Now that spring has finally sprung, that means wedding season is officially underway! For those of you who are still too college young to understand what wedding season is, I’d advise just ditching all of your friends now and getting out while you still can. Trust me, it’s better this way! For those of you who do know all about wedding season, then you know this is the time of year when you must forgo all of your free time, vacation days, and any savings you may have managed to build up in favor of lavishly celebrating a couple whose great love story started with the groom sending the bride a “u up?” text 6-8 months after drunkenly hooking up with her at a bar. See what I mean about getting out while you still can, kids?
Now, don’t get me wrong—wedding season can sometimes be fun (there’s always the open bar), but as someone who has never attended a wedding and/or wedding season event with a date, trust me when I say that this godforsaken season can be pretty treacherous to navigate at times. Luckily for you betches, I’ve developed a “Stop, Drop, and Roll” safety method but for, like, attending anything wedding themed as a single AF person. Since I’m more of a show not tell type of person, I’m going to throw a few scenarios at you and give some tips as to how to handle said scenario. These tips might go against basic wedding etiquette, but let me tell you they are absolutely essential when you’re out there in survival mode. You’re welcome.
Scenario #1: Someone Asks If You’re Dating Anyone
Survival Tip: Be more vague than a Poosh article.
I recently attended a friend’s engagement party and was asked no less than 15 times by various people at said party if I was “dating anyone.” And before you ask, no, apparently bringing up the guy who ghosted you in the winter of 2016 doesn’t count as “dating” anymore. I’ve never felt more personally victimized tbh. This is always a fun scenario because in theory asking about someone’s love life should be a harmless but fun question. In theory. But that theory goes completely out the window when the question is posed at an event where everyone is paired up like Noah’s freaking Ark and you’re the last sad muskrat on earth. Like, do these people think you would just show up to an event dateless if you had any other alternative?? Like I haven’t been out here propositioning the guy who asks for my spare change outside of Starbucks every morning for this very occasion?? Sighs. That said, if someone does dares ask you this question just know that the key to getting out of that conversation alive (and with your dignity still intact) is to be vague AF. Like, vaguer than Kourtney Kardashian’s instructions on what she does to get ready for a big night out. Say something along the lines of “I’ve been playing the field, just keeping my options for now!” and then run like hell for the booze. Works every time.
Scenario #2: Someone Tries To Give You Dating Advice
Survival Tip: Smile, nod, and haul ass to the open bar.
I’m going to bring up this engagement party again because it’s still fresh in my mind. I didn’t follow my own advice at one point in the evening and made the mistake of mentioning to the bride’s older relative that I wasn’t seeing anyone at the moment. She then proceeded to tell me that the reason I can’t find a boyfriend is because my Claddagh ring is facing the wrong way! As if a ring, which I bought purely because I saw Buffy Summers wearing one so I wanted to wear one, has the power to make men stop ghosting me. I didn’t have the heart to tell the old biddie that the general energy I put out into the world is somewhere between “burn it all down” and “break up with your boyfriend ‘cause I’m bored”, and it probably has nothing to do with the way I wear a ring on my finger. But, if it’s not Aunt Edna trying to give you dating advice, then it will certainly be someone else so you should prepare yourself for this scenario. My advice is to smile, nod, and then haul ass to some corner of the party where you should proceed to chug whatever drink is in your hand. Being proselytized to is always more fun when you’re drunk!
Scenario: #3: The Bride Tries To Set You Up
Survival Tip: Be mature about it. Hide in the bathroom.
I’m going to warn you right now, whether it’s at the engagement party or the actual wedding, the bride will try and set you up with the only other single person in attendance. This didn’t used to happen in my early twenties when more of my friends were single, but now that we’re all pushing 30 *shudders* and I’m the last one in my friend group to stay single, it happens A LOT more. And before you say “oh, but that’s so great of your friend to hook you up like that!” let me just tell you that they aren’t setting me up with a guy who I might be compatible with. No, they’re setting me up with any dude who has a pulse and a bare ring finger. As if we’re the only two pandas at the zoo and everyone is waiting for us to mate. There’s two ways to handle a scenario like this. One, you can lean tf into it and give the guy a chance (or, at the very least, a drunken makeout sesh). Or two, you can hide. The second method is my personal favorite because it combines two of my strengths: avoiding confrontation at all costs and drinking alone in bathrooms. The second part is optional, but highly encouraged.
Scenario #4: You Make Out With The Bride’s Younger Brother
Survival Tip: Deny, deny, deny
Speaking of drunken makeouts, what are weddings if you don’t dishonor your family name at least once by hooking up with a relative of the bride or groom in plain sight of the entire wedding party? As a single person at a wedding, it’s kind of your duty!! I’ve been introduced as the “blackout friend” at a wedding season event before, and you know what? You can’t be offended if it’s true. There’s definitely been times where I’ve made out with people at weddings and had zero memory of said makeout until the next morning when the savage animals I call my best friends reminded me in between dry heaves and wishing I was dead. They’re so sweet. The key here is to deny, deny, deny. Even if your friends present you with photographic evidence of said makeout (seriously, why am I friends with these people?) never stop denying it happened. You don’t know her. End of story.
So there you have it. Your survival guide for being single AF during wedding season. For those of you who are about to embark on this journey, stay safe out there, but more importantly—and I cannot stress this enough—stay drunk! Xo.
Images: Giphy (4)
Even if you don’t actually follow any, there’s a pretty solid chance that your Instagram feed is constantly flooded with Instagram influencers and their captions that start with “Hey guys, I’m so excited…” and end with #linkinbio. It’s basically like a giant worldwide cult where they all act, dress, and speak the same way. Except they drink Flat Tummy Tea instead of Kool Aid.
Anyway, as much as I love creating fake conspiracy theories, I don’t actually think that all influencers are in a cult. Actually, I know they don’t. In my real life (like, outside of talking shit about the Real Housewives on the internet) I work on the opposite side of sponsored content, and manage influencer campaigns from a brand standpoint. All of the annoying stuff they do actually has very specific reasoning behind it. Basically, the influencers that have their shit together all have a media kit, or some kind of way to organize their information so that they can pitch themselves to brands to get paid for creating sponsored content. In these media kits, they want to prove that they have a shit ton of active followers that are obsessed with them, and basically every move they make on social media is to help increase those statistics. Here’s why influencers do the things that make all of us question why we have to live in the age of social media, instead of like, the 80s when everyone just teased their hair and dropped acid.
Asking You Questions That Have Nothing To Do With The Picture
You know when an Insta model posts a picture of herself in a bikini at some obscure beach in like, Australia? Like, her knees are in the sand and she’s doing that pose that makes her look somehow… skinnier? It’s a total thirst trap and the caption is like, “What’s your favorite ice cream flavor?” Like, didn’t this chick just say she’s on her third cycle of Whole30 or something? Has she even had ice cream in the past four years? ANYWAY, you know that betch is going to pull in 2k likes on that, so why is she even wasting her time trying to think of a clever caption? Everyone knows that when the thirst trap is solid, you can throw any emoji in there and it will perform on its own.
Influencers aren’t concerned with just likes, because when they pitch themselves to companies to get partnerships, they typically measure their Instagram success by engagements, which is every action taken on the post. So if you like an influencer’s post, that’s one engagement. If you like and comment, that’s two. And if they ask you a question and your comment is an answer they can respond to, their own comment will count as a third engagement.
Posting A Story Announcing They Have A New Post
Pretty much every influencer has posted at least one Instagram story of a screenshot of their profile with the square of their latest picture hidden that’s like “New post! Go see!” Like, as if anyone’s going to be surprised by another photo of them wearing head to toe Zara standing in front of brownstone that they don’t live in.
It’s not necessarily because they think that you’re going to be totally blown away by their ability to have taken yet another seamlessly executed plandid (planned candid, get it?). It’s because they’re trying to game the ever-changing Instagram algorithm. The more you engage with an account (aka, watch stories), the more likely Instagram is to show that account higher up in the newsfeed the next time you log in. So when they post that annoying screenshot, it’s to hopefully send you to their latest post right away, but then to also get you to see their content sooner the next time they post.
Posting Sponsored Content Boomerangs
Ugh the dreaded SugarBearHair Vitamins boomerang dance. You know exactly what I’m talking about. Like, all influencers do that same #sponcon jig.
People are way less likely to like a photo of a girl holding a sheet mask or a packet of vitamins than a photo of a person doing actual normal human activities, like brunching. So, they post a boomerang instead because it uploads as a video and tracks views instead of likes. A boomerang that gets 2,000 views might only receive a couple hundred likes, so it at least helps to keep the illusion that they’re pulling in mad numbers all the time.
Having A Twitter Account That’s Literally Just Automated Links
Unless you’re really into memes and tweeting about Bachelor Nation, Twitter is kind of dead. So why do influencers still constantly tweet the links to their Instagrams and blog posts? It all comes back to building up the media kit. If they add all of their Twitter followers to their “Social Followers” stats, they can make it seem like they have a larger, more active audience than they really do.
Having A Million Story Highlights
Are you even an influencer if you don’t have a solid row of story highlights with carefully curated icons that match your Instagram aesthetic? Nope. Influencers don’t just create story highlights because they think you want to see a historical detailing of every açaí bowl they’ve ever eaten. They do it to have more places to put external links on their profiles. If you have under 10k followers, you only have the ability to place a link in your bio. If you have more, you can add “swipe up” links to your Instagram stories. When brands are looking for influencers to partner with, they’ll most likely want to make sure that the influencer’s social accounts link to their website. Obviously, influencers with blogs would rather save the precious bio link for their own personal content, so story highlights give them a place to hoard all of their sponsored shit.
Going Live All Of The Time
As you probably already know, influencers love to go live on Instagram more than you like to pretend ordering sushi with brown rice is clean eating. Most people are too lazy to turn off their notifications so that Instagram doesn’t alert them when a user goes live, and influencers can really benefit from this. It’s kind of exactly like how AOL still makes bank off of all of the old people who ordered dial up in the 90s and forgot to cancel it when their grandchildren came and helped them setup a wireless router. When you accidentally tune into an influencer’s Instagram live, it helps them get another set of eyes on their FabFitFun box.
Now you’ll never have to ask these questions to your group chat again. You’re welcome.
Images: Giphy (4)
