Have you ever crashed a wedding or other large party where it was unlikely that any of the guests would know you didn't belong?

In the New York Times yesterday, they had an article about people who have crashed weddings. They found out the information via the internet, and then got dressed up and joined the cocktail hour for hors d’ouvre and drinks.

I have crashed a large, corporate picnic (this was about 20 years ago) for three successive years. It was held outdoors on the grounds of a large public estate and so we went and joined in and hung out. Nobody asked me who I was or what department I worked in. I had an answer if they did, but nobody did.

In the “Comments” section of the Times article, people talked about theft of services and how it was wrong of the crashers to crash when the hosts may have omitted guests they wanted due to their (the hosts’ ) lack of funds. I’m not defending crashing, but if you think about it, for a large, catered event, you pay for the number of sit down meals (per plate cost). Cocktail hour, one or two extra people will go unnoticed and it’s likely that many guests will come late anyway so it’s really just an exchange of cocktail hour guests for sit-down guests.