DEAR MISS MANNERS: Our organization is having a holiday open house. The agency will have food, desserts, etc., for the entire organization and family members. Our smaller unit will also serve light refreshments and beverages in our conference room.

Last year, people loaded up on the deli sandwiches and we were left with not enough. Is it appropriate for us to limit the sandwiches to two per member until everyone has been served? We never know from year to year how many to expect.

GENTLE READER: Telling people that they have a strict sandwich allotment is unlikely to have the desired effect of spreading holiday goodwill -- or of limiting the intake.

But one thing offices have is staff. Place someone at the table who can help fill the guests’ plates. This will not discourage everyone from coming back for seconds, but Miss Manners is confident it will discourage enough. And it will have the added benefit that it will make surveillance look gracious.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I love to bake interesting cakes from scratch, using high-quality ingredients. I enjoy serving them to friends and acquaintances I invite to my home.

Frequently, someone will ask for a piece to take home “for my husband” or another family member. I usually comply; however, I don’t wish to be supplying cake to people I didn’t invite. I may also have other plans for the remaining cake.

Is the requester rude to be asking for extra cake? How can I politely decline?

GENTLE READER: Your hostly duties do not include stocking the refrigerators of departing guests. Since you cannot, however, tell a guest she is being rude, Miss Manners recommends a hungry, “offstage” friend or relative of your own: “I’m so sorry. I already put Egbert to bed, but I imagine he was hoping for leftovers.”

DEAR MISS MANNERS: Our 10-story condominium building has a social committee, and one of their missions is to raise money for common area improvements. They are selling tickets for a home tour, where unit owners open their homes to display their designs and decorating sense.

We have a premium unit in the building, and it’s undergoing major renovations. We were asked if we would allow our unit to be on the tour. I politely declined.

My husband and I are private individuals who keep things to ourselves, and have no interest in letting strangers into our home, nor in having our home photographed. No one from the building has been in our unit, but many are aware of the scale of the renovation, and ask questions in the elevator. I am usually brief and downplay it.

Although I would like to support the cause and purchase tickets, I have no interest in going on the tour. My husband warned me that it might be perceived as “snobby” by the neighbors. What do you think?

GENTLE READER: That it will be perceived as snobby by the neighbors. However, neighbors who are inclined that way were going to draw the same conclusion if you went on the tour and even if you did display your extensive renovations. Miss Manners recommends you stay clear of the entire project and show your support by instead participating generously in the next, less sensitive project.

(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: I was trained, at the earliest possible age, that when exiting an elevator, my role as a male is to hold the door open in order to allow all female and elderly passengers to exit before me.

How would you propose my handling the situation where the lone woman in the elevator is standing with her back up against the wall with her face buried in her phone, oblivious to the fact that the elevator has arrived at its destination?

I have tried two approaches, both unsuccessful. Approach 1: I stand there holding the door open indefinitely, with the hope that she will notice that it’s time to exit the elevator. I have often stood there for a long time without any reaction. That leads me to attempt Approach 2: I say, “Excuse me, the elevator has arrived at the lobby.”

This has been met every single time with an annoyed response from the woman, who then takes her time to finish up her text message and huffs out the door. Neither approach is working.

GENTLE READER: Your duty is to enable the lady to disembark, not to make sure that she does. Just as you would not hold the door indefinitely for someone you know is getting off at a different floor, the lady in question can be abandoned after a reasonable pause.

Miss Manners realizes that this robs you of the pleasure of seeing her annoyance when she realizes that she has missed her floor, but it gets you on your way.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: When I was a kid, I was teased all the time about how tall I was. I didn’t know how to handle it, and just stayed quiet.

Well, after decades of not having to deal with it anymore, the other day, an elderly woman teased me about it. I don’t think she meant anything cruel by it, but it took me aback.

I didn’t know what to say. Is there some way of nicely saying that I don’t appreciate any comments about my height?

GENTLE READER: One of the benefits of growing up is an increasing sensitivity to the feelings of others and a diminishing sensitivity to their opinions. Unpleasant as it is to be reminded of the teasing of school days, Miss Manners hopes you can laugh off this rudeness. But, if not, a stern, silent look should be enough to demonstrate your displeasure.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: If an adult child is estranged from parents and one parent were to pass, how should that child be acknowledged in an obituary?

In this case there are three adult children but one has “left the fold.” There was a gradual exodus, but it is presently a complete estrangement, and I was thinking of other families who might be experiencing a similar situation.

GENTLE READER: The mention of children in obituaries is usually limited to a factual list of names. Those facts, Miss Manners notes, have not changed. And an obituary hardly seems the time to rehash old disagreements.

(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: Every year around this time, I find loads of people, online and off, arguing that gift cards are thoughtless gifts. I’m sick and tired of this debate and would like it to stop.

If a gift card is bought at a place someone actually shops at, I don’t see how it could possibly be thoughtless. Especially if it’s a store the giver themselves would normally not step foot in. For instance, there are stores that I despise, but if the person I’m getting the gift for loves them, then by gum, I’ll get them a gift card there and not force my favorite stores on them.

So-called “real” gifts can be incredibly thoughtless. The shirt that is too small to encourage the receiver to lose weight, for example. I’ve had many people give me things they know I hate, such as CDs of singers I would never listen to or DVDs of movies I’ve already said I cannot stand, and they try to bully and force me to like them. I’d much rather have a gift card, thank you.

People also need to consider that not everyone can spend hours shopping for the perfect gift. My mother, who is disabled, finally realized that it was just better to give gift cards because she can’t get around like she used to and many salespeople treat her terribly, simply because she’s in a wheelchair. One even made her cry after being extremely high-pressure while treating her as less than human.

So can we PLEASE put an end to this fight once and for all? Gift cards are not thoughtless -- unless you get it for a store the receiver hates, but you love.

GENTLE READER: What an appalling amount of nastiness you have experienced in connection with the supposedly kindly practice of exchanging presents.

Must you keep up the custom with horrid people who delight in giving you things you hate? Was that unspeakable clerk who insulted your mother reported to her superiors?

And now can we talk calmly about gift cards?

Yes, they are minimally more thoughtful than outright cash. But all you have done is to limit where the amount can be spent -- and sometimes when, because those cards may have expiration dates. Industry reports show that many go unused.

But Miss Manners wants to be helpful to you, and there are other options. It seems unlikely that you would know people’s shopping habits without knowing anything more important about them. It is only a small leap, then, to choosing something that might please each one -- and that is likely returnable, in case not. That is what thoughtfulness means.

Miss Manners would like to see more thoughtfulness applied to your mother’s situation. Can you help her shop, perhaps online? Can you and her other usual recipients acknowledge her situation to the extent of continuing to give her (thoughtful) presents while discouraging her from sending anything other than her good wishes?

DEAR MISS MANNERS: Is it presumptuous of me, as a retired, tenured professor, to use “emeritus” in my signatures?

GENTLE READER: Not in correspondence connected with your academic work. In a text to the pizza delivery service, yes.

(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.)