Ex should have at least asked but Girlfriend guessed that the party theme was now Frozen.  Girlfriend also said that Son told her that she was being dramatic.  I said she wasn't being dramatic and that Son just didn't want to get bitched at by The Ex.  I said that I have always tried to ask her before purchasing anything for a party because it's not my place to decide what they're having.  I suggested using a few things that The Ex had purchased but she didn't have to use all of it; I said that they didn't ask her to buy the items, they never said the theme was Frozen, and The Ex could have communicated.

  I was, admittedly, confused as to why The Ex suddenly decided that she wanted to "help" less than one week before the party when she had really never done much in the past, and why she'd bought so many decorations without even asking.  But Girlfriend was about to say something that made it all fall into place.

  Girlfriend said that if it was just a few decorations it wouldn't really matter, or if Frozen had actually been the theme of Granddaughter's party then it wouldn't be a big deal; she said she's never had an issue with me buying anything, she just feels like The Ex is doing too much.  Then she said:

"I feel like to [The Ex] it's a controlling factor because [Son] told her you were making [food]."

  ....y'all.  This woman was 100% uninvolved with her own grandchild's birthday party until Son told her that I was making food for the party.  Once she heard I was doing something, she rushes to drop $40-50 on decorations that neither Son or Girlfriend asked for.

  I started laughing and told Girlfriend that's exactly why The Ex bought the decorations.  I told Girlfriend that I couldn't stop laughing and was already imagining how much trash-talking The Ex was going to do about my cooking.  Girlfriend said The Ex would definitely try to critique my food and added that The Ex had asked Son if we were staying at his apartment the night before the party; when he told her yes, The Ex told him that she was going to ask if he and Girlfriend wanted to go out for dinner that night.  Son told her that any other night would work for them, just not the night we were coming up to Tiny City; The Ex said it was "fine." (Sooo...The Ex didn't actually want to take Son and Girlfriend out for dinner.  She just wanted to emotionally manipulate Son into choosing between his mom and his dad, and make him feel guilty for not cancelling his plans in order to prioritize her over Husband.)

  The day before the party, Girlfriend messaged me and said she had asked The Ex if she could stop by to pick up the decorations that The Ex had bought so that she could decorate the hall the next morning before the party.  Girlfriend said that The Ex told her that she was just going to bring the decorations to the hall at 12pm. (The party was at 1pm.  The Ex, who is notoriously late for things, wants to show up one hour before the party and decorate.) Girlfriend said she told The Ex that she wanted to set up in the morning so she could go back home and get ready for the party instead of rushing to finish everything and now The Ex was mad at her.  I told Girlfriend this was because if The Ex brought the decorations herself, she could say that she helped decorate; I said that The Ex didn't want to help decorate, but she wanted to be able to say that she helped.  Girlfriend said she was irritated because The Ex had already overstepped by buying the decorations in the first place; she'd moved on from that but now The Ex was trying to dictate when they'd be decorating the hall.

  When we got to Tiny City the night before the party, Girlfriend showed me two small packs of decorations and said, "That's all that [The Ex] would give me.  She said she'd 'bring the rest tomorrow.'"  I shrugged and said, "Then I guess that's all you're using.  You told her you were decorating in the morning; you can't put up decorations that you don't have."

  The day of the party, The Ex and Ned arrived a little while after we did.  I was inside putting things out on the food table when Husband walked up to me and said, "[The Ex] just said 'hi' to me."  I was really struggling to believe this happened.  It's not that I think Husband is a liar; it's the fact that two weeks' prior, The Ex was saying that Husband could "eat shit" but was now cordially greeting him at their grandchild's birthday party.

  But wait, there's more.

  A little while later, The Ex and Ned left; Daughter said that The Ex took Ned to the ER because his hands were turning blue and he "felt weird."  Son and Daughter said that Ned has something off about his blood sugar and that he's "the opposite of a diabetic."  They weren't even entirely sure what Ned did/didn't have; I tried Googling it and got confused so I just gave up.  About 20-30 minutes later, The Ex and Ned were back from their hospital trip.  The Ex's dad (who happened to be sitting with me and Husband) asked if everything was alright.  Ned walked over to our table and started talking to both The Ex's dad and Husband. (Yeah, I know.  First, The Ex says hi to Husband; now Ned is talking to Husband.  This was super weird.  But anyway, back to the point...) Ned says that he went into the ER, the doctor came in, opened an alcohol wipe, started to wipe off Ned's hand and the blue started coming off.

  The official diagnosis: Ned's hands were blue because he'd been wiping them on his jeans. (If I hadn't been there, I would think this story is made up.  Unfortunately, this level of dumbassery exists in our world.)

  But wait, there's still more.

  After the party had started, we were sitting at a table with The Ex's parents eating while The Ex and Ned sat at a table next to us.  Daughter saw that The Ex was eating the food I had made for the party so in her never-ending quest to push her mother's buttons, she asked The Ex if she liked it.  The Ex told Daughter that it was good; Daughter told her that I was the one who made it.  As this was happening, I was standing up to go outside and as I walked by their table, The Ex looked at me and said, "[My name], you made a good taco pizza." (.....WHAT THE ACTUAL F*CK IS HAPPENING.) I said thank you and she said again that it "was really good." (I'm just as shocked as you are.  To this day, I literally do not understand what was going on.)

  Daughter also told us the other night that at some point during the party when we weren't by them, The Ex complimented Husband's facial hair and told Ned that he ought to do something similar to what Husband did. (This is the Twilight Zone.  There's no way any of this is real; there's no way any of this happened.  We all had to be hallucinating.)

  Before the party ended, The Ex asked Daughter if she was going to come over for dinner before she came home by us.  Daughter asked if we were all invited.  The Ex said that she thought that Daughter had driven up separately.  Daughter said that Husband had driven up on Saturday morning to help Son fix his truck, but she had driven up with me and the younger kids on Saturday evening; she didn't have her own vehicle and had to ride back with either me or Husband.  Daughter said that she was most likely going to ride back with Husband and asked if he was going to be invited to dinner.  The Ex replied, "Yeah, that would be okay." (My head is exploding right now.)

  Y'all, I know it sounds like I'm writing pure fiction here but I swear to you on everything good and decent, these are all facts.  Every last thing happened.  I didn't make it up, I didn't exaggerate, I didn't manipulate the situation, I didn't take it out of context.  All of this happened and I'm still trying to wrap my head around it.  I feel like The Ex had an "angle" in this, if you will...hell if I know what it is, but she's got to have an ulterior motive.  You don't have such animosity towards someone that you exclaim that they can "eat shit" to suddenly complimenting their face, their wife's cooking, and inviting them over for dinner only 2 weeks later unless you've got something to gain from it.