CF guests

[Gennz18]

We are on holiday, staying at our beach house with another family (my best friend from high school, her DH and 2 DC who are matey with my kids). Our kids range in age from 3-9.

A mutual acquaintance of ours (we have both worked with her at different organisations), A, is at the same small beach town - saw her on a walk and said “we must catch up for drinks”. A is staying with a friend B and B’s husband at B’s husband’s holiday house. We don’t know B.

A contacts us saying we should catch up for drinks - yes come over I say. This somehow morph into A, B, husband of B, plus a third couple who we’ve never met - C & boyfriend, plus C’s son aged 7 coming over for a bbq.

We were starting to feel stitched up but told them to come over for drinks and a basic bbq at 6. We thought they’ll arrive at 6, we’ll have a couple of drinks and a sausage and they have a 7 year old so that will set the curfew.

They arrived at 6.45 - ours kids had already eaten - their 7 year old hadn’t. Kids play nicely together but Child of C is clearly hungry and hasn’t eaten by 8pm and has been up since the early hours of the morning travelling. We get the BBQ cranking and by 9 everyone is fed, our kids are going to bed, it’s getting dark, the plates they brought are washed and ready for them to take home.

We are making “thanks for coming” noises when C (who I don’t know from a bar of soap) packs off her partner with her son and settles back in with another glass of wine. A, B and B’s husband also seem to be settling in for the long haul.

Cue panicked conversations between me and best friend about how to evict them and our husbands giving us filthy looks and disappearing to kid’s bedrooms under the guise of “bedtime stories”.

BFF starts offering cups of tea and we eventually get rid of them by 10.30pm.

BFF says we should’ve set clearer boundaries I.e. set a leaving time (which is right I think).

BUT AIBU to say this was general pisstaking by the lot of them.

TL;DR it’s cheeky fuckery to invite yourself + 5 strangers over to someone’s house, arrive late and then ignore natural cues and fairly obvious hints from your hosts to call it a night?

They do sound awful but you did invite them at the end of the day. All of them, she didn't just turn up at the door with them, if it wasn't ok for them all to come you should have said when making plans 🤔 45 minutes late is a bit much but I'd be surprised to arrive at a BBQ 45 minutes late to find everyone has eaten and the hosts are waiting for us to leave!

It sounds more communication and expectations breakdown

• they thought you were inviting them all as A had said they were staying with these people

You didn't , you invited couple A only

• you expected them to bring food

They turned up empty handed (bad form)

• you feed DCs early

They don't

• they thought it was a long relaxing drinking bbq evening

You were expecting a shorter catch up over bbq with just your friends, finishing at DCs bedtime by 9pm and C had gotten on your nerves by then

• they were late and think BBQs are drinks and chat then put bbq on so time isn't important

You said 6pm as you meant 6pm (this'd be me!)

Coming 45 minutes late is rude, especially when you have small kids. You were right to feed the children rather than wait for them. It drives me nuts when people have a 'oh we're late! Kids, ya know? Tee hee' vibe. I have small kids too, which is why I made the time we made, because they only have so much good behaviour in them and they need to eat/sleep at reasonable times or they turn into monsters.

They clearly ignored some social cues as well, I would certainly have offered to leave when I saw the kids being put to bed.

Bringing a stranger is weird in most places, but in those little coastal towns during the summer I think it's pretty normal for people to be hopping between houses visiting other locals. It's a social vibe and the normal 'rules' are more relaxed.

But they absolutely should have eaten and fucked off in the absence of hosts making it clear they wanted the party to continue.

The lateness is rude especially if they didn't let you know. If I were invited to a bbq at 6 and we had kids with us I'd assume we would probably get off around 10ish if I didn't have kids I'd probably think later. I find the bringing extra people more rude tbh. If you weren't wanting it to be a late one probably should have made it an afternoon/tea time thing. Also your lateness at putting food in suggests you weren't in a rush.

I was once invited to a friends house with my young son for the afternoon. We had not been friends that long as we met at baby group. We were having such a lovely time we started 3.5 hours! After about 2 hours her in-laws came and she made out like they had turned up uninvited but in hindsight I think we overstayed our welcome and she was so polite I didn't realise!

“Basic bbq” was literally a bunnings sausage situation if anyone knows that reference 😂

@Tiani4 your analysis is spot on … I was absolutely the author of my own misfortune

I don’t think they stayed too late at all, 10.30pm on holiday is perfectly normal especially since you didn’t finish eating until 9ish.

I can’t understand why you didn’t have the bbq up and running though, how did you expect them to leave earlier when they were coming for food but you didn’t start cooking until after they’d arrived?

You can't beat a sausage from the fine establishment of Bunnings

Both your husbands gave you ‘filthy looks’ because someone you’d invited for a barbecue while you’re on holiday had a glass of wine at 9pm?

They were rude to come late and bring friends without checking with you.

But why do you say that they invited themselves? You put it in your OP that you told them to "yes come over".

"A" was a CF and now you know.

This is not normal behaviour.

There is a type that behaves like this.

You were used by people who could care less.

@violetbunny

You can't beat a sausage from the fine establishment of Bunnings

Is that a NZ thing?

I gotta say despite how much a misunderstanding it was & not quite the relaxing bbq you thought with extra guests etc @Gennz18 did you have a nice catch up with the friends?

You'll know next time to restrict the invite so that you know who is coming

I always end up with extra guests at BBQs but as I'm England we don't often have the weather for it ! I'm a bit jel as have stops over bbq with folding umbrella before in midst of our summer

We have *stood over bbq

@ikeptgoing I think all of the rest of it would’ve been fine if the surprise guests hadn’t turned out to be so dire. C was like a female NZ version of that sketch of the braying toff “I’m on the train with a load of plebs”

When I say they invited themselves, I invited A (who was the only one we knew) and she interpreted it to include the other 5.

@violetbunny

You can't beat a sausage from the fine establishment of Bunnings

😂😂

@ikeptgoing no, extremely Australian too (actually just learned something new about it being an NZ thing)

Bunnings stopping the sausage sizzles was probably the most devastating part of covid here 🤣

Not gonna lie, would give my left tit to be barbecuing on the beach now, with or without randoms. UADBU.

A friend of mine will just start loading the dishwasher, thank people for coming and say what a lovely evening it’s been, when she’s had enough and wants to go to bed. It might seem a bit…blunt when you’re not used to it, but at least you know where you are!

Honestly? Just don’t offer to host if you don’t enjoy it. They were late but not horrendous—I feel like dinner parties there’s usually an expectation to be on time, a casual BBQ less so. Not having food ready to go 45 minutes after scheduled time is shit hosting on your part. Assuming people have eaten before a BBQ os frankly bizarre. Expecting a BBQ to end basically as soon as it has started is not something I would ever imagine, it would have been rude for them to eat and leave!! 10:30 is pretty early, are you of the 9pm to bed, no fun in the evenings variety?

A BBQ in my mind is the most causal of any eating event. It’s not a sit down meal where numbers must be strictly accounted for. So you don’t know how to host or have any sense of fun, sorry!

Very cheeky really of them.

Bunnings

I'll use that when I next host: 'come over for a basic dinner'

I’m quite happy to say “Right, sorry guys, I’m going to have to chuck you out now, I’m afraid! It’s way past our bedtimes.”

I didn’t really offer to host @Flowers500 I told a work acquaintance she should come over for a drink and suddenly found myself hosting her and 5 strangers

@stinkycheeseman 😂😭 Completely agree I am U in this context

A snag in white bread with tom sauce and a noun is oat kwizzeen in NZ don’t you know

I had one last year (nz also), invited a couple of families in for a drink before dinner, come around 5, they turned up at 8, bought frozen pizza for everyone, we were having a bbq and I don’t have an oven. It was WEIRD and rude! So they ate all our bbq food, I heated up pizzas in a pizza oven I found in a box at back of cupboard, and they stayed till 11.

Everyone had a ball (apart from me!)

Drinks. Before. Dinner. Is what I said!

Arrgghh that is so annoying @nzeire

Also why a meant to say was “a sausage and ONIONS” not “a noun” 😂