a funny thing happened on the way...

Speaking of queue etiquette, I wonder what the 'rules' are around queueing for Comedy Festival shows?

The Comedy Festival staff at Melbourne Town Hall do a wonderful job of directing all the people to the large number of shows at the different venues at the Town Hall. Everyone is directed to appropriate queues, and the staff wander around to make sure that everyone is in the right queue for their show and that the queues stay... um... 'ruly'.

When I went to see the Kransky Sisters, I arrived at the Town Hall a few minutes before the friend that I was meeting there, so I hopped into the queue. When she arrived, she waited with me. I guess that, technically, that means that she's jumped the queue ahead of the people behind me who were waiting before her, but I figure that one person is ok to 'hold' a place for a friend; that won't make much difference to anyone behind.

When I went to see Denise Scott, even tho I arrived 15 minutes early, I was a long way back in the queue. I should have guessed, since her show had been selling out, that the fans would arrive early (especially the competitive ones who don't like to be behind other people in queues!!).

There was a couple in front of me, talking on the mobile to someone whom they were apparently expecting to meet at the show. A few minutes later, their friends, another couple, arrived, and joined the queue in front of me. Ok, so two people have queue-jumped to be with two others... no biggie; I can deal.

The queue started to move towards the entrance, and as it did, two more friends of the same couple appeared, and duly slotted in ahead of me as well! hmmm... now it didn't seem to be quite fair, somehow.

Then, as we shuffled towards the door to enter the theatre, I noted a rush of movement out of the corner of my eye... and there was another two friends of the 6-person group, running up alongside all the people queued up, to slip in front of me and join their friends! So the two people who had waited in the queue had blown out to 8, with six of them queue-jumping, even at the last minute!

So I wonder... is that fair? Should people be able to queue-jump at will to join a sole place-holder further up the queue, or should they all have waited their turn? Or should people up front be made to drop back in the queue to join late-arriving friends? (Now there's an idea...!)