stories:
Table Manners
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Boy, It’s Getting LateWhen can you leave a boring dinner party? |
Dear Helena,
The other night I went to a really boring dinner party. The hosts were busy in the kitchen, and the guests had little in common. It didn’t help that after we finished a bottle of wine, there was no more alcohol in sight. As soon as we put our dessert spoons down, everyone leaped to his feet to leave. I felt bad, as the hosts had made a lot of effort with the meal, and it wasn’t even 11. How early can you leave a boring dinner party? And if you don’t stay long, is there a way to soften the blow for your hosts? —Desperate to Get Out of There
Dear Desperate,
Unlike a boring movie, which you can leave early, you have to stay at least until dessert. The exception is if the dinner has lasted far beyond societal norms—say, four hours, and the host has only just popped the cobbler in the oven. (Your rights in this type of ultralong dinner situation are covered in one of my previous columns.)
In a more typical dinner party scenario, you should stay through dessert, and then linger a bit more. James Nestor, a San Francisco writer who has suffered through “hundreds” of dull dinners, suggests “an hour to an hour and a half of chatting on top of dinner.” Otherwise it looks like you just came for the food.
While waiting for your dinner to conclude, you can’t just zone out. As Winda Benedetti, a freelance journalist in Seattle, says, “If you’re a guest, don’t just sit there twiddling your thumbs and thinking, ‘Oh, I’m so bored.’ If you’re bored, it’s partly your own fault.”
So how do you help make things more lively? Asking questions is a classic technique to juice up the conversation. But skip the obvious ones. I was at a dinner recently where one of the guests attempted to banish a long silence by asking all the other guests: “Do you have any brothers and sisters?” A query like this is the death knell of a dinner party. It signals social desperation. One by one, everyone gave his or her rote answer. Then silence descended again.
Instead, “ask something a little more outrageous or unusual,” says Laurel Sarra, a lawyer in Redondo Beach, California. “Instead of, ‘How did you meet the host?’ ask, ‘What do you have inside your survival kit?’”
Or do as Nestor does and try psychological quizzes. “They might be cheesy, but it’s better than sitting there saying nothing but, ‘Mmm, this is good.’” Nestor prefers a variation of this game. If it’s after dinner and you’re willing to commit to staying another hour, suggest a parlor game, like Fictionary or Mafia. Competition gets the adrenaline flowing and perks people up.
If you’ve put in an hour on top of dinner and you just can’t get the conversation off the ground, start clearing the table. Doing the dishes is a tactful signal to your hosts that the evening is over. It’s also a small compensation for the failure of their dinner party.
When you leave, smile and thank your hosts, but don’t fabricate an excuse. Leaving a dinner party is like getting off the phone: There’s no need to apologize or explain it. Just say, “I have to go.” As Sarra says, “There’s a certain elegance and dignity in not having to explain yourself.” Sarra also points out that if you offer an excuse, you set a precedent, and next time you want to leave, you’ll have to explain why. If you’re lucky, of course, there won’t be a next time.
Table Manners appears every Wednesday. Have a Table Manner s question? Email Helena.
"How early can you leave a boring dinner party? And if you don’t stay long, is there a way to soften the blow for your hosts"
That's pretty simple. After staying through dessert, say "It's late and we have to go." Afterall, you said it was nearly 11 p.m. when people finished dessert - that's pretty late. As for conversation starters - whatever you do, don't ask "What do you have inside your survival kit?" Not only will you be considered boring, you'll be considered a moron.
Agreed. If someone asked me what I had in my survival kit, I would think that they were a real kook.
I'm a pretty outgoing person, but the prospect of going to a cocktail party where I don't know anyone fills me with anxiety. My old roommate did Dale Carnegie [cough cough] brainwashing [cough] training, and though a lot of the ideas were BS, the "conversation stack"exercise (google turns up a ton of links) was very helpful in situations like this.
The conversation stack poses questions that can't be answered with a yes/no answer. "Do you have any brothers or sisters?" Not good. "Where did you go on your last vacation?" Good. The goal is to get the other person talking about him- or herself.
The one thing that seems to be constant in these "Dinner Party Disasters" is the absence of the Hosts. From reading this article, I got the idea that the guests were in one room and the hosts are in another (I guess the Kitchen). And this is not the first article to imply this.
I understand that food needs to be prepared. But if so much Prep is needed that your guests spend them time either 1.) Alone or 2.) With Strangers, well, you can almost guarantee a failure.
I agree with this Nestor. Games of a sort can always work, though one wonders if conversations are already dull will interactive games be equally boring. I suggest a competitive version of Charades with the party divided in to two or three teams and more intricate rules for devising "topics" than one word Films or well known book titles.
I don't remember the last time I was at a dinner party with no conversation going on. Surely people can find *something* to talk about, even with strangers, so I don't understand the response "with strangers, its a guaranteed failure". People love to talk about themselves, its really not that hard to get them going. Now, I have been to boring dinner parties, but there was plenty of conversation, it's just that none of the people were interesting LOL
Also agree that asking what's in someone's survival kit is a way to get labeled as nuts.
I just looked over some of those psychological quizzes. Who comes up with this stuff? They're *awful*. How does, for example, desiring to save my laundry on a clothesline caught out in the rain somehow indicate how important sex - of all things - is in my life? Good god. These are even worse than those completely vapid internet memes that tell you that because you like chimpanzees and the colour blue, somehow you're a driven person who enjoys good literature.
"If you’ve put in an hour on top of dinner and you just can’t get the conversation off the ground, start clearing the table. Doing the dishes is a tactful signal to your hosts that the evening is over. It’s also a small compensation for the failure of their dinner party."
Unless I asked for this kind of help, if my guests were to start cleaning up the table, they won't be invited back, and I would ask them, quite frankly, what are they doing.
The hosts should signal when the party is over, not the guests.
Agree with gloriousfood - guests clearing the table and washing the dishes is quite the opposite of tactful. Offering to help, yes. Just up and doing it to signal to your host that the part is over?!!?
I've been to social gatherings (not dinner parties, though - don't think I've ever been to a real dinner party, actually) where the whole premise was to meet other people, and where striking up conversations was like pulling teeth. I just don't get why they bother showing up if they're not willing to chat???
The more I read of Helena's advice, the more of a moron I believe her to be. Asking about survival kits? Guests clearing tables? Give me a break, and get out of the barn Helena. Agreed that the guests do have some responsibility, but if a party is on the near edge of failure it is clearly the host's job to get things going. If they lack the social skills to do so, then they should call upon the skills of one of their friends to do it for them.
A note to the Chowhound Editors... find a new maven. (no doubt this will be deleted as "non-helpful).
For me it's simple, just tell your hosts you're not feeling well and you've got to leave. Make sure you visit the bathroom often to make it convincing
I have to believe that if a whole dinner party of guests just sat there and quietly drank a bottle of wine, that the hosts might have been hiding in the kitchen, wondering, "Who ARE these losers?"
But seriously, if a party is falling flat, don't most of you want to help get the ball rolling for your friends, the hosts? Seems like the neighborly thing to do...
hmm, Helena doesn't know much about manners (so far: lipstick at the table and guests clearing the table). Maybe chowhound could at least change the name of this column.