Whenever more than two people are gathered together in one place, someone's nose is going to be put out of joint. Someone who thinks he or she ought to be there, but isn't, because (a) you didn't want them to be there or (b) you intended them to be present but forgot to invite them. Whether the injured party is an aunt who wasn't invited to the wedding, or a colleague at work who was excluded from a meeting, you will have some explaining to do.

There are a number of possibilities open to you.

1 An innocent mistake has occurred which is deeply regretted.

A thought B had issued the invitation and B was firmly under the impression that A had. Consequently, neither did. C wrongly assumed that either A or B would, so did nothing, either.

A variation of this excuse is that the absent guest was invited, in so far as their name appeared on the first and second drafts of the invitation list. The list was subsequently given to a secretary, or some other outsider, to type out and at this stage the name was accidentally left off. The possibility of a typing error didn't occur to you, so no double-check was made and the omission went unnoticed.

Another possibility is that, to ensure that everyone you wanted to be there was invited, you painstakingly drew up the invitation list from your address book. Unfortunately, a page was missing from the book and you just never noticed. As a result, the Kanes, the Keenans, the Kennedys, and the Kings aren't talking to you either. Admittedly, the Kinghorns were there, but only because, for some inexplicable reason, they were entered in your book under 'R'.

2 No invitation was issued because no one was invited.

The gathering was impromptu and unplanned, occasioned by the coincidence of four or five people being in the same place at the same time, all for different reasons.

3 The occasion wasn't 'the real thing'.

It was merely a dress rehearsal for the Great Event to which they will of course be invited when a date is fixed.

4 Because of the number of people involved, or the lack of space, you decided to have two 'sittings', distributing the important guests equally over the two events.

But the first, to which they weren't invited because you needed them badly at the second, was such a dismal failure that you have now abandoned plans for the second.

5 They were 'far too important' to be there.

No good, this, for a social gaffe, but highly effective at work or public functions. The argument here is, they weren't invited because you needed them to 'hold the fort' in everyone else's absence. The work they are engaged on is far too important to break off for what amounted to little more than chit-chat among colleagues. Besides, the only important things that were discussed you had privately informed them about weeks in advance.

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