Money talks

A friend of a friend was looking forward to his birthday party. He'd booked a restaurant in a hotel and invited all his friends well in advance. A couple of weeks before the party, the hotel called him, "Mr X, is there any possibility of changing the date of your party?" "Definitely not!" he replied. "It's all arranged." The hotel rang again the following day: "Mr X, if you could change the date of your party to any other day, we would pay for all the drinks." He thought about this offer, discussed it with his girlfriend but finally decided that since the date had been agreed with so many people, it would not be at all convenient to rearrange so he rang back and said, "No thank you." A couple of days later he had a call from the hotel manager: "Mr X, forgive me for being impertinent. We have had a request from a celebrity who wants to book the whole hotel on the night of your party. This person would like to know if you have a mortgage on your house and, if so, how large it is." Mr X disclosed that his mortgage was £65,000 and agreed to cancel the party for that sum. He received a cheque in the post for £65,000 signed by....David Beckham!