Manners

Q. I have invited some younger friends to stay with me at a family house in Spain. Among the party will be an excellent young fellow who I sense is attracted to my niece, who will also be joining us for a few days. Were I to ask if she is interested, she would think such a question ‘gross’ – but she should be, because he is an all-round star. Like so many of his age, though, he has a somewhat dithering and unconfident manner. Given that it will be too hot to dance, any thoughts about how I can help things move forward between them? They are both single. – Name and address withheld A. At an opportune moment, having engineered a chat, sit the pair down on a sofa and hand them your mobile preloaded with a relevant short podcast on the topic you have been discussing.

Q. What should I do if my housekeeper refuses to clean my nanny’s bedroom and bathroom? I am worried they will turn into a tip. – M.C., London A. Today’s competent London nannies are so highly paid that yours may have developed delusions of grandeur. Your housekeeper is quite right to refuse. Why not tell your nanny that you want to get the children into the habit of associating cleaning with fun at an early age? Suggest she supervise them tackling her bedroom and bathroom each day and you will come up to inspect and award stars for good work. Q. My family and I were dismayed when we heard that a woman who moves in the same (literary) circles has bought a house near our remote cottage in Cornwall.

Q. My husband and I have just been on a wonderful long weekend abroad to a friend’s 60th birthday. We met lots of lovely new people over the three days and we would really like to keep in touch, but it seemed a bit presumptuous to go around asking for everyone’s numbers. What should I have done? – A.E., Pewsey, Wilts A. Many people of your age have already got too many friends and have no room on their ‘books’ for more. However it is quite unthreatening to ask for people’s numbers so that you can ‘stay in touch through Wordle’. Wordle is ideal since – unlike with a Scrabble group – there is no pressure to play. This will provide an opening for future interactions when a space becomes available. Q.

Q. I ride a bike from Chiswick to the City each morning. It is a ten-mile journey that takes 45 minutes and it is good for my weight and mental health. I lock my bike to a lamppost outside my semi-detached house as there is no room for it inside. Now an official-looking sign has appeared on the lamppost saying ‘It is illegal to attach bicycles to this lamppost’, but I have checked and it is not from the council. I think it must have been made by Photoshop and put up by my neighbour on the other side of my semi-detached house. She is the only other person who can see the lamppost. I don’t want to fall out with my neighbour but I think it dishonest of her to put up this notice. What should I do? – C.W., Chiswick A.

Q. We live in the countryside, where the door is always open. Last week when it was sunny we had a drinks party in the garden. Despite our leaving a notice on the front door saying ‘In the garden’, most people rang the doorbell (waking up our grandchild and making the dogs bark) and waited on the doorstep to be greeted. I was busy trying to pour drinks and introduce people. It’s not a big house but I must have walked 10,000 steps. What should I have done? – Name and address withheld A. A certain type of person lacks the confidence to proceed unescorted into a household. Next time, ask a tongue-tied teenager to sit outside the front door, blocking access to the bell and telling arriving guests to just go on through.

Q. Often at parties strangers bear down on me looking excited and are then offended when I don’t recognise them. This is because I have never actually met them – they have just seen me on television and made the mistake of thinking we know each other. To say ‘I think you’re confused because you’ve seen me on television’ sounds patronising so I don’t. I then see their faces fall as I don’t ask the right questions and we go up conversational cul de sacs. Advice? – Name and address withheld A. Put them right gently by looking excited yourself and saying: ‘We’ve seen each other on television haven’t we?’ As they reply, ‘Well I’m not on television but you are…’, their mistake will dawn on them. Q.

Q. I like and get on well with my sister-in-law. My problem is that she is incredibly nosy and I always feel she is itching for a chance to go through my private papers. I can hardly lock the room where they are kept, so it means I have to keep an eye on her – almost as much as you would a toddler – all the time she is in our house. What do you suggest, Mary? – Name and address withheld A. Source an A4-sized documents box – the sort that you close with a ribbon. Lay the box on its back and fill with marbles. Tie the ribbon to shut the contents in and place the box, ribbon-side down, in a bookshelf with its back superglued to the wall. Put a sticky label on the front saying: ‘Super private papers – confidential.’ Then go shopping.

Q. My husband and I will shortly be having some South American friends to stay. They come most years and it’s always enjoyable to see them. Our problem is that they never divulge when they will be leaving – possibly because back home it doesn’t matter to them what time guests come and go; they lead a very different life to us, with maids and kitchen staff. For me, if they are here for an extra day it means a dash to Waitrose etc. My husband is always keen I don’t ask them outright in case it looks unwelcoming. How should I handle this? – C.N., Uppingham, Rutland A. Subcontract this awkward question. Arrange for a compliant neighbour to drop in on the pretext of returning a borrowed book. Let her meet your guests before she dashes off.

Q. I am on a long, jam-packed and much disrupted train journey to Scotland. In the carriage someone is working on their laptop. But it seems to be a noisy affair. Very aggressive and excited tapping on the keypad so we are all listening to what sounds like a very fast Morse code. But it’s erratic and the ‘return’ button click sounds more like a slap. After an hour it is getting on my nerves because it’s intrusive just when you might be trying to have a kip or read. What should one say? The train staff seem to be bewildered juniors on job experience. – P.R., London W1 A. One of the benefits of working in an office is that all the world’s a stage, while working from home means no audience and self-motivation becomes hard.

Q. At the Ludlow Piano Festival, during a Tyler Hay concert, my husband and I spotted a fascinating-looking couple who were fellow members of the audience. We longed to know who they were and are kicking ourselves that we never found out the identity of this charismatic pair. During the interval we could have approached them but didn’t want to seem pushy or pervy by just introducing ourselves. What could we have said? – S.S., Abergavenny A. ‘Sorry to bother you but do you happen to be a friend of Derek Duck? Oh… he gave us a jumper to return to someone he said would be at this concert but we stupidly can’t remember the name of whoever it is. We’ve asked all the other likely men here. By the way, I’m Sylvia Smug and this is my husband Cedric – and you are?’ Q.

Q. I have a friend whom I see quite often who keeps asking me if I will ‘get her invited’ for a weekend to the beautiful and luxurious country house of another friend. The country-house host is a long-standing friend and she barely knows the friend who wants to be invited. I wouldn’t dream of suggesting they invite her but am under constant pressure to do so. I am very fond of this first friend but am really embarrassed that she cannot see how pushy she is being and I don’t know how to get her to stop going on about this. What should I do? – F.G., Bath A. Next time the pushy friend chivvies you, put the ball into her own court. Say: ‘I am sure she would love to have you. You just need to gee her up a bit and let her get to know you.

Q. I left fashion school last year and since then I’ve spent most of my time applying for jobs and being rejected. (That’s only if they’re kind enough to send a rejection – most simply ghost me.) I finally have a job (the company does fast fashion) but when I tell my friends, who are all recent graduates, they mostly say: ‘Well I’m happy if you’re happy but I could never work for such an unethical brand.’ How should I reply without sounding unethical myself? – C.P., London SW18 A. Next time you meet with this response you can test the naysayers’ pomposity by replying: ‘Oh that’s a shame. Because they were asking me if I knew of any other talented young designers who were looking for work.’ Q.

Q. My husband never wants to go out to lunch on a day when he could be gardening but he has grudgingly accepted a wonderful forthcoming local event that I’m very keen to attend myself. Now I find from a fellow guest that our host is planning on seating him next to a woman who (she says) is ‘one of his biggest fans’. The feeling is not mutual – in fact, if my husband found out about this seating plan, he would definitely refuse to come. Yet now that I know about this, it would be disloyal and deceitful of me not to tell him. How can I resolve this without causing offence to our host? – Name and address withheld A. Confide in an influential third party that the leaked seating plan is causing anxiety for you.

Q. For the past couple of years, many of my sons’ friends have been gamely running the London Marathon for good causes. I received more than 15 emails this year, all asking for sponsorship. As much as I’d like to respond in the affirmative, I am not in a financial position to sponsor more than two at the most. They all know each other, so how do I go about choosing which ones to sponsor? – R.B., London SW9 A. Send out a group email saying that, as you aren’t able to give generously to each one of them, you will put all their names into a hat and the first two that you pick out will benefit. This way everyone will know your intentions are good and their requests haven’t just been ignored.

Q. Our son, 17, who is generally a credit to us, has started eating with his mouth open. It’s the only thing we don’t love about him. It’s not to do with sinuses and we don’t know if it’s a peer-pressure thing, but when we beg him to stop he always just laughs and insists that: ‘Eating with your mouth shut isn’t a thing any more.’ We are fretting because we have some very fastidious Americans coming to lunch who are important potential clients (and snobs). They are bringing their daughter, also 17, and have specifically asked that our son be there too. Help.  – Name and address withheld A. Serve food with a pre-masticated texture – for example cheese soufflé, followed by shepherd’s pie, followed by chocolate mousse.

Q. My son-in-law is running the Paris marathon to raise money for cystic fibrosis research and has sent out a mail shot to friends and family asking to be sponsored via justgiving.com. He has had a fabulous response. Some people have posted supportive messages alongside their names but have chosen to conceal the amount of money they are donating. Yet two supporters, who have been spectacularly generous, have anonymised their names –although not the giant sums of money that they have pledged. My son-in-law would like to know who these people are – what do you suggest he do? – A.E., Pewsey A. For practical reasons certain people make a deliberate choice to remain anonymous when giving money. Think it through.

Q. I’m very fond of a neighbour in our village and we see a lot of each other. She has told me she has got X, an acquaintance of mine, coming to stay and wants to bring her over for a drink before lunch on the Sunday. The trouble is X is a decorator and will ask if she can look around the house. I happen to know that she’s very nosy and indiscreet – but how can I say no? – Name and address withheld A. Why not pretend to be enthusiastic about the visit and then, on the day before, ring to say you are longing to see X but cannot possibly have anyone in your house as you have had the rat man in and there are disgusting smells emanating from under the floorboards – can you switch venues to your neighbour’s house? Q.

Q. Do you agree with me that it is very bad manners to ask for a wifi code as soon as you walk into a lunch in someone else’s house? I have a centrally located, although cramped, flat in Soho and am very happy to cook for friends and friends of friends, but it is a tough act to pull off single-handedly and it throws me when people ask for the wifi code as if supplying this is no more time-consuming than telling them where the loo is. Moreover, surely you should not even think of checking your emails and WhatsApps when invited to a non-professional lunch? – P.R., London W1 A.