DEAR MISS MANNERS: My colleague and I are perplexed about a set of napkins she has purchased. In one corner of each napkin, there is what appears to be a buttonhole.

Neither of us has ever seen this on a napkin, and we were puzzling over what its use might be. A horrifying possibility occurred to us -- could it be that the manufacturer intends the buttonhole to be used to secure the napkin to the uppermost button on a diner's shirt?

GENTLE READER: Miss Manners is sorry to inform you that your horrified guess is correct. Contrary to what our parents and grandparents told us, the world was not perfectly behaved before our generation came along and spoiled everything. The napkins were incorrect then, and there were also sloppy eaters who were indifferent to that fact.

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DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am a writer, and occasionally my publisher sends me on book tours. I am struck by how many people, fellow travelers, expected me to tell them all about myself simply because we happened to be sitting together on an airplane, in a restaurant or in a waiting area.

"What are you doing here in Orlando?" they ask, and if I give a friendly but vague and brief answer, they continue to ask questions until they have my whole life story out of me.

It happens over and over! I was almost -- but not quite -- rude the last time, but it didn't work anyway: A gentleman in a restaurant ended up demonstrating to me his new Palm device, including taking out the folding keyboard and explaining how everything worked.

I've tried subtly aghast facial expressions; I've answered, "I'm here on personal business." Nothing works.

I'm a friendly individual, but often, especially when traveling, I like to be alone and anonymous. Once you tell someone you write novels, they have to know everything about you, and then they quite often have to tell you all about themselves. Do you have any advice for me?

GENTLE READER: You already have all the advice you need, from your publisher and television and radio hosts. All you need to do is to turn it upside down.

As Miss Manners trusts they have been telling you, you should never give monosyllabic answers to on-the-air questions, but use them to chatter on in an animated fashion. In-the-air questions may be handled in the opposite way. If your replies are all "Yes," "No, and "Huh?" (that last asked rhetorically before you excuse yourself to return to your book or nap), your rating as a conversationalist will plummet to the point that you will have to be dropped.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My parents taught me to write thank-you notes, and so I am prompt about sending them when my friends or family send gifts or act as my host. However, as I have grown older I have noticed that friends of my own age are much better at sending thank-you notes to me than my own elder relatives. I don't think age should be the excuse, because one relative I can think of who is diligent about thank-you notes is 92 years old! (My mother, of course, always sends me thank-you notes.)

I have read lots of letters in your column from people who complain that their younger relatives do not send thank-you notes. Ironically, those are the relatives who do not trouble themselves to express their own thanks to me.

My uncle says that as the younger generation, I am subordinate to them and they have done so much for me that thanks for anything I may do for them isn't really necessary.

Is there some rule of rank that if the gift is from a younger relative, you don't have to send a note? I know they have done a lot for me, but I would like at least an acknowledgement that my gifts were received. (A lot of my relatives live out of town.)

GENTLE READER: No, there is no such rule. Politeness is not a commodity that can be dropped once you have filled your quota.

However, there is a restraining order out against your uncle, barring him from making etiquette pronouncements. Miss Manners knows, because she just issued it.

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DEAR MISS MANNERS: My husband and I were walking down the street when a man and his friend in a truck drive by and started whistling at me, leering and catcalling. I looked at my husband and he said nothing and ignored it. And I was furious.

I am an attractive woman and have only been married about a year and a half. I have always been subject to unwanted sexual advances and catcalls. I had thought that by being married and in the presence of my husband that I would be somewhat protected, but that appears not to be the case.

Most men would take offense that other men were referring to their spouses in such a demeaning manner and at LEAST say something. I know that I take offense at being referred to in such a demeaning manner.

Should I have been angry at my husband for not sticking up for me? Was he right to ignore them so as not to start a fight? Should I feel hurt that he felt that his (maybe our, but I'm not so sure) safety was more important than my virtue?

GENTLE READER: Let us hope that your virtue was not in question. Only you can lose it, for example by chasing after truck drivers, in which case nothing your husband could do would help.

Had these people confronted you directly, you would be right to expect your husband to protect you -- although whether he chose to do so by taking on a fight where he was outnumbered two to one, or by removing you from danger, would be a matter of judgment.

But as Miss Manners keeps trying to tell the road-rage crowd, drive-by insults must be ignored, as they cannot be safely redressed. As it happens, that is also the correct way for both ladies and gentlemen to deal with catcalls and other street insults.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My toddler son is cute. Incredibly cute. The kind of cute that makes people point him out to friends in crowded stores, that makes people follow us around asking, "What movie have I seen him in?" and that makes total strangers give him their snack foods.

The problem is when parents of other children come up to me and tell me how cute he is. For me to simply say "thank you" always seems to me to imply, "I have nothing nice to say about your child in return."

But the fact is, across a crowded bus, you notice that a child is cute. But you can't notice that a child is artistic, musical, well-spoken or talented in a myriad other ways. What is the proper response to such a compliment?

GENTLE READER: "Thank you. Your child is adorable."

But wait! Yours is so much more so! Wouldn't returning the compliment be a lie, and wouldn't the other parent know you were lying?

Not at all, Miss Manners assures you. Children are basically adorable by definition, which is why society is expected to put up with so many uneducated and unproductive people. And all parents believe their own to be incredibly cute, which is why they put up with them.

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