This one happened at another party, this time one of my friends' kids.
It was again a lovely day and the kids were doing their thing, allowing us to get on with the business of chatting to other parents too.
There was an ex-work colleague there (when I first joined ex-secret company, we were in the same division) and it was nice to see my actual friend again. This is my very lovely friend who is truly one of the nicest people I've ever met.
Anyway, the party progresses as normal and at one point, my friend asked me to see if I could get a pic of her daughter. She's very easy-breezy so it was not an urgent, "please get a pic or 12 for me" but more a "if you do happen to be in the same vicinity, could you get a pic?".
My friend is BEYOND lovely so I really wanted to get a nice photo for her. I looked for opportunities and eventually saw her little girl wandering around so I followed to get my photos.
I did get the photos (and she liked them!) but that's not the point of this story.
I wasn't making a noise because of not making the child stop acting normal (none of that "SMILE, BABY!") but maybe because I was quiet, I heard my friend's husband say to her in an urgent, tense voice, "it's 1 o'clock, they must all go".
EEEEKK
She said to him in her calm, reasonable voice, "But ___, we can't just tell our guests to leave. They will start leaving soon, and they (gesturing to the venue people) only need to set up for the next party at 2".
Him: "But the invite said 1 so they need to all go!"
OKAY THEN.
Granted, the invite did say 1 and it was about 12:55 so it was time to start making tracks.
It's all in the how, isn't it?
I would really have had no problem with them coming around to all the tables (a lot of us were still there) to say, "listen guys, just so you know, we've only booked the venue til 1, but you guys can move into the restaurant area". Perfect.
The fact that he said it with such aggression made me feel SUPER awkward so I went to D and said, "D, we need to go NOW. I'll explain later". We have our signals which is mainly in the eyes, so we gathered our children, said our goodbyes and we were off.
This is not a once-off; he's behaved badly at another social and, as such, I won't go to their house again.
Don't we all just put our other issues to one side when we're out with people and get on with the business at hand? Isn't that what growing up's about?
I don't know.
But I may pluck up the courage to (as an aside) say something to my friend. We'll see!
It's so hard when one part of a couple is SUPER nice and the other is ... not!
How do you deal with this kind of thing?
That is so rude!!! Though he probably didn't intend anyone but his wife to hear it (I assume). Depending on the relationship you have with your friend it might be good to say something so it doesn't feel awkward if she invites you over and you decline! I hope they don't have friends from my part of the world - time keeping is not their forte!!!
ReplyDeletePs: needing to round up when the fun is just beginning another reason I'm inclined to have parties at home :)
Oh wow, this is super difficult. On the one hand it is just rude, on the other he may have the venue people threatening to charge x amount if the venue is not vacated early enough (saw that the other day in a venue T&C). But seeing as there is a history I would just avoid him in future. If possible?
ReplyDeleteYes, we've been there. Tom and I had some really good friends for a very long time, but after awhile we noticed the husband had a lot of weird tendencies and how he talked to other people, including his wife. BTW, they are divorced now. We were not surprised.
ReplyDelete