Friend refuses to split $1,000+ check at a San Francisco birthday dinner after another friend racked up the bill with family-style platters of seafood, meat, and pricey cocktails: ‘We were each expected to pay $150, I had a $23 pasta and a $10 mocktail’

There's nothing quite like the modern group birthday dinner to remind you that sometimes, friendship is just a subscription fee with cocktails. You step into a swanky San Francisco restaurant for what you hope will be a laid-back evening, but instead walk straight into a Hunger Games of Venmo requests. Before you can even scan the menu, someone at your table—who is not the guest of honor, mind you—takes charge, ordering enough food to feed a small army and single-handedly ensuring that at least one person gets to play "who takes home all the leftovers?"

If you're a non-drinker and a pescatarian with a taste for affordable pasta and mocktails, too bad—you're drafted into the family-style trenches. When the mountain of seafood and red meat platters arrives, you watch in quiet horror as everyone else racks up the drink tab, and someone else declares their presence is purely for "the vibes." But when the $1,000-plus bill drops, it's time for the ritual sacrifice: split it evenly or be labeled a social pariah.

Heaven forbid you suggest an itemized check or only pay for what you actually ate. Suddenly, you're the villain ruining the "shared experience," the joyless accountant at the festival of excess. The birthday girl, jobless and mortified, offers you a $100 guilt discount—because "cost of entry" is a sacred tradition.

Some parties just aren't worth the overdraft protection.

Author image for Etai Eshet Etai Eshet
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