Wine and the university--who picks up the tab?

Busy week.  Graded 48 papers over two days.  Taught, sat on an honors thesis defense, met with students, finished making a quiz, all with 4 hours of sleep the night before. 

That wore me out for the next day, which is just as well, since I had to spend 7am-12noon reading and sitting on a dissertation defense.  Thankfully, it was a fabulous dissertation and defense.  Somebody better hire him soon.  He really is good.

I hope I'm recharged enough by tomorrow to finish that paper and SEND IT OUT.  This will be harder than it otherwise would be, since I am going to dinner with an invited speaker and several faculty tonight, late, 7:30.  Late for me anyways.  I am counting on having wine at dinner--will make talking to mostly humanities faculty easier.  I like humanities faculty one on one, but in a group it is sometimes hard for me to connect (or understand what they're talking about).

I'm at a public university.  The university will pick up the tab for the food and non-alcohol drinks, but we have to pay for our own alcohol.  Awkward with guests, as we never seem to arrange ahead of time about how to contribute $ towards the guest's booze and who will pay that bill.  We don't want them to pay for their own drinks, of course.  In our system, others at the table have to foot the bill for the guest's drinks.  I find that many grad students and faculty don't know that this is the case at some universities--I certainly didn't. 

So if you are a candidate for a job, think twice before you order (like my friend from graduate school did) a double Johnny Walker on the rocks.  Actually, there are many reasons why you might not want to do that.

The two big public universities I've worked for don't pay for alcohol, period.  How does it work at other colleges?  Any pointers for people on the job market on ordering a drink at dinner?  Don't do it? Wait to see if others are drinking, and what they are drinking?