Miss Manners^®

DEAR MISS MANNERS: What is a polite response when you ask someone for help and they say no?

You know they are capable of helping; you first ascertained they weren't busy; you explained there is no hurry, etc. I have strong, angry, sarcastic conversations inside my head and end up doing the task myself.

These are minor, simple chores or things that need fixing. And these are adults I am asking, not children.

GENTLE READER: It depends on the nature of the request. A friend refusing to clean out your garage must be answered as if you believed in their desire to do so, and in whatever excuse is offered.

A spouse who refuses to empty the dishwasher while you are making the children's lunches can be treated with measured impatience.

A cousin who is unwilling to help get you out of the hole you fell into has no right to complain if your screams attract wider attention.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My wife and I got married five years ago and have two children: One is 3 and the other is 1 1/2. We have many older friends whose children have grown up and moved out.

We have been invited to parties at some of those friends' houses, and, as we cannot really afford a sitter, we have brought our kids with us. This is usually received with comments such as, "I see you brought the little terrors with you."

I feel that this is a very rude thing to say. I do not know a polite way to respond that also clearly says that I love my children and do not appreciate them being insulted. How should I respond?

GENTLE READER: Insulting your children is certainly rude, although Miss Manners notices you conveniently skipped over your own rudeness in bringing them where they were not invited. (Otherwise, why offer the justification of exorbitant child care costs?)

There would be no need to respond had the original conversation gone something like: "I'm so sorry -- we would love to attend, but there is no way we are going to be able to get a sitter, so we have to decline."

"Oh, please bring the little ones along! We would love to see them."

"Well, if you are sure it won't be a bother, we are happy to accept."

Failing that, you could have enjoyed a pleasant evening at home with your beloved children.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am hosting a small dinner gathering next week. One of my guests called me to say that her friends, a married couple, might be interested in being invited. I don't know these people and I find it inappropriate, to say the least, of my guest to suggest this to me. What to reply?

GENTLE READER: "Unfortunately, I've already issued the invitations for next week, but we'd be delighted to meet your friends another time. Perhaps you will put us together at one of your dinners."

(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: Being blown off for meetings, including my one-on-ones, has taken the wind out of my sails, professionally.

My supervisor is routinely late to our team meetings and even ghosts them at least weekly, typically without explanation. And when she joins late, it's almost as if she considers her arrival the actual start time, resulting in meetings going over. Many of us feel pressure to stay while also needing to be elsewhere.

I'm pretty new to this office, and to me, this is a very bad sign about how the company values (or doesn't value) its staff and their time. Any suggestions for handling this situation that won't get me admonished by the supervisor?

GENTLE READER: The way to manage the boss is to bring her a problem for her to manage: "I realize you are swamped, which is why you can't make all these meetings. What should we do? Do you want us to reschedule, or should we go ahead without you? The meetings that run late are causing us to miss appointments with clients -- for those, should people just leave when they need to?"

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I went out to dinner with a friend and he did something so odd and unappetizing when eating soup: He put a spoonful of soup in his mouth, then squirted some of it out (as a baby would), then scraped that excess soup from his lips with the spoon and loaded it in again.

He did this over and over until the bowl was empty. It was as though he was both the baby being fed and the parent feeding the baby.

He's a dear friend, and I'm not sure if I should say something to him. I'm afraid it'll embarrass him and could cause him to become defensive or even unfriend me. But I hate to think what other people are thinking of him when they see him eat soup. He goes out for meals frequently with clients and friends.

Should I keep it to myself, knowing I'm maybe not being the best friend? Or point it out and take the real chance of losing his friendship? I'm torn.

GENTLE READER: Ew. Still, correcting another person's manners is rude.

This is not to say there are no circumstances in which a higher duty would take precedence. Were your friend sloshing his alcohol, rather than his soup, while making unwanted advances to the waitstaff, Miss Manners could see a duty to intervene.

But in the case you cite, the proper course is to move out of immediate range and not watch.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: Are funerals for the deceased or for the bereaved?

If a family member disagrees about the manner of the service, should that supersede the wishes of the deceased? Should someone make their own funeral/burial plans, knowing the family will be upset, or should they just not bother since they will never know the outcome anyway?

GENTLE READER: Better to ask who is in charge. To that question, Miss Manners answers that the principal mourner is in charge -- usually a spouse -- for right or wrong. It is safe to assume that the deceased would prefer some aspects of the service being not quite right to a distracting public struggle over the body.

(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 at an art show with my husband and mother-in-law that featured a 19th-century female artist. A brochure was given to us at entry that listed the artist's name as "Mrs. John Smith," with no first name given.

As an avid art lover and a feminist, I was taken aback, and said as much to the others. They both defended the practice, saying that that was the name she used when she was alive and that the writer of the brochure probably felt they were honoring her by using her husband's name.

I would have been grateful had my husband been willing to hear me out as to why this offended me, but he wasn't interested. Both he and his mother shut me down.

How should I have handled this -- should I have kept my mouth shut? Also, did the use of the artist's husband's name honor her, or should the writer have been more cognizant of today's sensibilities?

GENTLE READER: Shouldn't you be more cognizant of past practices if you hope to understand a show featuring art from a past era?

Miss Manners can sympathize with your relatives in thinking it tedious to hear people from previous eras being condemned for not practicing the 21st century's etiquette conventions.

In the 19th century, the construction "Mrs. John Smith" was so conventional that few people thought of it as either insulting the wife or honoring the husband. One who did was the feminist and abolitionist Lucy Stone, who kept her birth name after her 1855 marriage. But the Lucy Stone League, created in Stone's name to encourage other women to follow suit, was not founded until 1921, and the older convention generally persisted well into the 20th century.

Women in the arts at that time tended to use their married surnames, usually with their own given names. But few theatergoers would have recognized the name of Beatrice Rose Stella Tanner, although she was one of the most celebrated actresses of her day. She chose to be billed as Mrs. Patrick Campbell, even after the frequently absent Mr. Campbell was long dead and she had married someone else.

What the writer of the show's literature was respecting was not the subject's husband, but a woman's choice of her own name.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: When a birthday celebrant invites you to be part of their celebration by going on a cruise of their choice, is it normal now for the invited to be required to pay their own expenses -- i.e., getting to the cruise ship plus the cruise itself?

I have had two such invitations recently, and had to regrettably decline because I cannot afford that type of expense.

GENTLE READER: These celebrants are not inviting you; they are suggesting that you vacation with them. It being their birthdays does not obligate you any more than if they had asked if you wanted to go hiking with them on your summer holiday.

All you need do is decline, expressing regret, but not your reason. Oh, and Miss Manners reminds you to add your wishes for their happy birthdays and voyages.

(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.)