Mary Killen

Q. May I pass on a tip to readers? Now is the time of year to plant soft fruit bushes. Blackcurrants are a superfood and, if the berries are frozen, a few bushes will provide a whole family’s vitamin C needs throughout the winter of 2009. Think of the savings on supermarket juices. G.W., Wiltshire A. Thank you for this tip. Q. I am a member of a golf club that is considered to be one of the best in southern England and where non-members enjoy playing. Naturally, in addition to paying an annual subscription, there is a cost if one invites a guest to play. As is usual with this type of established club, the cost is not exorbitant.

Your problems solved Q. When my 16-year-old son has friends round I fill the fridge with beer for them. The other night, for example, ten boys came over. I know for a fact that only five of them really drink, yet after they had gone I found all 25 bottles had been opened and about ten left with just a couple of sips taken out of them. I think this is because the boys all want to pretend they drink but keep mislaying their bottles and opening another one. I had to throw all ten bottles away. In the credit crunch I would like to crack down on this waste but without seeming inhospitable. (My husband and I make ourselves scarce in the upstairs flat while these otherwise harmless parties are taking place.) What do you say, Mary? B.B., London SW12 A.

Q. Next week I will visit London where I have been invited to an exhibition in Cork Street by the artist Richard Foster. Since I understand he is one of the so-called Pinstripe Painters, I wonder if you can advise me whether it will be de rigueur to wear a pinstripe suit myself? I worry this may be thought bad taste in consideration of the current kerfuffle in the banking world. A. Pinstripe suits have long been controversial items but the reality is that they are worn, not by bankers, but almost exclusively by estate agents and theatricals. Neither, misleadingly, are they worn by the ‘so-called Pinstripe Painters’ (who also include country house painters Julian Barrow and Edmund Fairfax-Lucy).

Q. Last week I gave lunch to my dear goddaughter and her equally dear mother in a fashionable restaurant. Both my goddaughter and I were rendered speechless when her mother produced a plastic bottle of water from her handbag and commenced to swig from it. The situation was quickly remedied when we both upbraided her soundly and water was obtained from the management. My question is: what should we have done if we had not been in a position to be so frank with the swigger, given the live-forever industry’s continued insistence on the constant public overconsumption of this fluid? J.S., Goring Heath A. You would have calmly said to the offender, ‘Do let me have your water’, then decanted it into a glass without further ado.

Your problems solved Q. I am visited by my 30-year-old godson who, quite often, brings a girlfriend to stay for the weekend. As I live in the country and have a septic system, I would like to remind him not to flush prophylactics down the lavatory. I appreciate that people in my situation often choose to place a notice to this effect in the guest bathroom, but I fear that if I were to do this now it might be seen as accusatory. What do you suggest? M.H., Berry, NSW, Australia A. Even in Australia such a notice would be too explicit. Instead, arrange to receive a telephone call from a friend posing as a plumber shortly after the youth and girl next arrive to stay. Take the call in front of them, in full irritable mode. Say things like ‘When can you come and clear it?

Q. For her wedding present I gave my 28-year-old goddaughter a cheque, about five times the value that I would give to a mere family friend. I have now received a note from her which reads, ‘Thank you for the generous present. I hope you enjoyed the wedding...’ For some reason I feel that not enough gratitude has been expressed. How do I convey this without causing offence to her or to her parents, who are still my very close friends? Name and address withheld A. Some readers will be impressed that you received a letter at all, since so many twenty-somethings suffer from ‘entitlement syndrome’. All that will change, of course, in forthcoming months.

Your problems solved Q. When my husband retired two years ago I was pleased that I would no longer be obliged to be polite to his colleague, Bob. Now my husband says the reason he’s so restless at night is that he keeps having hectic action-adventure dreams featuring Bob. On holiday, Bob managed to infiltrate our room in Corsica. I don’t like Bob, Mary. How can I evict him from my bedroom? D.M., Cannes, France A. The dreams suggest that your husband stepped down too early and that the disturbing figure of Bob has become conflated with his former high-octane activities. He should now take up some part-time low-octane work. This would not only satisfy his continuing lust for the adrenalising thrill of achievement it would also present him with new colleagues.

Q. I have lived in Indochina for more than six years but I am still invited to various society weddings, exhibition openings, concerts and parties in London. Here in Cochinchina plenipotentiaries are kind enough to include me to garden parties on their national days and receptions when they have visiting dignitaries. Even my host government extends its welcome on occasion. My problem is, how to display these invitations in a house without fireplaces and therefore without mantelpieces? One doesn’t want it assumed that one has become a social pariah just because one lives overseas and it would be a shame if visiting friends failed to realise that I am a part of the English social scene.

Your problems solved Q. I have recently moved from New York to London to join my husband who is English and who works here. My problem is that when we are out together at, for example, early evening gallery openings or at the opera we often meet people my husband knows but who are new to me. Sometimes people will invite us to come and stay with them in the country or come to dinner. I am finding it very confusing to know what to say because my husband is always standing beside me smiling in so friendly a manner and nodding as though he wants to accept the invitation, but afterwards he says to me, ‘Why did you say yes? I really don’t want to go!

Q. I have just moved into a sizeable townhouse which also comprises a separately owned basement flat (occupied by a young family). The entrance to the flat is set half-below street/garden level round the side of our property and down some steps at the back. The house has not been occupied for several months and it would appear that the family in the basement flat had taken to using the garden during this period. The garden is unoccupied during the day as we are at work and belongs solely to the house. (The family below know this.) However, the family’s two young children continue to use the garden when we are out. Yesterday I was outside and the husband simply opened the gate, walked in, and politely asked if we would allow his children to use the garden during the summer holidays.

Q. I recently managed to put together a large party for a summer country-house opera at the Grange near Winchester. We decided not to picnic, but instead I had booked one of the private dining-rooms there. However, from past experience, it often happens that some guests will cancel at the last moment for one unforeseen reason or another. To avoid wasting the tickets and the dinners, this year I decided to ask some friends well in advance whether they wouldn’t mind going on the ‘standby’ list in case someone drops out. Most were flattered by my idea and agreed willingly. However, one said this was an insult and they didn’t want to have to arrange a babysitter for nothing. What do you think, Mary? Have I been insulting, or not? M.K., Mildenhall, Wiltshire A.

Q. My daughter has left her appalling husband and come to live with me while her new house is being made ready. Today a parcel arrived with the usual sort of impenetrable wrapping which needs to be cut through with secateurs. I attacked the packaging with gusto and threw it on to the fire. Only then did I see the delivery note which showed that the parcel was not for me but for my daughter. Inside was a battery-driven ‘erotic aid’. Clearly I cannot mortify my daughter by handing her the device, but nor can I repackage it and put it through the post again as it would then be postmarked from our part of the world — which is quite a remote little pocket of England. What should I do? Name and address withheld A.

Q. I am sorry this is anonymous, but I volunteered to write on behalf of a good friend — call her Anna Finch — who is terrified at the prospect of being identified in the small conservative village where she has lived for a dozen years. Here is the problem: when A.F. moved to the village and looked for a char she was advised to engage a treasure who had lived in the village all her life, was related to most of the inhabitants and had an encyclopaedic knowledge of all the local tradesmen. The arrangement has lasted ever since, but the treasure has gradually become a passenger and now appears to regard her position as one of permanent confidante and adviser. Virtually no work is being done.

Q. While staying for a weekend in a five-star Umbrian paradise south of Siena, you can imagine my horror when my breakfast partner recoiled at my pulling out my Baedeker on Siena. I always carry Baedeker when centreville-ing, but my companion expressed abject mortification and begged me to put it away. I consider myself to be a person of reasonably good lineage but did not realise it was bad form to have Baedeker in a public place. Can you rule, Mary? A. It depends on whether you are interested in posing as so entrenched an habitué of Siena that you do not need Baedeker or whether you are more interested in self-improvement.

Q. I have edited a selection of letters which is to be published later this summer. It is more than likely that, as part of the promotion process, I shall be asked to sign a copy here and there. However, it is not really my book, but that of the distinguished and, alas, departed correspondent. What is the protocol, Mary? Name and address withheld A. There is no need for you to feel so modest. You have had all the work of deciphering the letters, putting them into context, writing the footnotes. The book is your creation in that you are its midwife. It would be correct for you to sign it even if the person writing the letters was still alive — in which case you might jointly sign it. Imagine if Charlotte Mosley refused to sign the collection of Mitford letters she compiled.

Q. While staying in Gascony a local grandee, with a formidable brain and a château of great historical importance, was invited to dine. As dinner proceeded one of the two female houseguests seated next to him transmogrified herself from a kind, cosy, close and down-to-earth friend of mine, into a cross between Simone de Beauvoir, Françoise Hardy and some sort of Mata Hari. She poured (recently acquired) intellectual and musical opinions down the poor throat of the Frenchman while the other female friend, who also lives in an important house in England, was able to chat amiably and casually to this rather imposing guest. My hostess speaks perfect French and thus she too was able to exchange Proustian pleasantries. My presence went almost entirely unnoticed.

Q. I want to give a drinks party for 200 friends. The alcohol is within my budget. Most of my friends are recovering alcoholics and the others are too old to binge drink, but I have been quoted £30 a head for food. I do not want to pay £6,000 for, effectively, a few kilos of trussed up ingredients in exotic sauces. Most people will be going out to dinner afterwards in any case. What is the solution, Mary? I do not want to seem mean. N.S.C.C., London W14 A. Status canapés have become the norm at smart parties but your guests may well be grateful if you do not tempt them and add to their calorific intake. Satisfy their expectations instead by providing only the illusion that there is food at the party.

Q. I travel frequently to Cape Town where I have a house. I always fly in business class or sometimes in first class. I wonder when it is permissible as opposed to rude to put up the barrier between me and a total stranger in the seat next door during the 11.5 hours flight? J.L., London SW10 A. It is generally accepted that all first and business class passengers want mental privacy during the flight but there are two schools of thought regarding the etiquette of achieving this. One frequent-flying über-alpha of my acquaintance holds that, ‘It is always appropriate to put up the barrier.

Q. I am in despair because I am growing fatter and fatter with every week that passes. I seem to have developed the most enormous appetite and now want roughly double what I used to eat. I have had all the relevant medical checks done privately and there is nothing wrong with me other than what my doctor calls ‘straightforward greed’. I have been to three clinics/spas already this year but each time I come out I start gorging again. One of the problems is that I work at home. The other is that I know for a fact that Weight Watchers is the only method which has worked for me in the past but these days I am what is called ‘high profile’, so it would not be advisable for me to rock up at meetings.

Q. I have started receiving regular emails from a very old friend inviting me to avail myself of the services of the wealth management company in which he is a partner. Since I am penniless, and from the uncharacteristically humour-free tenor of these letters, I can tell that I was never meant to be a recipient, and that my email address has somehow osmosed from his personal contacts to his customer database. That other, equally impecunious old friends have received the same letters would seem to confirm this. But we know that pointing out that our respective net worths preclude us from becoming his clients would greatly embarrass him (he is painfully sensitive to issues of etiquette), as would simply asking him to remove us from his business mailing list. What would you suggest, Mary?