Q. Have you any ideas on how to deal with recurrent offenders in the party-present line? I have an old and intimate friend who always brings a present almost insultingly slight, but, more seriously, also invariably well past its sell-by date. One small jar of pickle was two years too old. Other old friends contributed to an important birthday bash a splendidly packaged bottle of whisky which on opening turned out to have been half-consumed. My view has always been that these little trials must be borne in silence (and with gratitude for being given anything at all); obviously to retaliate with out-of-date or used goods would be simply to earn a reputation for meanness oneself. But perhaps there are ways of getting one’s own back, or at least letting these people know they have been rumbled?
Name and address withheld
A. Many readers will sympathise with the bumbling, possibly short-sighted characters who have almost certainly given you these dodgy presents unintentionally. As Woody Allen has noted, ‘Eighty per cent of success is just turning up.’ It is quite a palaver to arrange babysitters, transport, self-grooming etc, and get oneself to a party on time, let alone find an acceptable present to bring along after having no time to go shopping. So you should forgive the recurrent offenders and at least be grateful for their presence, if not their presents.
Q. My name begins with A and, as a consequence, I constantly receive calls from friends who do not use the keypad lock facility and whose mobiles ring me by mistake as I am the first name in their contacts list. My line is blocked for hours by people who are out riding and have sat on their phones, others who are shopping and have crammed their phones into the bottom of their bags and then dropped something on top which causes the phone to ring me.
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