Me, I rarely bring anything even to potlucks. I am a terrible slacker. ;-)
Conversely, though, I rarely expect anyone to come to a party with anything in hand, unless they are known to be That Sort and/or have a characteristic contribution they regularly bring along.
In the case of a dinner party, I might take someone up on it who says in advance "what can I bring?", but I definitely don't expect people to offer or get offended if they don't. Guests are guests. I'm usually expecting to cover all the important bases myself, and spontaneous "here's a box of donuts" contributions (while certainly the kindness is appreciated) are not necessarily immediately useful. :-) It also gets tricky with kashrut (random bottles of wine, etc.).
Though it certainly varies by community. Going to Shabbat meals on the UWS with mbarr, they have a crowd that do elaborate Shabbat dinners AND lunches together every single week, and it seems that everyone regularly contributes something to each meal. I was guessing that's because some people don't actually take turns hosting, so the burden would fall disproportionately otherwise.
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Conversely, though, I rarely expect anyone to come to a party with anything in hand, unless they are known to be That Sort and/or have a characteristic contribution they regularly bring along.
In the case of a dinner party, I might take someone up on it who says in advance "what can I bring?", but I definitely don't expect people to offer or get offended if they don't. Guests are guests. I'm usually expecting to cover all the important bases myself, and spontaneous "here's a box of donuts" contributions (while certainly the kindness is appreciated) are not necessarily immediately useful. :-) It also gets tricky with kashrut (random bottles of wine, etc.).
Though it certainly varies by community. Going to Shabbat meals on the UWS with