Dear Mary…
Q. While at a party at which I knew only the host, I made the mistake of trying to enter a group by laughing at a joke that I had not heard. Although rather silly, this would have been fine had the man standing next to me not asked what the joke was, as he had not heard. Dumbstruck with horror, I affected a coughing fit in order to escape. Please guard me against this terrifying situation with your advice as to what I should have done.
C.W., Edinburgh
A. You should have replied, ‘Sorry, I can’t help you. I wasn’t actually laughing at whatever joke was being told there, I’m afraid I didn’t hear it. I just couldn’t help laughing when I saw the man telling it, because he is so like someone else I find tremendously funny.
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