That people are just a bit shit and not worth the bother?

[Sconehenge]

Sorry for the negative nelly post but I’m just tidying up a big mess from a dinner party. It cost us around £600 and counting to put on, in addition to numerous hours of planning.

I came home early last night so I would be fresh for today but half my guests were hungover and just a bit shit, a few cancelled last minute for various “good reasons” but I can’t help think they could have given more notice/worked around . Two of the guests spent the whole time talking about a party last night that I wasn’t invited to even though we are close friends. I mean, maybe it’s my own fault for planning a lunch on a Sunday I guess.

Honestly I don’t mean to sound ungrateful, I am a person who considers myself to have a nice social life but after a night like tonight I truly think what is the fucking point?

I know good friendships in life are meant to make you live longer and happier but my experience of good friends so far seems to be that most people are hedonists, they’re after whatever makes them feel good in the moment and if it’s you, then fantastic you’ll have “fun”, if it’s not you, then whatever.

I think it’s time to retire to the woods or something!

Are there better people out there or is this it?

£600! I think you just need to rein it in. A Sunday lunch for £50 which is more relaxed is going to be a more fun experience for you (and probably your guests too!).

Yes I can see how it would be a massive disappointment. It’s always tedious when people discuss at length another event you didn’t go to, (yet I know I have done it myself), and must be worse if it was your dinner party. I think the timing was in hindsight a bit off as people have so many commitments round Christmas so a Sunday at this time of year probably wasn’t going to see them arrive at their best. That’s probably the full extent of their “shitness” but I can understand it probably feels a bigger deal when you went to all that effort.

Did you ask why you weren't invited to the night before?

Also, I won't ever imagine that for a Sunday lunch event the host would spend the Saturday night prepping.

Clearly your guests didn't understand what a big event this was to you.

For them this was Sunday lunch with friends at yours, nice but just one event in the festive month.

For you this was your massive Christmas event and the thing that you were focused on for the whole festive period.

Ha ha, exactly my reaction. How the other half lives, eh?

A) it’s Sunday lunch and you expect people not to have gone out on a Saturday night

B) who spends £600 on a lunch. Mad.

Half a dozen bottles of LPNV is already 360-400, so easily done.

What they did wrong, as far as I can see, was not fulfil their side of the social bargain. If you get invited to someone’s house it is polite to make an effort be a good guest, to be present and contribute to the occasion. Otherwise, what is the point of going? I dislike people who cancel at the last minute, don’t enter into the spirit of the occasion or talk to one another at length about events they have been to/involved in that exclude other guests. It’s bad manners. I had to endure sitting between two people the other night who went on and on about their particular hobby and even when I tried to steer the conversation back to something more inclusive they drifted back. I was bored, couldn’t contribute in any way and was stuck between them so couldn’t move and it was too noisy to talk to other people across the table. It was rude. Another friend, whom I considered to be one of my best friends, pretty much ignored me all evening. It’s not the first time she has done that so I’m not putting up with that shit anymore either.

totally agree. was it a big occasion op ? how much notice did you give ? if I was in your shoes regardless of how much I spent I would be pisedd off too.
we invited friends if ours one Sunday for lunch during the summer. they had an hours drive to us dinner was at half 1. arrive before 3 not a care in rhe world. its the lack of disrespect that annoys me. no respect of time it takes etc and I was looking forward to catching up too which was cut short as they had to go back.
with regards to the money maybe here in Ireland things more expensive but 600 not bad. I has a party for birthday about 40 people that was 1k here. went out sat night to a restaurant not a fancy one now. 4 of us with 2 bottles of wine and that was 300e. caver lunch now is close to 20e here.

I do agree some people are shit. We go all out too but have stopped doing it with most people.

However, kindly OP, I think perhaps your expectations were too high - which probably happened because you spent so much money. Honestly, whenever my husband’s friends or family come over for a dinner party, something will happen to make me raise my eyebrows privately. We once had one who was on their phone loudly throughout our meal. With said person, a really delicious but quick and relatively cheap bowl of pasta with nice bread will suffice if we have to host again (family). No starter, expensive wine and dessert I spent hours slogging over a hot stove for.

So yes, to summarise, people are often indeed shit.

Tbh I think it was most likely just bad timing. Most people are very busy or have lots of parties and events in the run up to Christmas and especially on Friday/Saturday nights so I would avoid putting on a spendy formal lunch/dinner party around now - either have a full on party or something much more casual. All your efforts will be lost in the general melée! Best to wait until January/February when things are a bit slower/more miserable.

They knew the effort I was putting into the day, but still went out to a different friends Christmas party, didn’t invite me, and stayed out into the early hours to be hungover.

It wasn't their place to invite you to other friends' Christmas parties. That's up to the hosts of those parties and if they didn't invite you, take it up with them. Also if your friends knew they were seeing you on the Sunday, that's a reason not to take you along to the Saturday night party. Quite apart from not seeing you two days on the trot, you also wanted an early night on the Saturday so wouldn't have wanted to go out and party with them they way they chose to.

December can be full on chocca with parties and meet-ups, so although yours takes centrestage for you, it can be part of a social marathon for others and that they turned up after a big night out is a good thing. The fact you made it a £600 affair is your own look-out and a chilled Sunday lunch or lazy grazing get-together would have been wiser. But you know that now. People aren't worth the bother you went to, but that doesn't make them shit overall.

I cannot stand lateness to a dinner party or nice lunch. I have also had extremely late guests to the point the food was not cooked as well due to sitting around for far too long then needing rewarming in the microwave! This thread is reminding me actually of how many mannerless people we have had round. My side are great I must say, even if biased.

Your 30s are a period when you realise who your friends are, and when a lot of people fall away or get left. I remember hosting a party for NYE in my early 30s with a group who I considered my 'best' friends. They were so rude, ungrateful and obnoxious I have not seen most of them since! Sometimes people's character really gets exposed when a modicum of graditude, generosity or kindness is required. Fun isn't enough in the long run!

Also who's to say they didn't know the effort that the friend with the Saturday night Christmas party had gone to? It's not really about feeling obliged because of the effort anyway. It's good to make an effort but ideally your guests wouldn't feel the weight of that.

First of all, Sunday lunch isn’t a ‘dinner party’. Most people invited to a Sunday lunch would assume it was a much more relaxed thing.

Secondly, you say you ‘came home early’ on Saturday so you would be fresh for Sunday. OK, fine, but you’re the host. Obviously you need to be ‘fresh’ if you’re cooking etc. But you cannot possibly expect your guests to have an early night on Saturday just because they’re coming to lunch at your house on a Sunday.

Thirdly, describing your guests as ‘hungover and just a bit shit’ is weird. What difference does it make to you if they were hungover, really? Provided they were able to chat and eat the food, that’s all that’s required. What do you mean by ‘a bit shit’? Do you mean they failed to perform the part you’d arbitrarily assigned to them to make your event go as planned? Were they insufficiently witty and sparkling or what? They’re people, not props.

Fourthly, it isn’t their fault that you spent £600. You say a lot of that was on things like ‘glasses and decorations’. How on earth would your friends know that you’d bought all that stuff?! It was just Sunday lunch.

Fifthly, you say you ‘came home early’ on Saturday so were presumably out. Therefore I don’t understand why it’s an issue that two of your friends went to a party that night.

I know good friendships in life are meant to make you live longer and happier but my experience of good friends so far seems to be that most people are hedonists, they’re after whatever makes them feel good in the moment and if it’s you, then fantastic you’ll have “fun”, if it’s not you, then whatever.

Why shouldn’t people enjoy themselves in the moment, though? Most of them came to your lunch. Your problem seems to be that they were insufficiently entertaining to you when they got there. Basically, you made the whole event about you enjoying yourself, playing glamorous hostess to charming, hilarious guests, and then got pissed off that your friends didn’t stick to your script.

I think expecting people to be fresh and clear headed on a Sunday around Christmas is perhaps a bit unreasonable.

Expecting to be invited to everything your friend does is unreasonable.

Blaming your friends because you spent a lot of money on homewares is unreasonable.

Being upset at a lack of effort from your friends is not unreasonable.

TBH I'm not sure that everyone's a hedonist! I'm looking for people in my circle to bring my children up with, who have similar aged children.
The important thing to me is that they are nice, and have similar values and priorities to me...
I think your pals sound like not very nice people, I wouldn't be discussing parties I'd attended without the person hosting me unless it was a person who was completely unrelated, like DHs 2nd aunts husbands, nephew sort of thing.

I'm in my sixties and entertain often. A big Sunday lunch for a group of friends is probably my favourite option. It has never occurred to me that my guests should stay in the night before so as to be on top form for my do. They are quite a hard drinking crew so I'm sure a few will often be hungover at the start of the lunch but it doesn't seem to stop them joining in and having a good time.

It sounds as if it was your tension and resentment that put a downer on the party rather than any hangovers.

I’ve had the same scenario a few years ago, the last minute drop outs, and the same feeling. Thankfully I hadn’t spent £600 on them, but I was still annoyed that my friends didn’t appreciate the effort I had made.

I concluded it’s just Christmas - people over commit and then are flakey - my friends are actually quite a good bunch the rest of the time. So I haven’t thrown a Christmas lunch or party since 2017 - I do summer, or Halloween etc., and it all goes well - but December is out.

The only scenario I might be tempted by in December is a sort of mulled wine and mince pies open house afternoon - could be a way to get that fuzzy feeling without too much financial or emotional investment.

I can imagine you feel disappointed and a bit pissed off but try and look at the positives if you can. Everyone would've been grateful for what you did, even if they didn't show it.. and If it cost that much then im sure you put on a great spread.

I think people are generally a bit crap, and the funny thing is we can all be crap if we've got stuff going on. I can think of countless occasions that I might've said something by mistake that annoyed someone or didn't say thank you because I totally forgot etc.
The way I now live my life is to just expect the minimum from people, expect them to have stuff on their mind, expect people never to be happy for you because they are maybe a bit envious, just expect the worst and then sometimes you are pleasantly surprised.
Unfortunately in this day and age we are all so stressed. Christmas is going to be fun this year.. not!

And the high expectations. It’s lovely to have people around for lunch on a Sunday, but I think it’s generally an occasion when people would expect it to be casual, with easily-made food, not finicky, effortful dishes, expensive wines, special decorations, new crockery etc.

Maybe have a brunch next time? It sounds as if you thought of this as a far more formal affair than your guests did.

Last time we had peoole over on Sunday for lunch, I think we had lentil lasagne and salad, followed by cheese, and then brownies someone had brought served with whatever vanilla icecream was in the fridge. The children made themselves those homemade microwave teacup chocolate messes. Seven children plus eight adults, plus us. It was really nice.

Yes that's a bit rubbish! However, I felt you placed too much importance on your meal in the sense that you spent £600 on it!! I really can't get over that. What did you serve? Lobster, caviar and 20 bottles of champagne?!
We're all different but I like relaxed dinners with my friends - bung something in the oven and just chill.
I do a lot of hosting and some meals go better than others. Yes sometimes people are hungover or mutual friends have arguments or whatever but it's never a big deal because I don't place too much importance on each meal.
As for the friendships I look at the big picture - are they generally good friends to me or not? I wouldn't judge a friendship on whether they'd once turned up at a meal hungover. If they're generally not good friends to you why are you spending £600 on them?!

So, the basics rules::

• Don't cancel: your choice is to accept the invite, or not.
• Don't be a drag, be something of value to your host.

That's it, if you're tired or whatever just get over yourself for 5 minutes, you don't have to be the last one to leave. OP I agree they sound really boring and rude.

Last dinner party we had was with 2 couples (I didn’t add up our spend but nothing like £600, although wine was rather pricey). But my very good friend’s boyfriend put down his dessert spoon and said thank you for the food, we’re leaving now. Friend scurried after him and dh, other df and her dh and I all looked on rather befuddled. It was 9:10pm! We will do something again but it did put me off. She’s not with him now.

It’s not really their place to invite you to someone else’s party, that’s on the host.