Surprise! Surprise!

The author talks about the troubles of throwing parties for youngsters

As young working professionals, the children seemed at first hesitant about bringing their new acquaintances and colleagues home for fear their parents might appear “too friendly”, or so they complained. That wonderful spell lasted till they realised that entertaining elsewhere took a sizeable wedge out of their wallets. When they went dutch, there was always some teetotaler who complained about having to square up for others’ drinks, or a nuts-only eating health fiend whose portion of the bill was out of sync with the others, causing some little ill-will and not a little grumbling. A couple of years ago, they