Mary Killen

Q. My parents are giving a drinks party for me in our garden which, as all my friends know, is quite big. People also know my parents are very generous and laid back so my worry is that some if not all of the single men on the guest list will assume it is OK for them to rock up with a girl in tow. But I have too many single girls coming as it is. How, without coming over as pompous or predatory, can I tactfully ask these single men not to bring someone? Equally, without seeming desperate, how can I check they are even coming in the first place? Most of them have not bothered to answer. — Name and address withheld A. A few days beforehand, text these men asking them to let you know whether they can come.

Q. We grow our own organic vegetables, and do not really have a surplus to speak of, but because they are so fashionable and sought-after my husband cannot resist giving them away. How can we put a stop to this? for reasons of economy, we would prefer to be eating the produce ourselves. — M.W., Wilts A. Why not take a tip from organic guru Bob Flowerdew and invite people round to consume the vegetables at your table? In this way you can be generous with ounces rather than pounds of vegetables and at the same time your husband can enjoy a more extended self-validation experience. Meanwhile, the guests are likely to bring wine which will counterbalance your own outlay on meat. Q. Recently I had occasion to visit a friend’s bathroom.

Q. I often have the most fascinating dreams. These are not just run-of-the-mill dreams about flying or losing your teeth, but really amazing blockbusters which go on for hours and hours. Naturally I want to share these riveting nocturnal experiences with others, but I always find that when I try to recount them, while they are fresh in my memory, nobody wants to listen. It is they who are missing out, so what is the best way to get someone to stop stuffing in their breakfast and concentrate on something really mind-blowing which I am trying to tell them? — C.B., London WC1 A. Why not cast your audience as minor characters in the dream? Introduce them right at the beginning. In this way you may be able to hold their attention. Q.

Q. A very stylish woman with a much-admired house happened to drop into my rather dark cottage. She advised me that I should paint the inside of my fireplace white: it would look much better than the current black hole effect and would also reflect light. It seems such a good idea that I suspect the reason it is not done more often is because it is unsafe. Can you advise? — A.L., London W11 A. Fire specialist Allan Christensen takes a different view. He pronounces: ‘I would avoid using light colours inside a fire chamber as the light reflected is quite cold. You are better off using a dark reflective colour such as graphite or metal black as the light reflected is much warmer. It is possible to purchase heatproof spray online or try www.stovax.com.

Q. I give a young guns’ shoot for my childrens’ twentysomething friends every year and make a house party of it— it is an essential part of this very extravagant weekend that guests come to both the shoot and the dinner afterwards. This is fine for those staying; but I have found recently that one or two local invitees from very social families, who get a lot of these sort of invitations, accept the shoot but refuse the dinner on the basis that they have prior invites elsewhere. How can I tactfully make sure that they realise it is both or nothing, leaving them no opportunity to accept only the shoot, without giving offence? — Name withheld, Shaftesbury, Dorset A.

Q. As chairman of the parish council, I am required, along with a local member of the aristocracy, to judge the best red, white and blue outfit and the best hat at the forthcoming village Diamond Jubilee celebration. The potential diplomatic pitfalls are legion. I have thought of saying that I have, during the occasion, been texting pictures to our MP (who happens to be the Prime Minister) and claiming the selection was his. However, I fear that this deception may result in me ending up in front of some inquiry or other. Can you suggest a better way to negotiate this — as far as I am concerned — no-win situation? — C.C., Ramsden, Oxfordshire A. You are right to be concerned. No matter how just your judgment, you will inevitably become the focus of resentment.

Q. My wife was a recovering alcoholic. Now she is a lapsed recovering alcoholic. After three years of sobriety she has taken up the bottle again. I feel that if only she could hear the foul-mouthed and irrational tirades she delivers when under the influence, she might go back onto the wagon. I have recorded several of the hideous conversations she and I have had late at night with the idea of playing them back to her in the morning. Do you think I should try it, Mary? — Name and address withheld A. Definitely not. Recording her in this way is a violation of the trust between you. Much better to let her inadvertently record herself while ranting. To this end, introduce her to the speech recognition facility on her laptop.

Q. I am a very busy person. Consequently I find it maddening when I am talking to someone on the telephone and I realise that they are not concentrating on what I have to say, but instead are staring at their computer screen. A case in point is a younger friend who is a junior member of my own profession. He has consistently missed out on good advice I have given because he has not been listening properly, but has been trying to multi-task instead. What is your solution? —F.W., Aldeburgh,Suffolk A. Teach the youth a lesson next time you are on the telephone to him by simultaneously sending him an email saying ‘Concentrate! I am talking to you.’ Q. The widow of a friend is generous to a fault.

Q. Any more tips on how a lonely bachelor can improve his social life? Your recent advice that I should send out a round-robin email saying ‘I’ve had the all-clear’ backfired. I did get loads of calls but many of them were from people who assumed I had been suffering from an STD. — E.W., London A. Nevertheless, the response has proved my theory that, as a single, good-looking and solvent man, you are bound to be in demand and that as such people will welcome having an excuse to ring you up. Try another method of giving them one which was recently used, inadvertently, by another bachelor, who said yes to an email asking if he would recommend a new cab-calling service he had used?

Q. My husband and I are at loggerheads. One of the buildings he owns has become vacant and he has planning consent for change of use to a pub. On the one hand we very much need the money. On the other I dread the drunkenness and yobbery it would bring. Can you rule, Mary? — Name withheld, Worcestershire A. He could achieve the same result — filling your coffers — by turning this empty building into toilets. Anyone who doubts that toilets can be an attraction in their own right need only visit Stonehenge, where hordes pass through the toilets each day without even casting a glance at the world heritage site.

Q. A couple of weeks ago, on a Sunday morning, the Idler Academy arranged that there would be a ‘signing’ for my book. The Idler emailed the thousand idlers on their list and the headmaster’s mother came up from Oxford to help control the crowds. Two people turned up, both of whom were old friends. Mary, what do you advise? —D.B., London W2 A. Do not take the apparent mass snubbing as significant. Since your book (‘Among Booksellers, Tales Told in Letters to Howard Hodgkin’, by David Batterham) contains the modest musings of a gentleman and scholar as he goes about his business in the world of rare books, it is likely that most potential purchasers would also be unpushy types and disinclined to consider the cornering of its author on a Sunday morning.

Q. A friend had a glamorous book launch to which I was not invited but which was all over the papers. Since I regularly review books, this exclusion seems pointed. The implication is that I am no longer considered glamorous myself and she would not wish to be conflated with me in any review. What should I say when I next run into her? — Name withheld, London NW1 A. Don’t assume the exclusion was deliberate. These days most publishers have unpaid interns, to whom such chores as guest lists are often deputed with predictable results. Your dignified response is to assume that being left off the list was a mistake. Next time you see her, cry, ‘I’m so sorry about missing your party but I promise you I did not even know about it until I saw the coverage the next day.

Q. How can I road-test a potential lodger? I am under pressure from old friends who know that I live alone and am away a lot, and also that I have a spare room with a bathroom in my central London flat. They all seem to have children who cannot find anywhere affordable to live in London. I feel that it would be selfish not to let the room, but what if the young person turns out to be uncivilised? I have no children of my own, so I am probably out of date, but I still expect a bit of deference from someone 30 or more years younger than me. I am nervous of being landed with someone whose parents insist that they are meek and compliant, but who will bring people back, throw all-night parties etc. Most of all, I don’t want to fall out with the parents by falling out with the child.

Q. I went to lunch in the new house of a rather competitive woman. We have friends in common, without being particular friends ourselves. After lunch she showed me round this (slightly overblown) new mansion in Kensington and I was amazed to see two bathrooms off her marital bedroom. Naturally I enthused, out of politeness, and said how wonderful to have two — to which she replied ‘Oh don’t you and your husband have a double en suite? Oh poor you.’ My husband and I think we are doing well to have one bathroom en suite and I did not appreciate being patronised. How should I have replied, Mary? — F.R., London SW12 A.

Q. A bachelor colleague is in great demand as a spare man. He often regales us with details of the fascinating people he has met at dinner. Our view is that he should occasionally have people back, but he seems to feel that, as everyone knows he has no one at home to cook, he is excused this politeness. Sometimes we suspect he feels it is he who does his hosts the favour, just by turning up. How should we tactfully hint that he may be getting a reputation as a sponger? — R.F., London EC1 A. You can subtly steer your colleague towards the realisation that return hospitality may be due. Each time he regales you with details of the dinners he has been to, ask: ‘And did you sing for your supper?’ Eventually it will dawn on him why you keep asking this question.

Q. At a recent social event my wife and I were lucky enough to be guests of a dear friend who had also asked some dozen others. We started the evening as a party in a bar and, as 7.15 p.m. approached and we got ready to leave, I noticed that none of our party, mostly women, had offered to help to pay for their drinks, so I was left to pick up the tab, which came to £79. Interestingly, no one bothered to say thank you, as they had already walked off unthinkingly. My wife and I had had a glass of wine and a beer between us. I would appreciate some advice on how to avoid a similar situation in future. —Name and address withheld A. This was a classic case of involuntary sponging.

Q. A friend has asked me to a small birthday dinner, but she has also, unwittingly, asked a man with whom I have an embarrassing issue. In a nutshell, he invited me on a date and then didn’t call on the day or since. I have met someone else so I am not bitter. But I could have been really demoralised (because we snogged and so on). It was all against my better judgment anyway because, although he is very good-looking, he is a Tory and I am not, but I still think he should not get away scot-free, so can you recommend a way in which I can demoralise him at the dinner without creating a bad atmosphere generally? —B.J., London W11 A. This is the wrong attitude to take. Parents with naughty children should never discipline them under someone else’s roof.

Q. How, without causing offence, can you stop someone sitting next to you on an aeroplane or train from talking to you all the way through the journey? I find this often happens to me, and once you engage it is hard to bring the conversation to a close. I count on these journeys as opportunities to catch up on reading. — H.A., London W8 A. First soften the blow by talking animatedly for a few minutes. Then put your hand over your mouth and confess in despairing mode, ‘I always get so tempted to talk when I meet someone interesting on a plane/train. Will you promise to stop me if I try to carry on chatting? I’ve got so much reading to do and I’m sure you have, too.’ Q. A friend who runs an art business from her home in the country is too nice to her staff.

Q. When our daughter, who has a wheat allergy, comes up to stay for weekends or hols with her husband and children, my wife takes a lot of trouble ordering wheat-free loaves from a special source in our nearby town. These are then collected by my wife and pointed out to all present as being for our daughter only — there is plenty of other delicious bread. In spite of all this (the specially ordered bread is expensive, has to be collected, we can’t get another loaf quickly, and we’ve said it several times), her husband still goes on taking pieces! He may be winding up his in-laws, but either way, can you suggest a solution? — H.B., East Lothian, Scotland A.

Q. Recently my wife and I received a thank you letter from ‘John and Kate’ giving an address in Pimlico. They wrote to thank us for a picture of roses that ‘we’ had given them for a wedding present. My mother-in-law painted beautifully and often chose roses. My wife and I racked our brains to think who this well-mannered couple could be. Not one of ours — over to you Rollo and Janie (a local couple with whom I and my wife, Rollo and Caroline, are often confused). But it was not one of theirs either… How do you suggest both Rollos come out of this smelling of roses? — R.C.,West Porlock, Somerset A. A quick (free) search of www.thepeerage.co.uk reveals too many Rollos for the mystery to be easily solved. However, there is no need for you to be coy.