It truly will be just champagne wishes and caviar dreams for most employees at their holiday parties. Big corporations like Viacom, Hearst and ABC News, which used to book Hiltons and serve booze galore, have either canceled or scaled back party plans.

Now small businesses are following suit in scaling back on festivities, says the Associated Press. It's not primarily due to limited cash flow; some feel it's just not appropriate to party when pink slips are fast and furious.

According to a survey done by Battalia Winston Amrop, an executive search firm in New York, only 81% of businesses will have some type of holiday party this year, the lowest level in 20 years. Also, 37% say their party has been cancelled or scaled back, double the 19% of companies affected last year.

It started as an innocent-seeming question on my "sustainable living on a budget" listserv. A mama wanted ideas for sustainable party favors for her four-year-old's birthday party.

I was a little surprised that the first several answers were rather unoriginal but sweet ideas: have guests bring used toys or books to exchange; involve children in making something to take home (soap was the rather ambitious suggestion); or painted terra-cotta pots with little plants. Finally someone offered timidly, "you could go without the favors!"

Exactly. How is setting a cultural standard of buying rather useless items for other children to take home from a party you are throwing sustainable? Even if these items are good for the earth, or creative or lovingly-made, they still involve expense and work. Shouldn't a party simply be about celebration, not about things?

In my opinion, sustainability should be, not just about the environmental impact of something, but also the financial and societal impact. If everyone in a society stops offering favors and purchasing forgettable doodads for birthdays and holidays, it would stop being an expectation. Instead of buying a gift for friends' birthdays, my children make cards or help me sew stuffed things. For parties we host, I offer homemade cupcakes and delicious food and my hospitality and never offer favors. While I can't say I save a lot of money -- it's not that favors and goody bags are expensive -- I imagine that the impact of my decision is to quietly spread my Better Way.

Sometimes doing nothing at all is the most sustainable choice of all.

I just finished reading an article on CNN about individuals who send out invites to their friends for a party without asking them to pay for any of it and then expecting the friends to go dutch when the bill comes. For a second I felt like I was reading a bad chain letter forwarded to me by a distant cousin; I almost went to Snopes to check and see if this was really happening to people. Are there still people who are either this aloof or this self centered out there that they would send out an invitation to dinner and not indicate on the invite that the attendees should expect to split the entire bill?

Don't get me wrong, if I am invited to a dinner party out on the town I have no problem footing my bill. I'll avoid high priced alcohol and stick to something from the middle range of the menu. When a host informs everyone at the end of the night that they should just split the bill 8 ways and I have to subsidize everyone else's filet mignon and alcohol induced stupor then that is a different beast entirely. Maybe it's just living in a relatively small Midwest town that I don't run into this, or possibly I just don't have the tolerance to put up with anyone who would pull this kind of stunt long enough to get a dinner invite!

You can get a lot of cheap party ware at a dollar store, but going for the lasting products -- a set of plastic or china dinner plates -- might not be your best option for a party, especially if you're hosting a large gathering like a wedding.

Remember the 'hostess gift'? In the glittery nineties, if you were invited to someone's house for a party during dinner time, you offered to bring something and were refused. To compensate, a hostess gift was the way to go.

And then, 2008 rolled around. We're not banking quite so much free cash these days, and it seems the height of folly to offer to foot the bill for a sumptuous meal for your friends. Potluck is so much friendlier! Not to mention you can forget worrying too much about your guests' dietary needs. If your good friend Sarah has decided she will heretofore only eat locally-grown, organic food, whole grains only, and no sugar!, well, she can make her own quinoa snow pea salad. I've been to three potlucks in the past two weeks and I'm hosting another tomorrow; I think I can say with some authority that potluck is the new dinner party.

I've been wondering how it is my friends and family have been able to relieve ourselves of the societal urge to provide for the every need of a guest in our home.

Numbers, the club in Houston, Texas, not the hit TV show, is pulling out all the stops in association with Free Press Houston, to celebrate the recession with "Recession Thursdays"! During June on each Thursday, the recession will be celebrated or mourned -- depending on the fate of your work life -- with, what else, drink specials and live music. Personally I can't think of a better way to bemoan the economy than with specials on well drinks.

Part of me doesn't know whether to take this as a sign that there isn't a recession on the horizon, or if I should chalk it up to playful marketing. Houston was listed as one of the top ten recession proof cities by Forbes earlier this year so the job climate there may be much different than that of say, Detroit. On a different angle, if the effects of a recession have been hitting Houston encouraging more people to stay at home; maybe this blues busting party is just the answer to draw cash strapped youngsters out for a night on the town.

In my area the closest I have seen to recession themed marketing is a sign at the local ice cream stand advertising their recession buster special. It seems to me that advertising based on impending economic disaster, while good for the alcohol industry, isn't likely a first choice for stores such as Best Buy or Walmart. The stores, restaurants and entertainment establishments I frequent haven't deviated from business as usual. That said, they are often half empty when we do head out for the evening.

Any local stores using recession themed events or sales to draw you in?

Bankrate reports that "According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 130 passenger vehicle occupants were killed in drunk driving related traffic accidents during Super Bowl weekend in 2006. Young men ages 21 to 34 are the core audience for major sporting events and are also the most likely to drive while impaired, according to the NHTSA."

Bankrate adds that the total costs associated with a drunk driving arrest can easily top a whopping $20 thousand. So even if you are selfish and don't care about endangering the lives of innocent people, drunk driving is a pretty bad deal.

So have fun at your Super Bowl party. But please drink responsibly and if you can't do that, then at least don't drive.

It's a bad deal for eveybody.

During the holiday season when money is seeping out of your pockets as you buy presents for everyone on your list, here's a great way to save a buck: crash parties.

Think it can't be done? Let me regale you with tales of my latest exploits. This week I attended a talk by former Vanity Fair and New Yorker editor Tina Brown, at the Harvard Club in New York City. For a mere $20, my friend and I were treated to a lecture about the travails of Princess Diana as detailed in Brown's book, "The Diana Chronicles." The talk was followed by an open bar and delicious hors d'oeuvres.

From there, we took a subway up to the Columbia Journalism School for a forum on free speech put together by the BBC. After catching the tail end of a fascinating discussion about the media and freedom of the press, we were feted with free wine and munchies.

Oh, and we also hobnobbed with the rich and famous: I had a long conversation with noted Constitutional law expert Floyd Abrams, and my friend chatted at length with Brian Lehrer, the erudite host on the city's public radio station, WNYC.

From this example, you can see the basic rules of the crashing game:

Get there when the event is at least halfway over. Both of these events had a guest list. But if you get there late enough, no one bothers to check your name. And that's about when the booze and food start flowing freely.

Dress the part. (Don't forget the watch and shoes test – that's what a Mercedes Benz executive told me is what car dealers look at when they want to see if someone is truly a prospective buyer or is just looking for a joy ride.) Remember, most clubs, such as the Harvard Club, have a dress code that includes no jeans.

It helps to act like you belong there. I had a friend who was at the BBC event and that helped me walk in with confidence.

So next time you find yourself with an empty wallet but an appetite for some stimulating conversation and tasty food, check out your local listings for an upcoming event that you might be able to crash. And have a great time. But don't tell them I sent you...