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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To feel a bit pissed off at being given concert tickets?

226 replies

Zoeylee · 29/10/2017 12:24

I know it sounds mad, and I hate myself for thinking this. However, my brother and SIL have given me concert tickets for my birthday, (2 tickets actually, so me and DH can go.) It's for someone I do like (and have done for years.)

Problem is, we are very rural. We are literally 45 to 50 minutes drive from a train station, and the city where the concert is, is another HOUR and a QUARTER journey on the train. (Including having to change trains half way.)

So we are talking about starting out a MINIMUM of 3 hours before the concert starts, as it says on the tickets that the doors open at 6.00pm and it's advisable to get there early. The concert starts with a support act at 7pm... To enable ourselves to get the last train back would involve leaving the concert at 9pm. The main act will probably only just be starting then.

Either that or we stay in a travelodge or premier inn. I have already looked at the date, and because it's a Friday, the cheapest room is £85! Confused This would be on top of the train fares that will cost £70 for the two! So with food and extra bits and bobs, we could be looking at £200.

Driving would be a PITA too, as that would take the best part of two and a half to three hours (five to six hour round-trip,) and would be a ballache, with driving in and around a major city, and car parking and suchlike.

WIBU to sell the tickets on and buy something else? Should I pretend we went to the concert and fake a few photos? Or should I be honest? I feel like such a cow, but these 'free tickets' are going to end up costing us a bleeding fortune! And the thought of all the hassle involved in travelling to this concert, and back (even though I like the act,) is giving me a headache. My brother and SIL meant well, but I don't think they thought it through. Sad

OP posts:
myusernamewastaken · 31/10/2017 08:45

I think the Op is getting a hard time and i was in a similar situation a while back...a friend offered me free tickets to a gig in London....Im in Norfolk so the logistics were a nightmare....
I kept saying no thanks..the journey would have involved a train to Liverpool St and then loads of tube stops to the venue....and then back again at gone midnight....she couldnt understand why i didnt want the bloody ticketsConfused

KingLooieCatz · 31/10/2017 09:27

I'm with the op. I think a lot of people don't grasp quite how rural it is possible to get in the UK, quite how limited public transport can be and quite how slow the roads can be in some parts of the UK.

She didn't ask for it and they didn't ask her first.

JaneEyre70 · 31/10/2017 10:29

We went to see Coldplay 3 times last year. All involved a 6/8 hr round trip driving, parking, walking, afternoon off work and very late arrival home as well as costing a few hundred pounds. Did that bother us? Did it hell. We've gone abroad to see bands too if we couldn't get UK tickets.

We were stood next to people at Cardiff Principality Stadium in July and they'd driven there from Glasgow and were driving back that night. They loved Coldplay and to them it was worth it. Chris Martin always thanks their fans for going through so much to get to see them and that the band really appreciate it Grin.
If the OP loved the band/artist, she'd be excited. As it is, she's only seeing the downside and that's perfectly OK. Going to concerts isn't cheap these days, for tickets or travel as most bands only play huge arenas these days.

schoolgaterebel · 31/10/2017 10:55

Life us too short to do things like this if you don't want to / can't afford to.

Politely explain to DB why you are unable to use the tickets and offer them back. If they don't have any them, sell them on and use the money fur a nice meal out with your DH.

messyjessy17 · 31/10/2017 10:57

If you don't want to go, don't go, nobody cares. But to be pissed off at a gift, yabvu. And your attitude on here is also appalling.

Smitff · 31/10/2017 11:06

TBH I don’t think living so rurally suits you, if a gift of two concert tickets for a band you like sends you into such a rage!

RhiannonOHara · 31/10/2017 11:18

What a stupid comment, Smitff.

messy, it's quite hilarious to accuse the OP of an appalling attitude when there are people queuing up to call her miserable, ungrateful, horrible, asking if she's 80, suggesting she shouldn't live rurally if she doesn't want to have to travel hours to get to town...

There's a lot of spite on this thread.

messyjessy17 · 31/10/2017 11:27

OP started it all though.

When someone gives you a gift, you do not get pissed off with them because to use it will cost you money. How churlish and mean spirited is that? you say thank you and quietly sell it on, or explain that the thought was lovely but it doesn't work for you and would they like the tickets back to use themselves.
You don't act like they have done something awful to you by giving you a gift.

NotNowBernard1 · 31/10/2017 12:37

OP started it all though

Are you for real?

messyjessy17 · 31/10/2017 12:38

I believe I am, or why would I say it?

If you have a bad attitude in the OP, people tend to respond to that.

grimeofthecentury · 31/10/2017 12:48

Why do people live in the arse end of no where

Life must be miserable

fannyanddick · 31/10/2017 12:55

Yanbu and I doubt your brother will mind but do tell him the truth. That the logistics are a bit difficult, you really appreciate the thought but it's too far to travel. Would he like the tickets back or you can sell on and spend it on x (something you would like).
I would not be offended and would maybe just feel bad that I didn't consider it all properly.

deckoff · 31/10/2017 12:56

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Only1scoop · 31/10/2017 13:06

'OP started it all though.'
Grin

Slimthistime · 31/10/2017 13:06

Grime "Why do people live in the arse end of no where"

I can't wait to do this Grin

RhiannonOHara · 31/10/2017 13:25

OP started it all though. What are you, six?

Anyway, she said ONCE that she was 'pissed off'. In the same and subsequent posts she made it abundantly clear, except perhaps to the very hard of comprehension, that she was grateful, didn't want to upset her brother, knew it was a nice thought, etc etc etc.

She hasn't 'acted' like her brother has done something awful to her; she hadn't broached the subject with him when she started the thread.

But go on putting the boot in if that's how you get your kicks.

I mean everyone who's being a twat here, by the way, not just one poster.

messyjessy17 · 31/10/2017 13:35

No. Someone complained about negativity and rudeness. OP was negative and rude from the start.
What bit of that are you not following exactly?

RhiannonOHara · 31/10/2017 13:39

Gosh, I love being condescended to Grin

The OP said right at the start she felt 'like a cow' for not wanting to go. She posted partly for views/help on how to turn the tickets down without being hurtful.

If she's been snippy on occasion, I can't say I blame her, in the face of people piling on to snark about her living rurally, give 'helpful' suggestions about making a weekend of it when she's said she doesn't want to, tell us all proudly how their daily commute is longer, regale us with heroic stories of when they spent a week and a million pounds to go to a concert, etc etc.

Load of twats on here, as I said.

RoseWhiteTips · 31/10/2017 13:59

Oh dear.

strugglingtodomybest · 31/10/2017 13:59

When someone gives you a gift, you do not get pissed off with them because to use it will cost you money.

Why not? It would piss me off to get a gift that required me spending £200 to use it.

How churlish and mean spirited is that?

not very, imo. Plus the first line of the OP said I know it sounds mad, and I hate myself for thinking this so the OP is already feeling bad about it without loads of people sticking the boot in further.

you say thank you and quietly sell it on, or explain that the thought was lovely but it doesn't work for you and would they like the tickets back to use themselves.

Which is exactly what the OP was asking wasn't it? From the OP:
WIBU to sell the tickets on and buy something else? Should I pretend we went to the concert and fake a few photos? Or should I be honest?

schoolgaterebel · 31/10/2017 15:14

@Smitff actually living rurally seems to suit the OP perfectly.

It's concert tickets in a city far away that don't suit her, bit if a silly gift really.

BabychamSocialist · 31/10/2017 15:29

It depends who the concert is.

Like, we almost gave tickets up when our kids were toddlers because we worked out the cost was going to be over £300 for the night including a B&B, and we had to arrange childcare and it was a traffic nightmare.

Sort of glad we bit the bullet - it was David Bowie and it turned out to be his last UK date ever and his last tour ever as well. I'd always regret it if we'd given our tickets away.

Same happened with us to Joan Rivers - we almost sold our tickets to see her because it clashed with some tickets we had for a local attraction that happened last minute. We decided to go to Joan Rivers instead. Glad we did, because she died the year after we saw her and that was her final UK tour. She'd planned to tour the year she died and a lot of people had tickets to see her. I'm glad we didn't wait - she was worth it!

deckoff · 31/10/2017 16:47

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Smitff · 31/10/2017 16:53

Crumbs. I had no idea the country-townie divide was so spirited! It’s concert tickets. Do they really require this much emotion?! If living rurally (which of course has its appeals) can create so much angst when it comes to something as anodyne as going to a concert or not, then I stand by my first comment: obviously being so far from townie amenities doesn’t suit the OP. If it did, she wouldn’t have to create a thread asking for how to deal with turning them down. She’s just deal with it (like every other person who lives rurally and has to deal with such things!).

NetworkGuy · 31/10/2017 18:46

grimeofthecentury "Why do people live in the arse end of no where"

Not everyone wants city life, lots of traffic fumes, noise and an excess of people. London and the South East has infrastructure problems with power, water and so on, sky high cost of living...

Am I at all envious of that style of living? Not in the least, thanks.

London used to make me feel dirty just travelling on the tube, with black snot at the end of the day...

Yuk... no thanks, never again, even if could afford to buy somewhere (and I was born in Sussex but cannot say I miss it nowadays... traffic excessive, parking charges or difficulties {Brighton and Hove} )