DEAR MISS MANNERS: Is it considered impolite to tie the string of one’s tea bag around the teacup? I usually do this to prevent the string and tag from falling into the tea. Whenever I drink tea at my friend’s home, however, she gets terribly annoyed by this.

GENTLE READER: The presence of the tea bag at all indicates an informal, perhaps family, meal. This broadens the options for disposing of the bag to include placing it on the side of the saucer or empty plate, or excusing oneself to the kitchen to toss it in the trash or park it in an agreed-upon spot for later reuse.

So long as your method does not result in the bag landing on your lap when you go to drink, Miss Manners has no objection. If the hostess does, she is free to provide a different method of disposal, or a proper teapot.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: Our son asked my husband and me what we could contribute to his wedding. We told him we could host the rehearsal dinner with a budget of $2,500, but if the bill is more than that, he would need to cover it. We are retired and living on a fixed income.

My son and his fiancee travel lavishly and frequently, and both have excellent incomes. He became upset with us because he didn’t think we were inquiring enough about their wedding plans, and thinks we are waiting for the wedding to fall through. He also asked if there was any more we could contribute, such as hosting the bar at the reception.

He said he and his fiancee did not like our restaurant choice for the rehearsal dinner, but we know she would not approve of any choice we made. He has had to amend and add more to the engagement ring, and she is not satisfied with the engagement photos he paid for.

Bridezilla mentality has been the gist of their relationship: If he doesn’t do what she wants, she is not happy, and will leave. In all this time, she has never been friendly to us or our other son, and will go out of her way to avoid us. We were threatened to be cut from the wedding altogether, and from future contact with grandchildren, before they were even engaged.

If we are not able to choose a place we’d like to host the rehearsal dinner, our next thought is to contribute $1,500 to wherever they want to host it and that’s it. We don’t know where to go from here.

GENTLE READER: Unseemly as is the behavior of the lucky couple, offering them more control at a lower cost is neither graceful, nor likely to be effective. What you want, however unlikely it seems, is to make them happy and grateful -- in your debt figuratively, not literally.

Miss Manners would not exclude a change of venue to please them, if it can be done within the budget. But she suggests you be extremely clear with the venue that any alterations called in by the couple must be cleared with you prior to implementation.

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)

DEAR MISS MANNERS: A popular lunchtime meal is soup in a bread bowl: a small, round loaf of sourdough bread that has its center carved out and filled with soup, often clam chowder.

The etiquette problem comes when you have finished the soup portion. Are you then supposed to use a little plastic knife and fork to cut up the bread? Metal utensils are usually not available at establishments that sell this type of meal. Or is tearing it apart with your pinkies aimed skyward permissible? Sourdough bread is tasty, and it seems a waste to leave it behind.

GENTLE READER: The purveyors of bread bowls are not the first etiquette wags to entertain themselves by making the guests eat the packaging. Ice cream cones are a summertime example, while desserts served in edible marzipan cups date to at least the 18th century. The proper -- indeed, the only -- procedure is to consume the container in a way that does not leave the contents all over one’s clothes.

In the case of a bread bowl, this can be done after the soup is finished either with real utensils (i.e., not plastic) or hands, depending on the formality of the meal. Miss Manners would not attempt to cut soup-soaked bread with a plastic knife even if she owned a skirt with a clam chowder pattern.

But please stop making cracks about pinkies. As a practical way of holding a hot, handleless china cup in the 18th century, it is an anachronistic way to suggest snobbery.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I contributed to a group gift for a friend. Two of us contributed only monetarily, while the third person also purchased the items and delivered them. When the gift was dropped off, it was made clear to the recipient that it was from the three of us.

As of yet, I have not received any acknowledgment of the gift, unless you include a forwarded email wherein the giftee profusely thanked the person who delivered the gift, but did not mention myself or the other person. While I understand 99% of the gift entailed shopping and delivering, I still feel as though myself and the second gift-giver should be acknowledged.

This has happened to me in the past, with a wedding gift where my contribution was much higher. I was embarrassed to think the wedding couple did not think I gave them a gift, but let it slide without saying anything.

In this case, I would like the giftee to know I cared enough to think of them. How should I approach this? And, for the future, is there a way to ensure this doesn’t happen again, aside from refraining from group gifts?

GENTLE READER: Every gift-giver is entitled to a letter of thanks. But Miss Manners says this with slightly less than her usual conviction, having noticed that your own effort was reduced to writing a check.

Her solution is to assume that the giftee made no such observation, but perhaps missed your contribution because of the extremely informal way in which it was communicated. Ask the purchaser to correct the misassumption, and next time, arrange to include handwritten cards from each of the donors.

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)

DEAR MISS MANNERS: In the “olde days,” I would receive emails in which I was addressed as “Dear Dr. X,” which indicated a level of formality, and the use of “Dear” did not denote any romantic implications. I also used the “Dear” salutation in my emails to other people. (I’m a college professor, by the way.)

Lately, however, I’m receiving emails addressed as “Hi, (First Name),” which, though it eliminates any romantic implications from the use of the word “dear,” strikes me as inappropriately casual for a business setting.

Is this now the proper, accepted salutation that people use in business emails? Should I be using “Hi, Miss Manners” or “Dear Miss Manners” in the salutations of my business emails and printed letters?

GENTLE READER: Let us remain on dear terms, please. It is true that those who believe in universal informality and can’t stop messing with conventions now use “Hi” as a salutation, even professionally. Miss Manners does not consider that a reason for more dignified people to succumb.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: A distant cousin invited my entire branch of the family to his wedding, except for me. I assume this to be an innocent mistake, because we don’t have enough of a relationship for him to have a grudge against me. Since I wouldn’t have been able to travel to the wedding destination on the weekend in question, I didn’t see any reason to try to correct the mistake.

At the wedding, my grandmother figured out that I hadn’t been invited and made a snarky comment to the mother of the groom. A few days later, my cousin and his mother angrily asked me why I didn’t tell them about the missing invitation, insisting that they had intended to invite me all along.

I was taken aback by this confrontation and apologized immediately, but the apology leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Did I owe them an apology? If not, how could I have responded gracefully?

GENTLE READER: Your cousin’s behavior does not pass Miss Manners’ sniff test.

It is ridiculous to expect the supposed recipient to report the absence of an unheralded invitation. Rather than apologizing, you might reasonably have asked how you were supposed to know it had been sent.

But the bigger giveaway is their response. People whose mail goes astray may get angry at the postal service, but not at the would-be recipient. And they turn apologetic, rather than demanding apologies.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I live in the South, where it is apparently acceptable behavior to ask someone on even the slightest acquaintance what church they attend.

Miss Manners, I do not attend church in the traditional sense. I follow an Earth-based spiritual path that, in centuries previous, led to followers being hanged, burned at the stake and drowned.

I do not wish to impart this information to those asking me the above question. I have not been able to formulate an acceptable answer. What would Miss Manners suggest?

GENTLE READER: Well, that description does sound like an effective conversation-stopper, but Miss Manners agrees that it is just as well not to use it. That phrase about “not in the traditional sense” is a lot better, but it would be good to turn the question around and allow the questioner to extol the virtues of his or her church.

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)