I agree with the overwhelming sentiments here! While I LOVE getting together with friends, I hate the formal, look - aren't we sophisticated parties. I mean, c'mon! I know these women and they are usually blue jean wearing, down in the dirt, cussing up a storm types. Don't sit around a circle and expect me to act differently than I am just because you put on expensive clothes and are sipping wine instead of beer tonight. I don't buy the bull.
My biggest pet peeve though are weddings. I love a good wedding, but I am so sick of going to (and being in) wedding where I have spent money on an outfit, taken time off work and maybe even travelled to have the bride act like she doesn't know me and become a total, raving B-TCH - just because it's "her" day. I have friends who are no longer friends because of their behaviour at their weddings. The last one I went to was for a very good friend and employee of mine but was only 18 years old. I was her maid of honor and after about the fifth time she blew her stack over something stupid and yelled at her mother (who had paid for and busted her behind putting the whole thing together) I told her that if I heard one more word out of her I was going to punch her in the mouth and walk out the door.
I vowed when I got married that it would be just as fun for everyone else as it was for me - and it was. We had our reception in a fair building, put up a minimal amount of decorations, served baked beans, ham and potatoe salad and sang karaoke. It was the best!