YOUR PROBLEMS SOLVED
Dear Mary.. .
Q. May I pass on a tip to readers? When we go out to dinner locally, rather than hiring a baby-sitter for the night, we save the money by bringing our seven-year-old son tucked up in a sleeping bag in our hatch- back and park as near to the window of our host's dining-room as possible. He settles down happily with a torch and a book, we lock him in, and if anything goes wrong he sounds the horn until we come out! He absolutely adores this and sleeps like a log.
P.E., Sanderson, Wilts A. Thank you for your letter. Clearly this is an ideal solution when one is dining with friends in quiet Wiltshire villages. It would not work so successfully were you to use it when visiting friends on 'sink estates' or in the Piccadilly area of London.
Q. My husband and I suspect our nanny and her boyfriend of sleeping in our bed when we are away at weekends. We have no evi- dence — the sheets seem exactly the same as before we left, but I think she swaps them with others, then whips the originals back in time for our return — just a strong sense that one's privacy has been invaded. We are fond of the dear girl but she is only 19 and 19-year-olds do not realise how unpleasant such intrusion is for grown-ups. How do you suggest we catch her out, Mary?
P.C.O., London SW3 A. Arrange for a neighbour whose premises back on to your own to burst into the house one Monday morning at a pre-arranged time when Nanny will be present. Cackling lewdly, Dick Emery-style, she should wag her finger at you and say, `Aha! I've caught you out! There was a man in your bedroom at the weekend and it certainly wasn't your husband, you naughty girl!'
Q. Re. p.v. pronunciations. Wine pronuncia- tions are a real minefield, particularly where French names end in 'as' (as in Mas de Dau- mas Gassac and Gigondas) where, as you and `P.B.' (18 April) recognise, the various usages of ass and arse are complicated by the possibility of an 'All' alternative. (Incidental- ly, I wonder why the word 'arsenal' has never caught on as the complement to urinal in that area of activity.) C.J.W.M., London SW6 A. Thank you for your letter. This joke has made me very happy.
Q. Which new puddings are fashionable?
C.C., London SW7 A. Most people's palates are primed for a sugar-based experience at the end of a lunch or dinner but although treacle tarts and other examples of cardiac cuisine are rebelliously served in fashionable houses, the temptation can inflict a sense of guilt on those guests whose physiques are over- sized but who nevertheless succumb. One good alternative is the mango ice-cream ball coated in cold chocolate and presented lollipop-style on the end of a cocktail stick, served free as a kind of post-prandial bonne bouche at the new Leith's restaurant in Soho's Beak Street.
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