The pink! It burns!

[tree_and_leaf]

I was waiting for a bus earlier on, and ended up looking at a stall selling a myriad of tacky things, including some woefully awful plastic England hats, but by far the worst was the stuff for hen nights: I think it's the combination of predatory sexuality with twee little-girlishness that really depresses me. (I think the worst may have been the pink glittery fairy wand, which had pink fluffy featherdown attached to it, which read on one side of the star 'good girl' and on the other 'bad girl', although the list of challenges for the bride to be were pretty sordid and depressing).

Am never having a hen night, ever (though I can see the attraction of the German tradition of a party where you and your closest female friends smash up crockery. I'm sure it's a wonderful way to release tension and get rid of all the annoyance entailed in wedding planning).

It's not that I dislike parties (well, I do, but that's not the point). I like a drink and I like going to the pub with groups of friends. I even got chucked out of a pub once.* I have done dumb things when I was drunk.

I don't have a problem with liberated female sexuality either, but that's almost the point. I don't think getting rat-arsed and harrassing waiters, bar staff, people who want a quite drink and other innocent bystanders constitutes liberation.


* A long, implausible story involving a bar manager who objected to loud but amiable theological arguments. No, honestly, it's true.

Comments

[zoepaleologa.livejournal.com]

I think crockery hurling parties might be a good idea. Get that all important throwing practice in well before you need it in the marriage.

I mean it's pointless hurling a dinner plate at the sod for it only to hit the wall.

/practical

[tree_and_leaf]

Very true. Waste of a good plate.

[aervir.livejournal.com]

I don't think getting rat-arsed and harrassing waiters, bar staff, people who want a quite drink and other innocent bystanders constitutes liberation.

Oh, amen to that!

The only difference between a hen night and the male equivalent of a Junggesellenabschied (is there an English expression for that, too?) is, from my personal POV, the fact that I am only f***ing annoyed by the partying girls, whereas some sort of partying guys actually makes me feel slightly threatened (with their display of predatory male sexuality).

And if I ever reach the point when I, as a grown woman, run around waving a glittery fairy-wand, then someone should please reach for a shotgun and put me out of my misery pretty soon.

[tree_and_leaf]

Stag night.

I know what you mean, but I never seem to see them (fortunately...)

[aervir.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the vocab help!

And admittedly, I ran into a couple of drunken guys on somebody's stag night only nice, but it was rather ... unpleasant.

I know that it doesn't necessarily have to be, although that kind of behaviour does seem to constitute the fun for some people. *sigh*

[sammee42.livejournal.com]

Oooo, I wish I had had a hen night involving the smashing of crockery. After the stress of my wedding preparations, I really could have smashed a whole lotta pots.

The fairy wand you described seems positively dreadful. I agree with you on all accounts. I don't see why liberated sexuality needs to equal a complete loss of good taste. It is interesting that so many people equate large amounts of alcohol as liberation. Hmmm.

[dolorous-ett.livejournal.com]

Heh. You should have been in Edinburgh last Saturday. Talk about the Whitsun Stag Parties. Very loud and just slightly worrying.

[tree_and_leaf]

I'n glad I wasn't, I think....

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

You could have a “pleasant party with female friends” hen night. I attended one recently that was just a meal in a restaurant, a crown for the bride, and a set of quiz cards about marriage customs as a filip to ‘proper’ HN activities. But then none of us were the pink and sparkly type whatever the occasion.

On the plus side, I read recently that whereas the British Embassy in Prague is besieged by people on Stag Parties in need of rescue, they’ve never had a Hen Night group in similar trouble.

[mrs-wolf.livejournal.com]

The one hen night I went to was deadly dull. The bride gushed about her husband-to-be and the rest of us just stared at her as if she were an alien.
Later I baked chocolate chip cookies.

Served her right for inviting a bunch of singletons.

The crockery hurling sounds wonderful.