DEAR MISS MANNERS: I read, some time ago, that you are supposed to cut your food one piece at a time, eat it, then repeat.
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However, I pride myself on efficiency, and picking up and putting down the knife so many times seems wasteful.
Is cutting food one piece at a time the correct behavior? Or is it acceptable, for example, to cut an entire steak into bite-sized pieces, then eat it at your leisure?
GENTLE READER: What makes you think that efficiency is a virtue when it comes to eating? Is the person who can shovel the food in fastest therefore the most polite?
DEAR MISS MANNERS: I have a new acquaintance with whom I share a couple of interests and group activities. She seems quite lonely.
It’s clear she would like to be closer friends, and she reaches out multiple times a week to get together for events that I usually decline.
The problem is that when we do get together, I find her exhausting, negative, extremely critical of others’ behavior and a strain to be around.
I already limit my contact with her to the few events we both regularly attend, but do I owe her any explanation about my lack of interest in spending more time with her? Is there any way to point out the aspects of her behavior I find off-putting? Or is simply “ghosting” her overtures for more togetherness a strong enough signal?
GENTLE READER: She doesn’t sound like a lot of fun.
But seeing someone occasionally and declining to do so constantly is not ghosting. For that matter, while ghosting has a bad reputation, the alternative — explaining why you don’t like someone — is not exactly kind.
Nor, apparently, does it motivate people to change their behavior. The targets tend to blame the critic, whom they can then add to their list of gossip subjects.
That leaves the gradual method you have been using. Unfortunately, it takes some people forever to understand. Miss Manners would allow you to help it along by saying, “My schedule is very crowded these days, but at least I’ll see you at pickleball.”
DEAR MISS MANNERS: My husband and I will be visiting London soon, and will see several theatrical productions. One play will feature a famous American actress whom we’ve never met, but who is a friend of a friend.
Our friend suggested we send a note backstage with a greeting. Is it proper to include our contact information in the note? I don’t want to come across as a Stage Door Johnny.
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GENTLE READER: Unless you arrive with a bouquet of flowers so large that you can hardly hold it, along with a foolish, lovelorn facial expression, you are unlikely to be mistaken for a Stage Door Johnny.
The note that you give the stage door keeper should explain that your mutual friend urged you to get in touch and declare that the actress’s performance was superb.
You may add your contact information, but the question of meeting is likely to be settled immediately. The actress will either invite you to her dressing room, or voice utter despair that she is too exhausted to have what would have been the great pleasure of meeting you.
Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.