In an extract from his new book on etiquette, Robert O'Byrne gives advice on throwing a successful drinks party.
First, some bad news: the good-host fairy doesn't make it to every Christening. This explains why certain people, no matter how hard they try, never manage to throw a decent party. If that sounds like you, accept your fate and learn how to become a good guest.
INVITATIONS
It's better to ask too many than too few, so don't be afraid to over-invite. Some of the friends you ask won't be able to come, some of them will accept and then (rudely) not come. Nobody minds a bit of a social squeeze; it's certainly preferable to a handful of guests gazing at one another across acres of empty carpet.
Always invite a few new people, rather than just the same group of old friends. Everybody loves to have their social circle extended.
Try to arrange a gender balance on your guestlist. In a large crowd, the exact match of men and women matters less than it might around a table. Nevertheless, proportions shouldn't be too disparate. Otherwise, like an old-fashioned dance, the two genders are inclined to congregate on their own and stare across the room at one another.
Accept right now that somebody somewhere will take offence not to have been invited to your party. There's nothing you can do about this, particularly if your livingroom holds only 20.
Clearly specify what time your party is due to begin and end - and then watch while these demarcations are disregarded. We Irish tend to arrive later than asked, and stay later than we should. If you've invited guests for 6.30 p.m., be prepared for the first ones to turn up around seven (and then to ask you 'Are we too early?').
Arrange to do something or go somewhere afterwards, otherwise guests will ignore the event's prescribed limits and still be looking for another drink at three o'clock in the morning. Make a dinner reservation at a local restaurant and inform everyone of this in advance. Suggest guests join you for a post-party meal, strictly on a pay-your-own-way basis, of course. Alternatively, plan to host your drinks party on a night when you've already been invited to dinner in another house. If necessary, be prepared to put on your coat, leave the house and walk around the block a couple of times. Sometimes, desperate measures are needed to clear out residual guests.
Dress codes? It's your right to propose but not to impose. Ideally, you invited your guests for their charm, wit and flair rather than their way with a ballgown. Note to guests: when asked to do so by your host, make the effort. It's only one night, after all.
Advise immediate neighbours of party plans. Early warnings are like lucky charms: they ward off the threat of calls to the local garda station and subsequent frosty relations. It's a good idea (as well as good manners) to invite neighbours; unless you're already in and out of each other's homes on a daily basis, they probably won't take up the offer. But they'll be much more forgiving the following day when an empty beer bottle and three cigarette butts turn up on their lawn.
PREPARATION
Before the party, put away all breakables. Small items of sentimental or monetary value should not be left exposed on open surfaces. Your friends aren't thieves but they can be clumsy, especially in a crowded room and after alcohol has been consumed.
Add flowers and candles, as much of both as you can. Flowers, or even just arrangements of greenery such as trailing festoons of ivy, enhance the allure of a room. So do candles which, like champagne, possess the ability to create an instantly festive atmosphere. They'll also make you and your home look more attractive than would ever be the case by electric or daylight. Light scented candles in the bathroom.
Warm your house before guests arrive and then switch off the heating when they do; their conversation will generate enough hot air.
Allow enough time beforehand to have a bath and a drink - but only one; you shouldn't be clinging to a doorframe for support when the first guests arrive. While you'll want to make sure necessary preparations are complete, in the order of social priorities it's more important you're feeling refreshed and hospitable than that small bowls of peanuts have been distributed about the living room.
Avoid forgetting something vital by drawing up a to-do list. All of us, at least once, have forgotten that an oven is unable to switch itself on. The outcome: at 9 p.m. our guests are drunkenly bickering over the few remaining peanuts and we're staring at trays of raw cocktail sausage. Hang the list in a convenient place and tick off each task as it's accomplished. No matter how silly you might think it, include the obvious - particularly a reminder to switch on the oven.
Ask old friends to come round early and give a hand with last-minute preparations (e.g. putting out the peanuts while you have a quick bath and a drink). Invariably, despite your list, you'll still have forgotten something - like taking the dry-cleaning tag off the back of your dress. Your friends will spot this faster than do you.
An early appearance by old friends also helps when the first "real" guests arrive; invariably this will be a couple you barely know and only invited because your three-year-olds go to the same Montessori. Then, while you're busy fixing everyone drinks, your old friends can initiate conversation and discover the husband served a 10-year prison sentence for armed robbery and the wife's actually a post-operative trans-sexual.
Accept that you won't single-handedly be able to look after the needs of all your guests. If hiring professional staff is beyond your financial means, arrange for a friend or family member to help. Children often love this kind of work because it allows them to feel grown-up; just make sure they don't consume as much drink as they serve. By the way, at a drinks party, no one's more popular than the person clutching a full bottle, so this a great way to make new acquaintances.
DRINK
The primary requirement of a drinks party is that there's enough drink. Limit what you offer to just a handful of possibilities but have plenty of these in stock. Your must-buy list should include: ice (lots); lemons and limes; spare bottle opener and corkscrew; cloths for mopping up; low-calorie mixer (at least one guest will be on a diet).
If serving a cocktail, settle for something straightforward such as a Sea Breeze (equal measures grapefruit juice, cranberry juice and vodka, mix together in a jug, add ice, and pour). You don't want to spend the night assembling a complex blend of ingredients and then waving it about in a cocktail shaker.
If serving wine, have both red and white, and make sure the latter is sufficiently chilled; a few bottles of sparkling water will allow you to offer budget-stretching spritzers. The wine you serve should remain consistent and not change vineyards, vintages or continents between one glass and the next.
Wine can be an expensive choice because what's served has to be palatable enough to drink without the masking help of food. Good wine is not cheap. Nevertheless, no plonk please.
Don't forget to stock decent non-alcoholic drink. Some of your guests, among them the night's designated drivers, will only want something "soft". This is not a euphemism for tap water.
FOOD
This is a bonus and not an obligation. At a drinks party, food is like blotting paper; its function is to soak up alcohol. Provide whatever's within your capabilities and your budget. You should be able to manage at least a few bowls of nuts or olives. Bear in mind, though, that the high salt content of these will stimulate thirst, leading to further requests for drink.
Canapés? Buy them prepared. What you spend in extra funds, you'll save in extra time. Even when bought ready-made, they still demand final preparation and presentation, probably during the 20 minutes you'd set aside for a relaxing bath and drink. Most likely they'll have to be heated in the oven. And someone will have to handthem around.
Canapés will need to be accompanied by small paper napkins, otherwise when the party's over you'll find greasy finger marks on the new curtains (by the way, canapés have a high-fat content). In any case, later you'll find folded napkins tucked down the side of armchairs, inside flowerpots and behind photograph frames.
A WORD ON SMOKING
Even if nobody you've invited is a smoker, place ashtrays throughout the house on table tops, windowsills, above the fireplace, etc. After consuming a certain amount of alcohol, at least one confirmed non-smoker will develop an irresistible craving for nicotine and light a cigarette.
Are you entitled to forbid smoking in your home? Yes you are. Will this interdiction be appreciated? No it won't. Nor will it necessarily be obeyed; at some point in the evening, you'll come across a group of smokers huddled together in the bathroom or kitchen. Working on the principle that there's strength in numbers, they'll have defied your smoking ban.
MEETING AND GREETING
Introductions must be performed, especially at the beginning of the party when there are just a handful of people in the room. Later, when the place is jammed - and even you, the host, don't know half the guests present - it's just about permissible to let them assume responsibility for their own introductions.
Keep an eye open for the self-effacing individual who hovers at the periphery of the party, like someone standing on the seashore, unwilling to rush into the water in case it's too cold. He'll need a helping hand and, if this is provided, you'll have the satisfaction later of seeing him happily splashing about in the social tide.
Worried about how to make introductions in a crowded room? Before the party starts ask a self-confident friend or two to help with this task.
Provide not just names but also some small nugget of information about each person. Obviously, the nugget shouldn't be a non-sequitur ("Mary's a post-operative trans-sexual" is unlikely to lead to easy chat). What you're looking for is a point of common interest, however banal, that can act as the starting point for a conversation.
Guests prepared to perform their own introductions are greatly valued by hosts.
AND FINALLY ...
Never make a move on somebody else at your own party. Even if you know the marriage is going through a rough patch, this isn't the ideal moment to tell your best friend's husband about the crush you've had on him for the past five years. He won't have time to formulate an appropriate response before you're called away to serve fresh canapés.
Feel free to slip away from your own party. Being a host is hard work. Take to your bedroom for five minutes, lock the door, inhale deeply and analyse how everything's going. Do you need to rescue an old school friend from a notorious bore? Is the supply of drink holding out? Could the bathroom do with a quick freshening?
While not neglecting the needs of others, enjoy yourself. The people you've invited are your friends. They'll still love you, even after your cheese soufflé has flopped, your toilet has flooded and the local fire service has been summoned to extinguish a blaze in the kitchen. But they'll find it harder to love you - and your hospitality - if you're obviously not having a good time at your own party.
Robert O'Byrne's Mind Your Manners, A Guide to Good Behaviour is published by Sitric Books, €14.99