Slumber Party Ploy

""I'm telling my parents that I'm staying at Stan's house, Stan's telling his parents he's staying at Kenny's house, and Kenny's not telling his parents anything cause they're alcoholics and they don't care!""

- South Park, "The Wacky Molestation Adventure"

If you've got a series whose main characters are kids, one of the first problems you run into is how to get them into wacky adventures without their parents finding out. So what do the kids do when they want to do something they know their parents won't approve of?

Say they're having a slumber party, of course!

Might take the form of Bob telling his parents he's staying at Charlie's house for the night, while Charlie tells his folks he'll be staying at Alex's, and Alex claims he'll be sleeping over at Bob's. By the end of the episode, the parents may talk to each other and find out that they've been lied to.

Anime and Manga

 * In Bakemonogatari a girl said she was sleeping over at a friends when really she was off getting supernatural invisible snakes removed.

Comics

 * Toothpaste For Dinner had a comic about this once. Here it is.

Literature

 * The standard excuse used in Animorphs is that everyone is sleeping over at someone else's house.
 * Also, after Tobias got locked into Hawk form, they covered his disappearance by telling his uncle that he's staying with his aunt, and his aunt that he's staying with his uncle, when the two relatives cannot stand each other, and haven't talked in years.
 * The Animorphs eventually stopped using this in favor of getting the Chee to fill in for them.
 * The Body by Stephen King. The boys claim they're camping in the field behind Vern's house but they're actually going into the woods to look at the body of a missing kid. Also happens in the film version, Stand by Me.

Live Action TV
"Giles: Round robin?
 * Used on Buffy the Vampire Slayer:

Willow: It's when everybody calls everybody else's mom and tells them they're staying at everyone's house.

Buffy: Thus freeing us up for world saveage."

"Astor's friend Olivia: My mom thinks I'm staying at Astor's.
 * Unfortunately, it's karmic; after being Promoted To Parent, Buffy gets tricked the same way by Dawn.
 * In "Band Candy" Buffy tells mother Joyce and father-substitute Giles that she's staying with the other so she can sneak off and see Angel. Unfortunately they quickly tumble to this ruse.
 * On Dexter, Astor, Dexter's stepdaughter, shows up in Miami drunk after running away from her grandparents' house with a friend.

Dexter (to Astor): Let me guess, your grandparents think you're staying at Olivia's."


 * On Skins, Pandora's mother is the one parent who seems to be concerned about how drugs and sex will impact her daughter. Pandora gets around this by telling her mother she's staying over at Effy's house every time she's getting up to some bad behavior.

Web Comics

 * Used during the "sister" arc in El Goonish Shive.
 * Early in Juvenile Diversion, the boys used the "round robin" plot.
 * The Flea in PS238, here.

Western Animation

 * In the South Park episode "The Wacky Molestation Adventure" the boys do this in order to attend the Raging Pussies concert without their parents knowing.
 * In a Hey Arnold episode where Helga got locked in Arnold's closet and couldn't leave without being seen (long story), she called Phoebe on a cell phone and told her to call her parents and tell them Helga was sleeping over at Phoebe's.