Neglected At Party

Ravenscroft - your story remind me if a wedding we went to in the north. A long journey for us, two nights in a hotel, pricey gift, new outfits.

Old country house reception (we just went for the evening) , sparse food , pricey drinks, and so so cold. (December)After a couple of hours we tried getting a taxi back to the hotel. No luck as it was out in the wilds. We had to wait til midnight for the wedding bus .
We eventually arrived back and found we’d been locked out.
Stood around in the freezing cold for half an hour before someone let us in. ( concierge was asleep) !
Why in earth did we accept the invite! 😂😂😂

AiryFlyingFairy put it down to experience and a Lesson Learned. In future always take a couple of bottles to a party and even plastic glasses. Also take some snacky food such as French Fancies, crisps etc that you can take back if not used. I have had similar experiences at parties over the years and so always go prepared!

In these circumstances I would have asked if there was any more food/drink/seats. They could have sent someone to the supermarket or convenience store for more supplies. The squeaky gate gets the oil.

She may ask you if there was enough food.
Perhaps she realised things were a bit sparse and hoped everyone would eat sparingly.

Latecomers are latecomers and she probably didn’t cater for them. She mustn’t have had enough food to go round which was poor planning and I doubt she meant to offend you. It was her party and she was probably stressed enough without coping with people who are not there at the time. I think it was nice of her to send a note afterwards, not many would.

Give her a break, who’s the judge of how big people’s problems are?

Sounds like poor hosting to me!
Maybe respond saying “it was great to see you enjoying your party”

All of this reminds me of Abigail's Party.
Ever and ever and ever and ever you'll beee the one....

Sorry to be a bore but I've remembered another embarrassing occasion. We were invited to a golden wedding tea party. We turned up on the Sunday afternoon and were puzzled to see the house looking quiet with no cars outside.
We rang the bell and their DD appeared and looked surprised to see us since the party had been the day before.

Her lovely parents told us to come in anyway and to help them eat the leftover cakes and we had a great laugh and chat with them!

bababoom, who mentioned global events?

If I'd been you AnyFlyingFairy I think I'd have joined up with the other latecomers and have gone for a pizza or fish supper and never mind the disappointment.

On leaving art school and my lovely flat mates in Norwich we agreed to all meet up at our local pub the following year. I hitchhiked from London in foul weather but when I arrived very late at the pub everyone had left. The barman said they'd waited a long time. Ofcourse no mobile phones back then. I must have found somewhere to sleep but never found my "pals" .

My Ex sister in law used to do this to us on purpose. Arrived at given time to find all the food eaten and all the seats taken. I vowed when it happened repeatedly I would not show I was bothered and sat on the floor DH lounge against a wall.
Eventually, we refused invitations and behind my back, I was accused of being standoffish.

You could send a thank you to your friend and say:
"Sorry we had to leave early but we had to get to the chippie before it shut"

Nor was that.
If you are worried, stressed or ill, or have health worries either for yourself or members of your family can be hard to do more than raise an eyebrow at some “problems”
Bear in mind you do not the circumstances of anybody posting on a thread.

kittylester at 19.37 That wasn't very nice was it? Gransnet is for everyone to chat about anything at all that's bothering us, not just monumental earth shattering events. It would be a sad old world if we were only allowed to post about depressing global events don't you think?

Not food related, but friends of mine went to what they had been told was a fancy dress party.

She went as a baby doll, wearing a nappy and dummy, and he was a punk.

They travelled 40 miles to London like that, only to find it was just them in fancy dress

In the noughties I travelled from the south to the very north of England to a friend's wedding. It was in a very old castle. They ran out of food so we had cheese wotsits. There was no heating so I spent the reception in my yachting jacket. Funnily enough it is the one wedding we still laugh about.

You might even be more annoyed than usual, with this problem on top of all your other ones.

i have loads of problems and i would have still been annoyed, if that helps?

I was invited to a party and a candidate boyfriend was driving me there

He forgot I existed 5 minutes after arriving there and wouldnt detach from his best friend- another girl

I honestly couldn't stop laughing and met lots of nice people

I later talked to a classmate and he did the same thing to her

Ahh don’t beat yourself up airy you ve done the right thing by thanking them it’s all over bar the shouting you probably felt worse about it as you were tired and felt disappointed
Put it behind you here’s to the next time
I can’t remember the last time I went to a party 😳they don’t come along often at my age

Don't apologise.
Sometimes you need a neutral point of view (or several) to mull things over in your own mind.

I have replied thanking them and saying had a lovely time.
I had explained in advance I would be late due to the flight being late! In fact I had changed my arrangements so I could make the party. I had run myself ragged to be there.
I feel really stupid about all this. Please ignore me. 1st world problems.

OP ‘Please tell me your neglected at party experiences!‘

I was one of two families - I think there were eight of us - that arrived simultaneously at a much larger family New Year gathering, held in an aunt’s large holiday let, at 12.30 pm as requested on the invitation. We joined everyone else as they were just starting on their pudding! ‘The children and Aunty J were hungry and couldn’t wait’ we were told. My sister had been allocated the cheese and biscuits to bring but my salads mostly returned with us. To this day we wonder why we were so polite!

We’re you guests of honour at the party?
No?
Then I’m afraid being so rude as to turn up half way through the evening -even with a reason- you can’t complain that you were “neglected”.
I imagine your friend had invited lots of other friends and as late arrivals it’s just your bad luck the other guests had eaten the food and presumably drunk the wine!
(Do people not mingle and mill around at parties any more? In my day nobody sat down and you were either served your drinks as you chatted or helped yourself from the bar )