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Yes, I just went in and read further down on the "backstory" and it says the $3,000 was added as an April Fool's prank. So given that, the rest of the ticket looks reasonable.

According to the blog entry attached to the picture, "X" was a prank pulled by the birthday boy.

What I did for my parents' anniversary party was send out the invitations with the wording that we were asking their friends to join us as we surprised them with a dinner, meaning that my sister and I paid for our and our parents' food, and no one elses. I wouldn't have thought of making any of our guests pay for any of our food. However, since I was making it clear that we were just paying for our parents, I wouldn't have offered for pay for any of theirs. We all did seperate checks, and it was a great time. It also helps that we invited people that are my parents' age, and it was their 30th anniversary. As for the whole split check thing, it always ends in tears, so I try to avoid it, after paying 50 dollars for a meal twice in a row for a pasta dish and IHOP.

I have to wonder if some people are raised by wolves and/or jackasses. Really? You're not going to be friends with someone because you forced them to give you money they might not have? Ugh. Maybe it's because I'm still a poor college student, but I would never put someone in that kind of a situation. If I wanted to do a birthday dinner type thing, I would have the good sense to check with everyone before we started ordering.

I remember being in high school and going out to a celebratory meal with a friend my age and pretty much everyone else of drinking age. I ordered a small meal within my means, but everyone else either kept ordering drinks or accepting drinks brought to them by the server and were utterly shocked when the bill came. I'm not going to pay for something I didn't/couldn't consume. Sorry.

This is just crazy because of the sheer cost involved. I used to go to brunch with some friends, but after about 3-4 times of getting stiffed, I just stopped. It was fine when one friend with a calculator (yep, an engineer) would do the math for everyone - but he stopped coming.

I also used to go to Mom's Night Out. There is a large variety of incomes with the moms...some have very little family income and some have a lot. You could tell - some were only willing to go out to the "free" things (dancing at a club with no cover charge). Whomever would plan these things for dinner, however, picked REALLY expensive restaurants. And sometimes the restaurant would pad the bill. I love Mom's night, but I don't want to spend $50-60 for a meal and one glass of wine.

I've just heard of a "trickle-down" example of this . . . in my daughter's high school art class the teacher announced the other day that if anyone with a birthday wanted to celebrate it, and wanted to plan ahead, the class could do so.

One girl said "I have a birthday coming up soon!" and the teacher responded "Okay then - you can be in charge of the birthdays. Go around and get a list of the dates of everybody's birthdays in the class then give it to me."

Several days passed and the birthday girl did not go around getting a list of everyone's birthday. But today she came in with an extensive list of things that she would require for her own in-class birthday celebration (cookies, chips, soda, paper goods, etc!) and told the teacher she had a list to pass around where everyone could sign up for what they would be bringing in for her party. Which is supposedly tomorrow.

Ha, ha, ha, ha!

Ridiculous.
It's just so damn precious.

My daughter was near the end of the line getting the paper and ended up having to sign up for bringing cookies. Which she's not crazy about because she'd rather eat more healthy things . . . and because she doesn't even know the birthday girl (or didn't before she met her with the birthday gimmes-plan) . . . and because the girl "forgot" to make a list of anyone else's birthday in the class in the hot pursuit to plan her own party.

Tomorrow should be interesting. :)

@kroehl: I agree under the circumstance that when outing is someone else's idea. But when the birthday girl/boy plan their own expensive party and don't expect to pay at all for it...

If the B-day boy or girl invites - then he or she is the host. If the host doesn't tell the guests up front that the expectation is a split bill (or whatever) then asking the guests to pay is just...gauche.

Frankly, in any group dining situation if the expectations about how the bill is going to be paid are not discussed ahead of time, then the diners only have themselves to blame for hurt feelings and miscommunications.

What we typically do is everyone pays for their own and then everyone contributes for the birthday persons'. Hopefully, there's a large enough group where it's not that much.
I've refused to do the split evenly thing since I once went to one, only ordered a soda, and had to pay $35...at Hooter's of all places.
Wooo, college!
I don't are if I'm the jerk. I, personally, despise birthdays, so if anything happens for mine, I invite my friends over for cake and drinks and so no one has to pay and it all works well.

This is exactly why I hate other people's birthday dinners. Too complicated! When having one, I think it's most important to think of who is invited and how much it's going to end up costing. And it should be kept simple. It doesn't matter who pays, it could be split equally - by the entire group (or minus the b-day girl/boy), a select few who have volunteered to host the party (whether it's a spouse, multiple friends, the b-day girl/boy). The point is that nobody should be dining with the mentality of trying to cut the bill by ordering only salad or not drinking. Whoever is paying, is paying for the party, not the dish they eat. If this is not your thing, then don't do it!

If it was not pre-established that the birthday girl could bring guests who were not expected to pay, that birthday girl is a dolt who will likely NEVER be invited out by her friends again.

In my experience, the birthday girl is the only person who does not pay at such a gathering. This is generally discussed at the outset by all parties planning to attend.

As far as the "you ordered a more expensive dish than I did" that's an argument going on since the dawn of "splitting the check." Here's the thing - if a person is strapped financially, it might be best to simply forego the outing rather than order a salad or half a broiled chicken when your dining companions are more financially equipped to order the lobster. The person who is watching expenses will eventually wind up paying a whole lot more for that salad or chicken. It might be a better idea to invite the birthday girl out for a "one-on-one" coffee or lunch.

When I go out on this type of celebration, I know I'm going to a) order what I want and b) pay whatever the "split" amount plus tip winds up being. When there's a birthday celebration to be had, I'm not looking for a bargain.

Most years my husband is away for my birthday. Church camp just falls during that week. When he is away for my day, I normally have a girlfriends go to dinner with me. When I extend the invitation, I tell my friends that it is "dutch treat". Please don't bring gifts. All I want is to enjoy a night with the girls.
This year was one of those years. I picked a reasonably priced place (

I think the problem is that people don't know what to expect when it comes to birthday dinners. What's the difference between having the party in a restaurant or at your house? If I throw a party and invite people, I expect to supply everything unless it's clearly a potluck or BYOB party.

Even if it's the birthday person throwing the party, you don't ask people to chip in at the door of the house, and if the birthday person chooses to have the party in a restaurant, you might have the same expectation -- that the host is footing the bill, and you bring a present.

Like a wedding. The wedding couple pays for the party, and the guests generally bring gifts. Which may or may not cover the cost of their share of the event.

I was recently at a birthday party that was catered in a hotel's banquet area. They birthday person's DH paid for the event, and guests weren't asked to chip in. We brought presents. It was all very clear from the beginning.

At a restaurant, it's a little less clear, because in some cases, everyone wants to pay for the birthday person's meal, while in other cases, the birthday person views it as "their" party and wants to treat everyone. Or it could be something in-between.

It's particularly muddy at a restaurant if everyone is ordering different things, because some people will feel resentful if they order salad and iced tea while the person next to them gets a 7-course dinner and a bottle of wine. It's easier, math-wise, to split the bill evenly, but it's not always fair.

It should be up to the host (whoever is doing the planning and inviting) to make it clear how it's all going to work. If it's not clear, then the guests should ask for clarity. Generally, I would expect to pay my way at a restaurant, and I would be prepared for that, but I'd also hope for some fairness in splitting the bill. If one person gets particularly extravagent in ordering, they should be willing to kick in a little more. If someone else is being frugal, the group should make sure that person isn't paying more than they need to.

When I worked in a large company, our office would go out to lunch for everyone's birthday, which ended up being about once a month, on average. The deal was that we'd split the bill and we'd split the birthday person's meal. Usually, no one drank, since we had to go back to work, but if someone ordered anything extra or expnsive, they'd offer to kick in extra. The places we went to weren't expensive, and the price ranges for lunches weren't huge, so in general, everyone's meals were close enough to the same price that it was fair to everyone without being nit-picky. And it all evened out over time, since someone who ordered the cheapest meal one month would order something more expensive another time.

The exception was one guy who always seemed to be fasting. He'd be on bread and water, and he'd end up eating just that -- tortillas and water, crackers and water, bread and water -- and he always offered to do the even split, but the group refused, since we weren't usually being charged for what he ate. So he'd kick in a few bucks towards the tip and everyone was happy with that.

Oddly enough, our problem was usually that we ended up with too much money, so the servers generally got very good tips from us because no one would take back the extra they chipped in.