I am at a wedding with my boyfriend and I’m wearing a dress since it’s in the summer. I have multiple tattoos, but the most prominent is on one of my legs from my hip down past my knee. My dress is modest and goes from mid- to lower thigh. 

My boyfriend and I are chatting with other guests when a lady I don’t know walks up and starts chatting with us. 

Lady: “Oh, my, that tattoo on your leg must have hurt. It is pretty, though. What does it mean?”

Me: “Thank you. Some of it is just because I think it looks nice. The other part is in memory of my grandmother.”

Lady: “That is very nice.”

This seems to be the end of the conversation, and I turn back to my boyfriend. All of sudden, this lady LIFTS MY DRESS up to my stomach to see the rest of the tattoo. Being in a public place with many people around, this is highly inappropriate — not to mention thinking it is okay to expose a stranger you’ve never met before and touch them without permission. 

I am livid. I slap the lady’s hand away and start yelling. 

Me: “Who in the heck do you think you are, touching me and exposing me to all these people?! Never touch me again, and stay away from me.”

Lady: “I don’t know what the big deal is. Don’t get tattoos if you don’t want people looking at them.”

Boyfriend: “There is a difference between looking and grabbing my girlfriend’s clothes off of her!”

My boyfriend then guided me away from the situation because I was still fuming. This is why I rarely wear clothes in public that reveal my tattoos; some people have zero respect for personal space. Don’t get me wrong. I will always talk with people and explain my tattoos if they ask respectfully. This lady crossed a line and still gives me shudders to this day.

My mum has a catering company, and when she has a big job, as it’s a family-run business, she will ask my sister and me to help out now and again when she needs it. We’re not fans of it because we don’t like people, but it’s my mum’s baby and we love her. This particular time it is a very chill wedding with an assembly line where we are divvying out my mum’s delicious food.

I can hear this guy in the line loudly talking about how no one wanted to be his date for the wedding, poor him, he’s such a nice guy, etc. He gets to my mum in line.

Guy: “This good looks wonderful! Are you the owner?”

Mum: “Yes. And my two lovely daughters are helping me today.”

The guy looks at me and then my sister.

Guy: “Well, one of them is lovely, at least.”

My mum, taken aback, continues on as if he hasn’t spoken and serves him. He gets to my sister — the lovely one.

Guy: “You’re so beautiful. How does it feel to be the typical, beautiful younger sister?”

She gives him a basilisk stare.

Sister: “Do you want a bread roll?”

The man doesn’t want to hold up the line, despite clearly wanting to carry on speaking to my sister, and he gets to me.

Guy: “I rate you about a four out of ten. How awful it must be for you to have a sister who’s a ten out of ten!”

I don’t think I’m ugly, and I do think my sister is beautiful, but we look very different. She is very slim, athletic, and tanned with bleach blonde hair with conker-coloured (brown) eyes whereas I have an hourglass figure, pale skin, and grey eyes, and I’m heavily tattooed, so I am aware I’m an acquired taste.

I’m not offended that he thinks my sister is beautiful — I think she’s beautiful — however, I am offended that he thinks we want his “assembly line” commentary, especially when he looks like a human version of Sea Biscuit.

I lean back.

Me: “You’re the guy without a date, right?”

I can see my mum twitching like, “Please, for the love of God, don’t be too harsh.”

He’s grinning at me with his friends all proud of himself.

Me: “I wonder which one it is — if it’s your lack of manners, looks, or personality that stopped you from getting a date when every else has one?”

I pause to put some food on his plate, and then I hand it back to him and smile.

Me: “I imagine it’s all three. Also, despite being a ‘four’, I’ve never not had a date for a function. Have a good day now.”

I never got to hear his response, as the line needed to get moving; however, the guy’s smile was now gone. Such a shame. I didn’t get told off by my mum. Maybe now he’ll have a better approach to women. I doubt it, though.

This story is part of our Best Of October 2021 roundup!

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I am a bridesmaid in a dear friend’s wedding, and we are at the rehearsal the night before the wedding. It’s a fairly laid-back atmosphere and the officiant is just walking us through the steps of the ceremony.

Officiant: “All right, so then it’s time for the vows. Repeat after me: I, [Groom].”

Groom: “Hello!”

We all laugh; typical [Groom], a bit of a goofball.

Officiant: “Right, okay, let’s try again. Repeat after me. I, [Groom]…”

Groom: “’Sup.”

Now comes general confusion.

Officiant: “[Groom]. Repeat after me. I, [Groom]…”

The groom looks incredibly confused.

Bride: “Oh, my God, [Groom], say it back!”

Groom: “Hi, [Officiant]!”

Wedding Party: “NO!”

It turns out [Groom] was somehow hearing, “Hi, [Groom],” not, “I, [Groom],” which led to the confusion. We all laugh about his obliviousness and move on. As the rehearsal progresses, we come to the ring exchange.

Officiant: “Now, I know you have the rings in boxes right now, but tomorrow they’re going to need to be out of the boxes when you hand them to me. So, you’ll need to practice that. Okay, so, may I have the rings?”

The best man immediately hands over the rings in their boxes. We all groan. The bridesmaid next to me leans over

Bridesmaid: “Is that [Groom]’s brother?”

The answer, dear readers, is yes. It must be at least a little genetic. The wedding went wonderfully, though. This is why you have a rehearsal!

My dad told us this story about one of the recent catering events for his business. He was catering for a wedding and he had a chain bakery bake the cake. It was a simple three-tier cake and the picture he showed us looked beautiful. However, the manager of the bakery was not used to delivering cakes, especially tier cakes, and it showed.

When the manager delivered the cake, the third tier had fallen down the back of the cake while in the trunk of the manager’s car. The manager simply handed my dad a tube of icing for “touch-ups” and expected him to fix it.

My dad was furious and took the cake to another location of the bakery chain, showed them the cake, and asked them to fix it. The bakers at this bakery were just as shocked and pissed at the other location as my dad was. 

Instead of just fixing the cake, they threw it out and made a whole new cake from scratch. Thankfully, the wedding wasn’t for another hour or so when the cake was finished; otherwise, the cake would’ve been late. 

I hope the first bakery was reprimanded for their behavior for delivering him a cake like that and expecting him to fix their mistake.

My grandma is notorious for judging how we look and what we wear. She doesn’t get outright confrontational, but she comments all the time in a way which is sometimes “funny” — which it really isn’t — or “questioning” why we wear something, which is really just supposed to tell us she hates it. I would love to answer wittily, but I can never think of a good comeback fast enough. It has gone so far that my brother wears his most worn-out clothes whenever he is visiting Grandma to show her he won’t give in to her. Some of her comments go like this.

We were wearing camouflage pants.

Grandma: “Oh, you look so funny with your colourful pants!”

This is “Grandma” for “I don’t like that.”

Another time, I got a black piercing in my eyebrow.

Grandma: “Oh, did you get a piercing?”

Me: “Yes, I did.”

Grandma: “Oh, I was about to say you have a tick on your face.”

Cue me intentionally not reacting.

Grandma: “But you’re taking that back out, right?”

Me: “No, I’m not. I didn’t get this just to get rid of it again.”

The best and most memorable moment was the day of my brother’s wedding. In Germany, if you want to marry in church, you first have to do a legal wedding with a state-issued official. Most people who have their “big day” in church don’t dress up as fancily for the legal wedding as they do for church. My sister-in-law, for example, wore black pants, nice but sporty shoes, and a colourful shirt with flowers in it. Of course, this was not fancy enough for good old Grandma. However, my sister-in-law doesn’t take s***. When Grandma saw her after getting dressed, she tried one of her questions again, looking her up and down.

Grandma: “Oh, are you ready already?”

My sister-in-law was not having it.

Sister-In-Law: “Yes. And [Brother] will marry me like this, too!”

It’s been three years since the wedding and I still draw on that awesome comeback.