A new drinks-party-shirking method has taken hold in British society. I call it ‘Lastminute.non’.

Previously, the way of not going to someone’s party was to write a polite message of refusal at least a week in advance, giving the host or hostess ample time to absorb the sad but inevitable fact that various friends would not be able to attend – usually for copper-bottomed reasons, such as that they had other plans for the evening or would be away on holiday.

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The new trend seems to be to accept an invitation, and then, mere hours before, to duck out of it. This means that from breakfast time onwards th

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