ArcaMax

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I have asked my friends to help me swap an engine on my pickup truck, and they have generously agreed.

Mechanic etiquette says that if your friends are helping you on a car project, you provide drinks while they work. A worker is worthy of their wages. However, I am unsure how many beers I should give them for their ...Read more

DEAR MISS MANNERS: One evening, quite late at night, I received a long, impassioned text from a stranger by mistake. In it, he talked about having had a "wonderful few hours" with someone and hoped to see them again. He also revealed some personal insecurities about their time together that are, obviously, none of my business.

I'm aware that ...Read more

DEAR MISS MANNERS: At a dinner party, my companion quietly excused herself after the meal to smoke a cigarette. She went outside, over our nonsmoking hostess's protestations that inside was fine.

As I escorted my friend outside, I heard a fellow guest, the wife of a mutual acquaintance, shriek, "What? She SMOKES?" in a tone that would have been...Read more

DEAR MISS MANNERS: We attended a charity event for a homeless shelter -- an event we have gone to for several years. This time, there was a guest speaker who was a former client of the shelter.

This gentleman had gone there when he was homeless and fresh out of jail. He spoke for 45 minutes, which I thought was way too long, and he included ...Read more

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am planning to invite my daughter's in-laws to a formal dinner. I plan to host it the way my late almost-aristocratic mother would have done 60 years ago: with fine china, starched linens, good silver, flowers, the lot. I am partly (well, mainly) motivated by a few snobbish remarks dropped by my daughter's father-in-law.

...Read more