The first total I wrote down was wrong. I figured that out twenty minutes later, after my sister had already seen it.

This happened on a Sunday evening. I was at the kitchen counter, half watching a baseball game and trying to work out the hibachi catering cost for her birthday. Nine guests, I thought. I found a per-person figure, opened the calculator on my phone, and did the easy multiplication. Done.

My sister replied: Does that include everything?

No idea.

The number had no cousin, no lobster, and no address in it. I closed the calculator.

I had counted chairs more carefully than people

The grocery receipt was still damp from the counter. Its front said limes, paper towels, seltzer, and candles. On the back, Mike appeared twice because I had also written cousin Mike as if he were another man.

So we had eight people. Then my friend asked whether her husband could join. Back to nine. My cousin still had not confirmed, which put us at nine and a question mark.

I wanted to leave the question mark out of the budget. It looked untidy. Unfortunately, it was a real person who might want dinner.

That left me with two useful questions. What total applied if we stayed at nine? When did the headcount have to stop moving? A minimum order may affect a smaller party, and I did not want to discover that after collecting everyone's food choice.

I kept two totals in my notes after that. One for nine guests. One for ten. Neither received a circle around it.

The family chat made the menu more expensive before breakfast

I sent everyone the Hibachi X menu on Monday morning. That was a mistake, though a fairly entertaining one.

My mother answered steak and shrimp at 7:06. My sister asked about noodles three minutes later. Mike, still represented by a question mark on my receipt, wanted to know about lobster. One child picked chicken. The other child copied him, then switched to shrimp after seeing the word in Grandma's message.

The menu describes two proteins with fried rice, vegetables, and salad. Choices may include chicken, steak, shrimp, scallops, or tofu. Noodles, filet mignon, lobster, and a third protein may cost extra.

I stopped pricing the text messages. Anything that looked extra received a U in my notes. Not a dollar amount, just a reminder to ask.

The questions became easier once they had names. Were Mom's choices regular selections? How would my sister's noodles be added? What could be arranged for the guest who did not eat meat? Three people, three questions.

Tuesday night, I remembered that the party had an address

Our mailing address uses a town name people recognize. The house itself is farther out, past the road where delivery drivers usually call and ask whether they missed the turn.

I had been looking at prices without thinking about the drive. That made no sense for a service coming to my patio.

The service area page gave me a place to start. I still sent the full street address because a state name could not answer the travel question for my house.

The side gate also sticks after rain. The driveway is wider and avoids the kitchen steps. Not a pricing issue, probably, but useful for anyone bringing a grill into the backyard.

My party budget had a catering side and a me side

I folded a notebook page in half. The booking questions went on one side. My own shopping went on the other.

The chef side covered the grill, food, sake, and entertainment. Mine covered the tables, chairs, drinks, utensils, and setup. Most of my half was already in the garage or kitchen.

The two missing chairs were next door. One blue, one green. I considered renting matching ones for perhaps thirty seconds.

The chair colors became a useful reality check. I had spent ten minutes worrying about something no guest had mentioned while Mike still had not decided whether he was coming. I put the blue chair at one end, the green chair at the other, and sent him one last text. He replied with another maybe. The chairs, at least, were confirmed.

The folded page stopped me from blaming the catering estimate for the cake I had chosen. Ice was not free just because I bought it somewhere else, either.

At the bottom of that page, I wrote my personal spending limit. I did not send it to the family chat, and it was not a published Hibachi X price. It was simply the point where I would change the menu, reduce my other party purchases, or choose another dinner plan.

Having that private number made the quote less emotional. I could look at the total and decide instead of trying to convince myself after the fact.

I nearly compared it with the wrong restaurant bill

My next move was to compare the hibachi estimate with restaurant entrees. Again, too simple.

At a restaurant, ten of us would order drinks, somebody would add an appetizer, and we would take at least three cars. My mother would probably call from the wrong parking entrance. An entree price did not capture that evening.

Drop-off trays still made sense if food was my only concern. I was considering hibachi because watching the cooking would occupy part of the evening too.

I was not giving the budget unlimited permission. I was comparing a meal and an activity with other ways of feeding ten relatives. Keeping everybody at the house was worth something to me.

The request I finally sent fit on one screen

After all that scribbling, my message fit on one screen: nine confirmed guests, maybe ten, our date, the full address, one non-meat eater, and two possible upgrades. I asked for the amount attached to that information.

I also asked how the minimum, travel, tax, and gratuity would show up. I wanted this party's answer, not a number borrowed from somebody else's receipt.

Those details can be sent through the Hibachi X booking page. I would still use the phrase hibachi party cost per person while comparing options. I simply would not send that number to my sister again until I knew what sat around it.

My calculator worked fine. I was the one feeding it guesses.