Mildly Infuriating

I am sorry this was your experience, it’s an awesome and tasty spread, I would have loved to have been invited and would have eaten a lot of it haha

That said, I think some times disappointments like this happen because there’s some mismatch in people’s expectations of an event

I find that sometimes it also helps to let people know in advance that there will be food so they don’t eat beforehand. Sorry if you already mentioned this in the thread somewhere. I hope you make some more friends, but no need to officially break things off with anyone from this event. Just cool it with them for awhile I guess

I don't know if that makes you feel better, but for my 40th birthday I invited 20 people, prepared accordingly, and 3 showed up.
Not even my wife was there, cause she ate too much of the dough for the weed brownies she had made for the occasion.
She crashed half an hour before the guests showed up.

We sat around the table, emptied a couple bags of chips, I was the only one who drank beer. My friends left after 2 hours.

My fucking guy, you had free trees and booze and they still didn't show up?

Are you sure they're your friends?

That's still way too much food even if everyone came. And everyone never comes.

I feel your pain.

Years ago I threw a party for work friends and acquaintances where I had 30 confirmed and 10 tentative (from calendar invite). I bought a variety of drinks (alcoholic and non) and bought/cooked food for about 50 to ensure there was plenty.

... 4 people showed up.

That was the instant that I stopped giving a fuck. Ever since then I've adopted the approach of "I'm going to do something, you can come if you want, but I'm not planning for you". Or, more commonly, I just don't organize anything :)

EDIT: I should note that this was a recurring yearly party that got bigger and bigger over 5 years until it just died. Pre COVID.

I need friends like you. I would have eaten so much I felt ill. Then helped clean. (I love cleaning, I know I'm weird.)

In reverse, I'd never throw a party like that because my anxiety is exactly afraid it'll turn out like you said.

this is actually sad :(

That's fucked up I'm sorry, I'd have eaten an entire plate of cheese hors d'vors myself and taken half that chicken with me afterwards. I'm not even into wrestling and I'd have come for that food.

You're a good friend for providing that for a watch party (on top of paying for ppv) and I'm sorry your friends don't appreciate how well you maintain your half of the bridge. The least the 2 could have done is tried the cheese and chicken.

Edit holy shit are those pre stuffed pretzel bites. Bro wtf is wrong with these people I'd have asked if anyone wanted any and eaten the entire plate. (I may or may not have portion control issues but seriously, they didnt touch any of that delicious looking food)

Can we please be friends? I'll make sure those lovely snacks don't go to waste. I can bring two grackles, a bluejay, and a couple of raccoons to fill out the party. Oh, and my wife!

That sucks man. You went the extra mile to be a good host, so you should be proud of that, regardless!

So I guess the little balls are the pretzels? Never seen them in that shape, looks yummy just like everything else there, sorry to hear about your disappointment.

That’s…. A lot of chicken. Even for four peeps.

I’m sorry you went to all that trouble, though.

I’d drop a few recipes for what to do with it… but uhm, I hope that chicken is long gone by now, heh.

Side note, you need better friends! Pro wrestling isn’t my jam, at least I’d hang out. Maybe shout insults at the heel or something.

There's a tough lesson I learned about trying to get my friends into board games: It's easier to turn gamers into your friends than it is to turn your friends into gamers. I've learned that some of my friends are never going to share my interests as much as I'd like, but that just means I needed to find people who were already in whatever hobby and start hanging out with them and some of them will eventually be your real friends.

Making and keeping friends as an adult is way more difficult than it seems it should be, but it's a painful reality.

Shit that looks delicious but maybe they just weren't hungry (could have eaten before). And I don't mean to disrespect you but you did not have to do this much for watching a wrestling game. Though it does suck 2 people flaked.

You're a good host, sorry to hear this

Two things:

• Did your friends know you were going to have a bunch of food and they were expected to eat it?
• Was your party at a time that people normally eat?

I find that if it's too early/late or if you didn't tell them what was expected, your results are suboptimal. Could just be your friends, though.

Don't be discouraged. This may not have worked out like you hoped and planned, but keep doing awesome things. Somebody will love you for it and you'll have a lot of fun.

This is why I always eat all the food I can at a party. Everyone else is being too polite and someone's gotta eat all that food.

I always get self conscious about eating at parties, but fuck if only 1 other person showed up beside me I'm gonna eat at least two people's worth.

I feel your pain, several years ago I made Thanksgiving dinner for about 15 friends, everything prepped the day before, and we had a hard ice that night, everything frozen over and no one showed

What you did for your friends was great. I would have absolutely appreciated you doing this if you were my friend and invited me. That said, one of the things I've noticed after covid is that a lot of people are already going to go home after gatherings. Getting baked/drinking might be an issue with that. Were your friends driving by chance?

Communication is key, and you seem to be struggling in that department.

Gotta invite more than 4 people