YOUR PROBLEMS SOLVED
Dear Mary. . .
Q. Your problem from D.L. (3 October), Whose telephone line had been mistaken for a fax line, gave me food for thought. The other day I wanted to speak to my brother on the telephone, but couldn't face speaking to his wife first if she answered. One cannot just hang up. So I 'simply', as You would say, went to my office fax and dialled his home number. When my broth- er's wife answered I pressed the transmit button. The high-pitched beep, as fax-users Will know, precludes conversation. There is therefore no way of identifying who is try- ing to get through. On the third try, my brother himself answered the phone saying, Oh good, it's you, some damn fool has been trying to send a fax through to us.' I offer you this solution to a problem that many of your readers are bound to have come up against in their own lives.
G.S., Stamford in the Vale 4. Thank you for your considerate letter.
Q: On a crowded table in a restaurant or dining-room where a large number of glass- es are cluttered, and become increasingly SO as the merriment continues, I often get confused as to which is my own particular glass. Have you any ideas about how I can keep a check on it? F.P., SW! A. As a general rule, it is probably a safe bet that your own glass will be the one clos- est to you. But why not take a tip from style leader, Isabella Blow, a member of Vogue's staff, and mark your glass for good by wear- ing an indelible lipstick in an extremely dis- tinctive shade? This ensures that her own glass remains marked come hell or high water. The stain may even survive a cycle in the washing machine, thus enabling hosts to produce the same glass for her next visit and providing a comforting sense of continuity.
Q. I recently went to stay the weekend with old friends in the country whom I do not see nearly enough. On my arrival on Satur- day 1 was told I'd been asked to drinks before Sunday lunch with a neighbour. I immediately expressed horror at the thought of having to make polite conversa-
tion on a Sunday morning. Then, to make matters worse, at breakfast on Sunday I was told we had all been asked to tea at the house of a particularly strident woman and her husband. Since I'd already had to endure their company at dinner on the Sat- urday, I visibly balked over my coffee. I felt I'd made the effort to go to the country to see my friends, not to fraternise with the local grandees. What tactful excuses should I have thought up to gracefully decline the morning drinks and afternoon tea?
Name and address withheld.
A. There would have been no point in your declining these invitations since your week- end hosts were going anyway and you would thereby have seen even less of them. One of the things that friendship is based on is the discussion of mutual acquain- tances and, no doubt, your hosts felt at the back of their minds that these outings would only have served to intensify your own friendship as you 'bitched' about the people afterwards. When planning future visits to these friends, however, you might pre-empt excessive socialising by saying, `I'd so love to come and spend a quiet weekend with you in the country — I've been having such an exhausting time that it will be bliss to not have to socialise.'
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