No matter how interesting your friends may be, parties are a lot more fun when you break the ice and get everybody to loosen up a little. Here are twelve ways to do just that.
1) Serve cocktails in glasses made of ice. It forces your guests to drink faster.
2) Set up a large terrarium and leave the lid wide open. Put a sign on it saying SNAKES: KEEP LID CLOSED.
3) Hire an unemployed CIA agent to secretly record all kitchen conversations from the first two hours of the party, edit them down to the good stuff and then play back the edited version for a fun-filled exposé of how your guests really feel about each other.
4) Make a large wet spot in the carpet just outside the powder room door.
5) For background music, play a CD of dishes breaking, fistfights, drive-by shootings, fire trucks and women screaming.
6) Hide bacon in all the chairs and bring in a stray dog.
7) Have a couple of cops arrive, put you in cuffs and escort you out. (Only do this if you think it will surprise your guests.)
8) Insert small firecrackers into the candles.
9) Hire a clown and give everyone a full seltzer bottle.
10) Bury a rubber mouse in the bottom of the cheese dip.
11) Play a game where everybody tries to line the guests up in descending order of net worth.
12) Rig the toilet handle so that when it’s flushed, a flashbulb goes off.