NWR: The quickest decline ever

aurorajanette

Last night I got a FB invite to a friend of a friend's birthday party. She is hosting it in her own honor at a restaurant where entrees START at $50, and only go up drastically from there. In the information section it said:

"Let's gather at 8:30PM on January 25 to celebrate me! No gift's please. The splitting of my plate by all my guests will be gift enough."

I didn't even consider it for a split second. Talk about tacky!

bethsmiles

It boggles my mind how entitled some people are!

misshart00

Wow. I don't mind people saying, hey let's get together for my birthday, but I would not choose a restaurant like that or expect people to pay for me.

Maggie0829

She sounds fun.

aurorajanette

Yeah, typically FI takes me out to dinner on my birthday and then I'll text friends and say, "we'll be at x bar, if you'd like to join". I think that's pretty normal. Never would I expect my friends to pay for my meal.

MayDay513

why? like why bother?

JennyColada

Lol. I don't understand how people like that have friends to invite in the first place.

Amyzen83

Is this woman like 5?

misshart00

Jennycolada said:

Lol. I don't understand how people like that have friends to invite in the first place.

Maybe they invite their whole friend list?

RebeccaB88

How much you want to bet that no one shows up and she ends up buying her own dinner.

Cookie Pusher

I just... wow. I've ended up cooking dinner for my birthday before, but not because I was having a birthday party - my family lives in my town and often come over for meals, which I totally don't mind. But "inviting" people to take me out? Tacky.

phira

Inkdancer

misssunshine17

My jaw literally dropped. Eww. 

lyndausvi

aurorajanette said:

Last night I got a FB invite to a friend of a friend's birthday party. She is hosting it in her own honor at a restaurant where entrees START at $50, and only go up drastically from there. In the information section it said:

"Let's gather at 8:30PM on January 25 to celebrate me! No gift's please. The splitting of my plate by all my guests will be gift enough."

I didn't even consider it for a split second. Talk about tacky!

She had me up to the bolded part.  My friends and I often met for dinner with friends with that kind of invite.  

 She lost me at the bolded part.  Pretty presumptuous I was going to give you a gift at all let alone basically telling me the amount of the gift I'm to give is based on how many people attend. 

The fact that she wants to go to an expensive restaurant is completely irrelevant to me.  I would be equally annoyed if she said "lets meat at McDonald's, no gift, just pay for part of my meal."

climbingsingle

Wow! You know, every time we go out for a friend's birthday, we don't let them pay and split the meal among the rest of us. It's an unspoken thing. But to insist that on your birthday party invite - that's just fucking obnoxious. 

phira

ClimbingBrideNY said:

Wow! You know, every time we go out for a friend's birthday, we don't let them pay and split the meal among the rest of us. It's an unspoken thing. But to insist that on your birthday party invite - that's just fucking obnoxious. 

Same here. I think a lot of etiquette involves the idea that there are things that you don't ask for, but you are likely to get. Like, you don't ask your guests to wear semi-formal attire--they're likely to show up in semi-formal attire. You don't ask for gifts, but you are likely to get gifts.

You don't ask for your friends to pay for your birthday meal, but they often will.

RebeccaB88

And then, what about the people who are strapped for cash and couldn't afford to buy their own meal at the chosen restaurant, let alone split the cost of someone else's meal (and drinks, dessert, tip, etc)? And if only one other person shows up, is the birthday girl going to expect that one person to pay for her entire meal? Is she planning on them buying just her entrée, or does she want a salad, dessert, a bottle of wine or three, a couple mixed drinks, a cappuccino...

RebeccaB88

DP

KeptInStitches

Wow. And I'm still working out whether I'm more dumbfounded by the insistence that it's fine that her guests pay for her plate or the misplaced apostrophe.

HisGirlFriday13

It's very normal in my group of friends to go out to a restaurant for someone's birthday, and we all buy our own way (and probably buy the birthday person a drink or two), but whoever organises it (usually not the birthday person), takes charge of paying for the birthday person's dinner.

Also, we usually pick places that are middle-of-the road. They're not McDonald's, but they're not Le Bec Fin, either. 

lyndausvi

HisGirlFriday13 said:

It's very normal in my group of friends to go out to a restaurant for someone's birthday, and we all buy our own way (and probably buy the birthday person a drink or two), but whoever organises it (usually not the birthday person), takes charge of paying for the birthday person's dinner.

Also, we usually pick places that are middle-of-the road. They're not McDonald's, but they're not Le Bec Fin, either. 

Le Bec Fin... yum

mimiphin

I have just always gone to a restaurant in town here where you get a free dinner on your birthday, it's great, no one has to pay for you and the resturant gets a whole bunch of people in it who wouldn't normally go.
Although the past 2 years I have organized it myself for my birthday I also buy my own damn cake!

I wouldn't even respond!

cowgirl8238

In my circle it is not uncommon for people to out for the birthdys and then invite their firends along.  For us we all pay our own way (including the birthday person) and just use it as an excuse to go out somewhere.  But it is never really anything formal either.

pinkcow13

Wow that is tacky. In my circle, we do whatever the birthday person wants (dinner, drinks, etc), and it is an unspoken rule that we either cover the persons plate, or sometimes the SO will cover that persons plate. One time though, I remember having a not so great experience. It was my friends birthday, and we all went out to a restaurant by the seaport. Most of us arrived after she and her coworkers did. The coworkers had to leave early, and gave us money. Well when the bill came, and we counted how much they left compared to their bill we realized they only (barely) covered their meals! No tax and tip included! So of course we came up short. My friend was out of it due to too many drinks during happy hour, and her boyfriend at the time just looked away. So we all had to pay extra to cover the coworkers meal and drinks, on top of the money we were paying for my friend. What pissed me off was that I felt her boyfriend should have picked up their part, and not made each of us pay extra (he didn't put in extra money I might add). Needless to say they are thankfully no longer together.

Edit: Missed a word

cupcait927

I...just....have no words for that. I just can't imagine treating your friends that way. For my last birthday two of my girlfriends organized a dinner for us and our SOs at a very nice restaurant and I certainly didn't expect them to pay for my dinner and was so grateful when they did and insisted it wasn't necessary. I figure at this point in my life, just celebrating with my friends is present enough without them providing any sort of gift, in any form. We're going out for my best friend's birthday on Friday night, just drinks, and we plan on buying drinks for her because it's her birthday but I know she doesn't expect it and would never make us feel obligated to do so. Some people are just so rude and tacky!

rmueller89

Wow! Rude!

JennyColada

HisGirlFriday13 said:

Also, we usually pick places that are middle-of-the road. They're not McDonald's, but they're not Le Bec Fin, either. 

Hey, what's wrong with McDonald's? You get a free toy!