Call it a midlife crisis, a bid to recapture my youth—but the bygone thing I’ve been chasing isn’t a taut neck or glass skin , but a good old-fashioned sleepover with my girlfriends.

Girls’ nights out have started to feel like speed dating, with everything set on a timer: the restaurant reservation, the babysitter, a middle-aged woman’s ever-diminishing tolerance for noise. “Ladies’ Nights,” as they were known at their late-20th century inception (shout-out to Kool & The Gang), weren’t even designed to satisfy women’s desires. A discounted drink to increase female patronage on a slow night was just bait—to lure male patrons willing to pay full price.

That’s not to say that girls’ nights in haven’t fallen prey to late-stage capitalism. A cursory Google search of “adult sleepovers” wil

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