Be More Charitable To Neighbor

Dear Miss Manners: My wife and I live in a fairly exclusive beach community. Recently a new couple moved into the area. It is normal for someone to ask, upon meeting a new arrival to the area, “Have you found a place yet?” or “Where are you living?” I am not sure anyone really cares, as we’re actually just making small talk.

Anyway, the female part of this couple would always answer, “We are building a 10,000 square-foot house on the beach.”

I have never heard anyone mention the size of the house that they were building, and I attribute her comment to a fragile ego. Unfortunately this has become something of a joke around the neighborhood - people will say, “Oh, there’s so and so. She’s building a 10,000 square-foot house on the beach.” I think this woman would be mortified to know that she is being mocked.

We recently received an invitation to her house-warming party, which specified that “sophisticated casual” dress was required. I found this unusual and pretentious. I could see specifying either formal or casual dress, but sophisticated casual?

I have two questions: If you treated someone as an object of derision, would you still attend their party? Am I wrong in thinking that this woman is being obnoxious in her specification of a dress code for her party?

Gentle Reader: We all have our little glossaries of words that make us snicker. For example, Miss Manners’ list includes referring to a neighborhood, especially one’s own, as being “exclusive.”

Truthfully, Miss Manners shares your distaste for “sophisticated casual,” although she understands why the phrase is used. It is not as unusual as you think. A number of such terms have cropped up because people can no longer be trusted to understand that informality has its standards, and not show up at a party in sweats.

While it is odd to announce the footage of one’s house to social acquaintances, Miss Manners is charitable enough to consider an explanation. Perhaps the lady unknowingly picked up the description after hearing it used, not improperly, by the builders or the zoning board in the course of their work.

Dare Miss Manners hope that you might become more charitable to your neighbor? Could you bring yourself to attend the party in the spirit of getting past your first impression enough to consider whether you mightn’t be able to like this couple?

If not, stay home in your own square footage. Attending a party for the purpose of sneering at the hostess is Miss Manners’ idea of more obnoxious behavior than the verbal crimes you cite.

Dear Miss Manners: While eating dinner at a restaurant - with a client, no less - I was subject to ridicule that I believe is completely unwarranted.

After I finished my main course, I arranged my knife and fork next to each other at the 4:20 clock position on the plate. The waiter came over and asked me whether I was finished, at which point the client exploded: “Don’t you know anything? When you have finished your meal, you’re supposed to turn your fork over (prongs down) to signal that you have finished.” She also said the knife and fork should be at an 8:20 position.

My father, who was in the Foreign Service, has drummed the 4:20 position thing into me since I was a kid. I have never, ever heard of turning over your fork to signal you are done with the meal. Who’s right?

Gentle Reader: What makes you think that people who ridicule their dinner companions know about etiquette?

As it happens, this one is wrong about the placement of eating utensils as well as in the more serious transgressions of sticking her nose in your plate to see what you are doing, and then subjecting you to embarrassment. Miss Manners is only relieved that it is not she who is representing us in our foreign service.