Girls' Night Out!

Loyal readers, welcome to another installment of "How Socially Inept Am I?"

As part of a generation raised on Sex and the City, I'm supposed to have a close-knit posse of girlfriends and walk around arm-in-arm with them, Cosmos in hand, constantly laughing hysterically.

But I don't have this posse. I've never had this posse. I started hanging out in co-ed groups in Grade 9 and never looked back. The all-girl parties I attended (with a few exceptions) always felt like veiled interventions: "I guess Robyn is technically one of us - maybe we can save her and make her less weird!"

Doing the co-ed thing is great; however, I recently realized that my guy friends outnumber my girl friends 5 to 1. That's getting a bit ridiculous. So, I decided to go bowling last night with 12 other girls, no boys allowed!

I knew I was in trouble the moment I walked in. I had just thrown on some old jeans and battered Converse sneakers, because who dresses up to go to Rev's Bowling in Burnaby? Apparently, everyone. These girls had each spent at least an hour on their hair. They were wearing knee-high boots and sparkling with jewelry. I had never seen so many flawless manicures in one place. If I ignored the sound of bowling pins falling over, I could imagine I was at a Hollywood premiere.

And everything they did took forever. Before a girl bowled, she had to pose for a Facebook photo with the ball. And then we'd do a team photo. And then the team in the next lane would notice we were taking photos and join in. Then, she would bowl. If she hit anything at all, our team would all scream, jump up and down, and hug each other. We'd dance to the background music. Maybe we'd take a celebration photo. The bowler would say how relieved she was that she hadn't broken a nail - because she almost broke a nail that time! A lively discussion would follow about our favourite places to get nails done, and harrowing tales of botched manicures. And then - OMG someone's taking a photo!

Near the end, I was physically exhausted. I had lost my voice from all the screaming. More than anything, I wanted to sit down, order a drink that wasn't pink, and talk about what would happen if zombies attacked the bowling alley.

I was at that bowling alley for literally 6 hours. And I left early. The others were probably there for at least 8 or 9.

Is this the sort of thing that's supposed to come naturally to me? Because it doesn't - I went home and slept for 12 hours straight. Mission to find Sex and the City-esque girl friend posse - FAIL.