Day out friends..they left to go to diff restaurant on their own

[TFICoffeetime]

Met up with close friends yesterday. We live opposite sides country. We picked scenic village, countryside & meal at a nice country inn.
We were 40 mins late (it's 2.5 hrs for us) 1 hour drive for us & got caught in traffic then stopped once to let DD go to the toilet & stretched dogs legs so she'd wee. All communicated with friends. We arrived, had lovely stroll, river swim and meal at nice country inn with great views. They had booked the meal...we thought lovely place. But when we got there they said they had to leave at 5.30 to go to another restaurant (just them and child). They are starters and went. They said they hadn't realised this place was a fave restaurant & was close to their home. (So why go today). So we were left. It felt v awkward & like punishment for being late maybe. It had been lovely day and ended on weird vibes.
We finished our meal on own then went to another beautiful inn for pudding. After this I feel perplexed. AIBU to think their actions rude & far ruder than been late. We weren't intentionally late & just how it goes with traffic & teenagers.
I don't understand why we couldn't enjoy the meal together as planned. They booked it on the day (it felt like because we were late). We avoided confrontation but left sour note. Our children were perplexed. Just odd & awkward. This friend doesn't like confrontation even if it's "we were a bit sad you changed to go elsewhere" so she wouldn't discuss if I did. But I'm left feeling am I wrong. I just can't see myself having issues if they had longer to drive and was late & I would not change plans on a meal that was meant to be spent together. Xxx

You may see it. I don’t , and have been here a long time.

Of course if I did think this, then I certainly wouldn’t bother posting. That’s a solution. Otherwise accept not everyone will agree with you all the time. It’s served me well in my long life.

Nah, not really. Although it does tend to be the more mean spirited, goady ones that stick in your head. Don’t know why that is, maybe makes them easier to ignore most of the time.

I mean rather than admit their mistake, @SomethingUniqueThisTimeis tripling down and calling Aus uncivilised now. Would be funny if it wasn’t so tedious.

This whole entree debacle wouldn’t even be a conversation had the three of you not @ me purely to call me wrong on something that I wasn’t even wrong about. It didn’t (and still isn’t) even contribute anything to the thread. At least my original posts with the word were trying to help the OP.

For some reason they left early.
The other reservation may have been a lie.
Do you see each other often?
They found something off on the day and decided to bail out. You may never know OP which is very frustrating.

This is probably what happened alright! Otherwise sounds v odd!

I don’t think they were enjoying the day and got away as soon as they decently could. Maybe the reality of having your dog at their meal wasn’t appealing but they could hardly say so having encouraged you to bring it.

If you’re asking for advice I would let this friendship drift away. Don’t contact them again, see how long it takes them to contact you.

Do you think maybe our friends had an argument so just wanted to leave? (As in the husband and wife)

I agree. The fact rhey haven't given you a proper explanation says it all

I think you’re getting a hard time here OP.

I don’t think being 40 mins late after a 2.5 hour journey is any problem at all. Surely everyone knows that you can experience unexpected delays on long journeys??

If a friend was going a five hour round trip to see me and I was only doing an hour each way then I certainly wouldn’t feel I had any right at all to be miffed if they experienced travel delays. I’d feel sorry for them and not complain about having to wait.

You’re right that it’s incredibly rude to announce at the point of ordering that you’ve decided to eat elsewhere. Getting up while you were still eating is horrible behaviour. If you being late had upset them so much that they couldn’t stand to eat a whole meal with you (ridiculous) the decent thing would be to say before you got to the restaurant that they weren’t wanting to eat and give you the choice to eat elsewhere too.

I’d be dropping the friendship unless an explanation/apology is forthcoming.

Please ignore all of the ‘you’ve made a couple of typos so you and your family deserve to be treated like shit’ posters. There is literally no excuse for the way they acted.

It's not a 'common error'. I have never met anyone who thought an entree was a synonym for main meal.

Here you are, being rude even in (half) acknowledging your bizarre mistake, that you were rude in announcing

An entree is the main course not the starter 🤣

and then rudely insistent was the case.

There you are everyone that needs to know . 🤣🤣🤣

I really don’t know what your problem is with me, you are being so rude and personal in your replies. The phrase you used earlier ‘usual suspects’ indicates you think I am someone else you have come across before. I very rarely post on Mumsnet, probably less than 10 posts this year.
You are the one who is incorrect, in the UK we don’t use the term entree for starters, entree is the course after ‘starters’ or appetisers, usually a meat course. I accept your opinion that in the places you frequent in Australia the term is used for starters.
Please just leave it now, can’t we just agree that we both think we are right. Life is too short to be so aggressive over a difference in opinion about correct language use - get a grip of your tendency to get so angry over something so inconsequential. I will not be replying to you again.

can’t we just agree that we both think we are right.

But you are entirely wrong!

In America an entree is the main course. It’s weird how it differs and makes no sense! I’ve never heard it used in the UK, maybe it’s regional here.

I can believe that.

@Raven85 no the restaurant was in the next village up. So we arrived together.Also they chose it based on menus they like.
They didn't arrive there before us. We met in a different village as planned.

If you are correct what petty behaviour

If they only live and hour away and you kept them updated with delays why on earth did they set off when they did? Common sense would tell you hang on and set off when your around an hour away. 2.5hr journeys with kids is always going to take longer. One toilet break is not unusual at all. It’s not difficult to fill 40mins in a scenic village, go for a walk/drink/ ice cream?

I find your friends behaviour wild and incredibly rude after you had driven all that way to see them. Perhaps there are problems that they aren’t ready or willing to share yet that have nothing to do with you and your family. Maybe you’ve just been caught in the cross fire.

I would be incredibly hurt by this behaviour tho, unless they come forth with a huge backstory I think I’d be questioning the longevity of the friendship. ‘No drama’ to them must of been really hurtful and embarrassing for your family.

Now it's the other couple's fault for setting off whenever they set off! OP's posting style is low on facts and high on incomprehensibility, so it is hard to gather when the actual intended meeting hour was...

But it seems they were supposed to meet up after lunch. Perhaps the other couple decided to arrive at said location early and have a leisurely lunch there, rather than waiting for the disorganised OP to tell them she had finally set off, whenever that might have been.

I would assume, no matter how they said it didn't matter, that this level of lateness did piss them off, and after all that they just wanted to go home.

ugh, that was some weird crap.

This is all beyond baffling I still have so many questions but I don't think think I can cope with another mind bending response. so I won't.

Huh?

And there it is! It’s like Bingo - poster (you) is unnecessarily rude and condescending in their incorrect put down of someone else, for no other reason than they are rude and condescending (and wrong), then gets all butthurt and offended when the other said poster (me), comes back to them with an equally rude and condescending retaliation, embarrassing them into the bargain, because they weren’t even right in their original unnecessary snark, and stamps their foot with a “I won’t be responding to you again!” I suppose the lesson here is don’t give it out if you can’t take it? 🤣

(SS of thread response for reference)

This. I'm really sorry this happened @TFICoffeetime . It was rude and I'd be hurt too. I think given you've asked them, there's not much more you can do. At least they know they hurt you now and hopefully feeling thoroughly ashamed of themselves. If it was something you did then they had their opportunity to voice this when you asked, so you can only assume it's them not you xx

You are confused about another thread a poster wrote in this thread about her own experience.

Where did you get changed OP so that you were suitably dressed for an expensive restaurant after a walk and swim in a river? Were you able to shower?

why is that relevant?