Mary Killen

Q. Is plate-swapping in restaurants now acceptable behaviour? When dining out, a not-so-young Dutch couple I know, both smart and rich, are in the habit of blithely exchanging plates midway through each course so that they may taste one another’s choice of food. However, in one fashionable restaurant recently, a handwritten note accompanied their bill which said ‘in this establishment, plate-swapping is not encouraged. In future please refrain from indulging in this practice.’ Was the indignation of the Dutch justified? — T.D., Majorca A. There is no legal reason why the two should not swap plates.

Q. We live exactly halfway between London and Cornwall. People often ask themselves to stay so they can break the journey and we usually say yes — we need outside company to liven things up around here. My problem is that we are short of cash these days and I have started doing b&b. I still want my really good old friends to stay without paying, and I still want to see the less good friends, but I am not happy for those in the latter category to block off rooms which I could be letting out to paying punters. Can you suggest a tactful way of suggesting to less good friends that they actually pay to stay? I know this sounds grasping, but we do need the money. — Name withheld, near Bruton, Somerset A.

Q. I receive a huge number of invitations. This is no reflection of my status i.e. I am not powerful or rich or anything, I just know hundreds of people and in this I am probably quite typical of anyone else of my age (25). My problem is knowing how to reply when asked to something six months ahead. You cannot say you are already busy and so you are forced, out of politeness, to accept. Often, I find, when the time comes round, that I would rather be doing something else. —D.A., Crouch End, London A. Why not take a tip from another reader, M.G., also aged 25? Says M.G., ‘When I am invited months ahead I always ask myself: if it were tomorrow, would I want to accept? If the answer is yes I say yes, and if no I say no.

Q. I am a man of modest means but every year my cousin allows me to use his country house to host a cricket match against the village close to the family seat in the West Country. I invite members of the itinerant London-based team for which I play, and their families, to stay for the weekend, and provide food and drink at my own expense. The point of difficulty is that my cousin’s staff expect to be tipped and my guests, unfamiliar with conventions of country houses, do not, in the main, oblige. As a consequence I have to make up the difference. I have thought of approaching our captain and asking him to brief the team, but although a splendid fellow he cannot be relied on in this regard.

Q. How can you have people to stay the night — but not the next day as well? My parents have bought a flat in London. They have given my brother and me keys so we can use it when we want. This is amazing but the problem is that the flat is really central so our friends from university always want to stay after we have been clubbing or even just in the pub. Then, while my brother and I are trying to work, they hang around until they are ready to go out again. — S.H., London W1 A. There is an 8 a.m. Mass at Farm Street Church every day of the week with additional later ones at 11 on Saturday and 9.30 on Sunday. Why not get into the habit of going to mass on mornings when you need to shift layabouts?

Your problems solved Q. I have met a man who, despite being 66, is very fanciable. He has been paying me some attention. The problem is that he spits while he is speaking. I think this is a new habit: his former wife and long-term girlfriend have high standards and would not have put up with it, but he has been single for a couple of years. I don’t want to nag him even before we have embarked on anything — but I would not want to embark on anything while being sprayed with spittle. — K.M., London WC1 A. Invite him to lunch with a small group, including another man who spits. Seat the two spitters opposite each other.

Q. I thought I was au fait with road users’ etiquette, but confess to being nonplussed when confronted by the advisory signs Baby on Board or race horses in transit displayed in vehicles. Mary, what is the correct reaction to this information? Should one hoot? Cheer? Smile sympathetically? Flash the headlights? Pray? Depending on your advice, should one adapt these signs, do you think, to read Headlice on Board when ferrying schoolchildren around? —J.J., Shaftesbury, Dorset A. These signs are not entirely without purpose. They point to a motorist who is either passive-aggressive or lacking in good judgment. Steer a wide course. Q. A rather supercilious middle-aged American lives in the same apartment block.

Q. May I pass on a tip to readers? Three of my sons are revising for exams at the moment, all in the face of the usual sorts of distractions from social networking sites, cricket and football score alerts, to say nothing of emails pinging into their laptops. I was therefore delighted when they told me that an electronic opportunity to resist these temptations now exists. Two of my sons have installed it into their own MacBooks. Apparently you just go to Google and download ‘self-control app’. This application enables you to set a limit, say two hours, during which all access to time-wasting social networking sites and emails are blocked.

Q. I recently met an old friend I had not seen for some years. Answering his question about my meeting with a certain film star, I mentioned cosmetic surgery, in a disparaging tone. He seemed confused rather than amused, and after we parted it dawned on me that perhaps he too had ‘had work done’. How can I apologise for something I might not have done, regarding something he might not have done, and at the same time find out whether he has? — Name and address withheld A. Inappropriate facial expressions are the usual giveaway, so it seems your suspicions are correct. But you are oversensitive. The disparaging tones will have reassured your friend that his ‘work’ must have been done with such subtlety as to be unnoticeable.

Q. My friend John sets the standard of dress for our small community. It has come to his notice that HRH the Duke of Edinburgh is sporting black suede shoes with black tie. I think John is keen to adopt this mode of dress but is unsure about it. I think he should stick to black leather. What do you advise, Mary? Also, should suedes be worn during daylight hours? —G.A., Crewkerne A. As is revealed in the forthcoming biography ‘Young Prince Philip’ by Philip Eade (Harper Press), the Duke has never been that interested in ‘correct’ dressing. In his early life his valet battled to keep him out of the visibly mended cast-off suits of his father. However, there are special rules for nonagenarian royals which do not apply to the average man.

Q. I belong to the clerical profession, one to which, in theory, a certain dignity adheres. I particularly dislike ‘trendy’ abbreviations of my Christian name. On meeting recently a new ecumenical colleague I introduced myself as ‘David’ and he replied: ‘Oh great, I’m a Dave too!’ I was lost for words. What should I have said or done? After all, nobody called Jesus ‘Jeez’. — Father D.S., Southampton A. You should have nipped the abuse instantly in the bud by smiling pleasantly as you replied ‘Do you know… I thought everyone would call me Dave but in my neck of the woods they all seem to want to call me David. Apparently they think it has more dignity and is more appropriate to the office.

Q. We normally drive guests departing our house in France to our nearest station for trains connecting them to Eurostar. One departing guest, an attractive divorcee, had half an hour to kill, so I suggested a croissant and coffee, which meant lugging her very heavy case over to the café and back again to the station where, as I sank exhaustedly onto the bench with the case between us, my elbow activated a battery-driven item in the suitcase. Toothbrush? — I wondered — or something of a more intimate nature? Was it polite to ignore the buzzing, and feign deafness? Or should I have mentioned it, risking some embarrassed scrabbling in the case? A.T., London SW3 A. On this occasion your silence will have spoken louder than words.

Q. Thank you for your advice regarding my ‘fecundity’ question (24 March), but I did refer in my question to a gastronomic salon i.e. a private house. The location was not a restaurant and no need to drop credit cards around! —R.S., Bombay A. I must apologise to readers for advising R.S. how to shake off a tiresome drunk in what I assumed was a restaurant scenario. When a drunk has bearded a happily chatting group in a private house it is a different matter. Here the correct protocol is for the most alpha member of the group to take responsibility. Simulating fascination with the drunk, he can suggest the others leave them alone so they can have a more intimate discussion.

Q. After dining at a well-known gastronomic salon in Bombay with two gap-year visitors, together with two exceptionally pretty girls working in Bombay, we were sitting in a side room, whereupon a gentleman with a straggly beard tried to join our group with the following comment: ‘Eh... fecundity — there is nothing like a polysyllablic word to get the party going!’ We looked at each other in slight amazement as we tried to recall the meaning of the word. When we did, the implication, particularly for the girls, held distinctly unappealing prospects! Mary, what should we have done? — R.S., Bombay A. No doubt your cosy smugathon was irritating to fellow diners. The bearded man’s remark was passive-aggressive and probably linked to alcohol intake.

Q. My daughter’s bedroom window has a clear view down into next door’s kitchen. Yesterday she drew my attention to several mice who were bolting out of the kitchen skirting, feasting on crumbs and having a high old time while my neighbour (who is very nice but not a bosom pal) was safely upstairs putting her many children to bed. Do I tell her? I think if the circumstances were reversed I would want to know. But she has a new baby so I am afraid she might be feeling overwhelmed already. Please advise! — Name and address withheld A. Your neighbour must be informed. The problem is that by telling her you observed the mice from your private viewing chamber next door, you risk making her feel self-conscious in her own kitchen.

Q. Over the last 20 years four of my closest friends have moved abroad. The good thing is that they come to stay with me when they are in London. The bad thing is that invariably, when they are packing up to leave our house for their cheap flights, they find that they have somehow accumulated too much luggage during their stay, and ask to leave the overspill with me, to be collected when they next visit. The next time they come the same thing happens again. I do not want to be inhospitable but there are now 11 leftover bags. What should I do? — J.F., London SW12 A. Email your friends to announce your discovery that it is surprisingly inexpensive to send parcels abroad through the Royal Mail.

Q. A talented young man helps me out as an intern. Sadly I can’t personally offer him full-time work but I have a close friend who will be recruiting shortly. This man tells me he will be looking for young people who are bilingual and super-bright — but that he prefers school leavers to graduates as he wants to ‘mould’ them. The work he is offering is interesting, but although my intern is bilingual and superbright, he is a 24-year-old graduate and, quite rightly, self-confident and fully aware of his own worth. Should I tell my intern to pretend to be humble and mouldable? Or should I let him emanate his usual brio?

Q. Our son is at school in England with the son of a billionaire. They have become friends and we would like to invite the child for the week-end. However, our own manor house, while of historic and architectural significance, does not offer the opulence to which our prospective guest might be accustomed. How can we address our pangs of social anxiety? In the country where we live, we have certain social and literary cachet but no serious money. —Name and address withheld A. Your problem needs to be put in context. You are a high-profile political figure; the billionaire boy will be aware of this.

Q. In the light of WikiLeaks and Facebook, should the Chatham House rules still apply in civilised society? My life is rather mouvementé just now and, although I have no immediate plans to publish it, I feel it a duty to keep a diary. Unfortunately my wife thinks there is an element of sneakiness about my doing this. My view is that if you have the kind of access I have, then it is almost a moral obligation to keep a record of who said what, for the moment when, as they say, the history books come to be written. Can you rule, Mary? —Name withheld A. A diary, written as a narrative of one’s own life, is one thing. It is useful for the purpose of self-analysis and as a record for one’s children.

Q. At a drinks party I was introduced to a senior politician and found myself lost for words. I was not overawed, Mary, the problem was that although I admire the man, every gambit which went through my head seemed to be intrusive, patronising, critical, grovelling or stalker-like. I would like to be better prepared should the situation recur. — M.W., Wilts A. You could have taken a tip from the Queen and posed the anodyne query ‘Have you come far?’ You might even have used ‘Have you had a busy day?’ Such gambits give a politician scope to reflect on those areas of his life he can discuss without breaching security. However, it would have been more considerate on your part to explain who you are yourself.