THE CONFETTI NUISANCE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 219, 16 September 1930, Page 6

THE CONFETTI NUISANCE.

Confetti -is the bane of everybody .who is called upon to. clean up any building, where it has been used, and, according to the "Grey Star, the caretaker of the Greymouth Town Hall had on a recent morning the task of removing about five million pieces, of confetti, each and everyone of which was sticking obstinately to the dancing floor and had to be practically scraped an ordinary 'brush simply sliding over them. The newspaper suggests that justice would ibe done if those people who make a habit of using confetti were made to clean it up afterwards. Most clergy dread the use of confetti at weddings. In spite of verbal exhortations and written instructions urging people not to throw confetti in the church, the gjiests at . a wedding usually •leave a trail of these abominations over the floor of the building. They shake out the whole contents of a package without a thought for the unfortunate cleaner to whom is .entrusted the task of getting the church ready for the Sunday services. It sometime? happens that an evening wedding is fixed for a Saturday, or the eve of some Church festival, in which case much of the work falls on the minister himself, or those of the congregation who make an early arrival. It is rarely that any fee is left for the cleaner, and sometimes the language used by those to whom falls the task of removing the confetti is not quite in accordance with, established ecclesiastical usage. The most that can be said in favour of confetti is that it is better than the old-fashioned rice. Cases have occurred where rice has been thrown in the face and caused injury to the eyes. But even if confetti is harmless in this respect, it produces the unedifying spectacle of a newly-married couple shaking themselves like 'large dogs in order to get rid of the hundreds of pieces of coloured paper. The shells of peanuts constitute a source of litter at maiiy entertainments almost equal to that of confetti- People who go to pictures depicting the woes of the heio and heroine, the kind of picture that is desciibcd in the advertisements as making you want "to reach once for your gun, once for your hip pocket, and twice for your pocket handkerchief," seem to find a peculiar solace in cracking peanuts and littering the shells about the floor- The same applies to Sunday School prize-givings and other entertainments of a semi-serious nature. A combination of confetti and peanuts would piovide a desperate problem for a cleaner. _ Fortunately, they are seldom found in conjunction. Confetti seems to have something of a festal nature about it while peanuts arc more in the nature of a solace. We can only hope that they will not make their appearance at weddings. —W.M.