Q. I’m an artist and work from home painting people’s pets from photographs. While working I take a lot of FaceTime calls from friends, with my phone on a stand. My problem is that my husband is in the racing world, and when they glimpse him in the background they want to ask him for tips. How can I say ‘Sorry he is too busy’ without sounding rude?
– Name withheld, Newmarket
A. FaceTime offers ‘Portrait mode’ which blurs the background while keeping you in focus. Tap the screen, then the effects option, then ‘Enable portrait’. While this will not fully hide background objects, it makes details harder to see. Meanwhile, you should get into the habit of wearing AirPods as it is a breach of etiquette to be gossiping on FaceTime without alerting your interlocutor of the presence of a third party.
Q. I have recently installed an EV charging point at my house for the use of guests who come to stay (often arriving with range anxiety). Should they offer to reimburse me for the cost of their top-up charging, or is this now part of the hospitality that is expected of a modern host? Guests have just driven off after leaving their car charging overnight, which I estimate will have cost me some £15. What do you advise when these are frequent guests but I don’t want to come across as ungracious?
– J.B., Conock, Wilts
A. How kind of you to have installed this facility. To charge an EV at a private house can cost as little as a tenth of what it would cost at a public superfast charging point. As a result of this initiative your EV-driving guests must be conflating you with extra pleasure. You should forget about trying to claw back some of the costs. Guests do not pay for logs or hot water or indoor electricity, and to supply the fuel for their return journey only adds to the general expression of hospitality. Yet this is not ‘expected’ of a host and the guest should certainly offer to pay, while the host should insist on their not doing so. If the guest seems unhappy (for one reason or another) about not paying, then let them.
Q. A much-loved old friend has begun to tell the same stories he has told us before. Should we stop him in his tracks each time, which could undermine his self-confidence, or should we just ‘listen again’?
– F.W. & S.C., Oundle, Northants
A. Why not enthuse: ‘Oh I’ve always loved this story. Do tell it again!’ Incidentally, the late Quentin Crisp liked to preface his own anecdotes with: ‘I may have told you this before but I would rather like to hear it again myself.’
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