The Noisey Guide To… Not Going to Glastonbury

Even if you think you don’t care, you definitely do care that Glastonbury Festival is happening as of right now. It’s the king of all festivals with the king of all He surveys headlining on the Saturday night. It’ll be all over every TV channel and social media outlet, and Noisey promises loads of in-depth coverage that’ll make you feel like you’re there even if you’re not.

Personally, I’m A) 25 years OLD and B) dead inside so IDGAF about outdoor shit shows filled with basic bitches in leg chains and boys in floral Hype x Simpsons x Topshop t-shirts. But what do you do with your life when your whole crew seems to have hooked themselves up with festival passes and you find yourself wondering when you fell off?

Perhaps you were cc’d on the Facebook message about it, but you muted the conversation to immerse yourself in your fourth episode of Broad City. Maybe all your friends sold their souls to the devil of management consultancy after leaving university and therefore actually have quarter of a month’s rent to spend on a glamping pass. Meanwhile, your career as a pub quiz specialist still hasn’t quite taken off, and you pissed whatever money you did have on pop tarts and Red Stripe.

Does this sound like you? Are you alone? Taking selfies against the TV with BBC Red Button in the background so you it looks like you’re at the Pyramid Stage? Pull yourself together mate. I am here to help you with this comprehensive and entirely factual guide to conquering festival FOMO that is valid from the first day of BBC’s Glastonbury coverage to the last Instagram’d Croatian sunset of Dimensions.

If you’re as good and loyal a friend as I am, then you won’t just leave your besties to enjoy their weekend without at least reminding them of your presence via iMessage. After all, how much fun could they possibly be having without you? That’s right, none. None at all. But text them frequent abuse just to make sure. For example: True Detective Season 2 spoilers, photos of crusty white dreads captioned with ‘your man/girl’, and keep reminding them how warm/dry/not covered in other people’s shit you are, and punctuate every sentence with the poo emoji. Repeat this until they block your number.

Nobody likes a mopey prick, so if you insisted on not going to Glastonbury because “who wants to spend £300 to sit in a muddy field in the rain? NO THANKS” then you’re going to need to take your mind off the fact that all your friends are all having the time of their life seeing god’s face in a dog turd on their third munch of mushrooms.

If you can’t be bothered to leave your bed, then Netflix costs £5.99 a month, and, depending on the show, is infinitely better than living outside for four days. Personally though, I’d recommend getting out there. Have you ever been to a festival and regretted that perpetual warm state your beer is always in? And the way drunk glitter bombed youngsters lean on you while they neck? Well, may I introduce you to: THE PUB. Pubs serve cold beer, in glasses, there are seats, and you can find them at the end of any self-respecting road. Drinking alone makes you look either mysterious and intellectual, or mad and unpredictable, both of which are great looks in 2015.

If all else fails, Taylor fucking Swift is playing Hyde Park on Saturday and even if you have to go alone the chances of seeing a 9 year-old vomit from pure adrenaline are high enough to make it worth your while.

Obviously, this is never a concern of mine because I am way too hot for any of my past present or future boyfriends to even consider cheating on me. I also double barrel this by only dating pale white boys who are way below my league and spend their every waking moment in wonderment that I am with them. But, if you aren’t an earthbound deity like me, you might find yourself worrying that your significant other might meet a girl called Karen from Hampshire whilst queueing at the artisan quinoa stand. You imagine them spending the day flirting over cans of gin and by the time the sun goes down he is transfixed by its dying rays reflecting off her 99p bindi and can no longer contain his lust… They consummate the crime in eco toilets.

If you’re letting yourself think like this, you’re either not ready for a relationship, or you don’t trust em. Dump him.

It is very possible that at least 15 percent of the people you follow on Instagram and Twitter are only attending Glastonbury so they can post about it on Instagram and Twitter. Do not give them the satisfaction of knowing how much you, in this moment, hate them with the power of a thousand eco-friendly strobe lights.

If your festival-going acquaintances are as awful and predictable as the average BuzzFeed quiz-taking low-fat hummus eating human, then their social media uploads are also going to be awful and predictable too. You can guarantee that every single visual dispatch will be comprised of one or more of the following: the whole team throwing up peace signs standing out their 18 man teepee looking like the rejects from a musical that never made it to Broadway because it was shit; a photo of the backs of 700 heads with a tiny black smudge in the distance whose identity you're only aware of the caption; a 2-4 lad can-can formation photo involving some sort of matching polo shirt situation or spandex or both; blurry snaps of someone toppling arse-first into a hay stack, clutching a bottle of water and gurning.

Your friends are in a field Snapchatting themselves adorned in a variety of problematic costumes ranging from Vanessa Hudgens at Coachella to Rachel Dolezal at her whole life. You, on the other hand, are meeting a fellow loser friend in Soho for a totally fucking justified £16 savoury cocktail or some shit whilst adorned in none of those things. If you do for some reason find yourself walking the streets of London wearing a Native American headdress then you are a cunt and should shut yourself up in your room away from the rest of decent humanity and wait for Wireless.

A mate once called me on the night before a festival began saying he could hook me up with two spare press passes if I got myself there ASAP. The catch was that this festival was just outside of Berlin and I was very, very inside of Neasden. But I was also unemployed and in love, so I called up my not-boyfriend and told him to meet me at Gatwick in 8 hours. It took me 3 years to get the £300 I paid for his flight back from him and there was a really cool period of about 2 hours when it looked like one of us wasn’t going to get in, but I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t one of the best experiences of my life. Also, on-demand TV didn’t exist then, and reckless spontaneity was a much more attractive prospect when it isn’t conflicted by the option of remaining in your pants, out of debut, binge-watching entire series’ of America’s Next Top Model from 2004.

On the other hand, if the “mate” in question is someone you hooked up with at a party three years ago who hasn’t stopped texting you at least once a month since and the “hook-up” involves a pair of pliers and some “insider knowledge” gained from a security guard then maybe leave it.

Watch this video in a weak and pathetic attempt to tell yourself EVERYTHING IS FINE and that it’s OKAY TO BE ALONE SOMETIMES whilst crying at the live-stream of Kanye headlining Glastonbury you’ve got open in the other window.