DEAR MISS MANNERS: I used to be invited by a pal who works in our state’s governor’s workplace to attend a school soccer sport within the college president’s field.
This can be a nationally acknowledged college, however not an Ivy League college.
On the sport, the president requested me what school I had attended, then gave me a condescending stare after I named the college (which I attended over 50 years in the past). My alma mater is a state college, not not like his establishment, and it was all I may afford on the time.
He then proceeded to right my grammar on one thing else I had mentioned. It was an odd, technical correction, and I feel my phrases mirrored my regional dialect reasonably than any misuse of the English language. Nonetheless, it stunned me and felt very awkward.
I didn’t reply to his feedback, however as a substitute thanked him for permitting me to go to his field, after which walked away. I used to be embarrassed for the pal who had introduced me, who saved apologizing to me.
Since this has by no means occurred earlier than, and I get pleasure from attending school soccer video games every time supplied, I wish to know the way Miss Manners would have dealt with this.
GENTLE READER: For what’s the college acknowledged nationally? Tolerating a president with nothing higher to do than embarrass a visitor? Is that his method for charming alumni and donors?
Miss Manners would have dealt with the state of affairs precisely as you probably did. And doubtless suggested her younger kinfolk to use elsewhere.
DEAR MISS MANNERS: Ought to pie a la mode be served on a plate with a fork, or in a bowl with a spoon?
I’m all the time pissed off when I’m served a dessert topped with a scoop of ice cream on a flat plate with a fork. The ice cream invariably melts and is unimaginable to eat, particularly if the pie is heat!
Once I recommend that it ought to be served in a bowl with a spoon, I’m informed that isn’t how pie ought to be served. What says Miss Manners?
GENTLE READER: That the fork and spoon should not like a pair who had a nasty divorce and are forcing their associates to decide on between them. Relatively, they’re like a pair who ought to be invited collectively, until there’s an apparent motive to ask solely one in all them.
For individuals, such an event may be a women’ spa day, the place the husband wouldn’t be invited. Within the case of flatware, the analogous dish may be ice cream alone, the place the fork could be superfluous. (Miss Manners will chorus from the case of ice cream forks, as a result of she hasn’t seen a number of them round these days.)
So each fork and spoon ought to be offered when the dessert has each gooey and dry parts. They might be used individually or collectively, with the fork within the left hand and the spoon in the proper. You would possibly need to eat the ice cream earlier than it collapses, since you ought to, certainly, use a plate for pie — to keep away from squishing it right into a bowl.
Please ship your inquiries to Miss Manners at her web site, www.missmanners.com; to her e mail, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or via postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas Metropolis, MO 64106.
