DEAR ABBY: My husband and I live and work in a delightful resort town. Lately, we have noticed a trend among our friends and family who are traveling to our town. Instead of calling in advance, many of them call us on the day they hope to see us. In the last two weeks, it has happened three times.
These are people we like and would enjoy seeing, but we work full-time and we usually need a little more advance notice.
We know our friends make plans well in advance to book airline reservations, so we're baffled that they don't contact us while they are making their travel plans. What can we say when our friends call hoping to see us and then are disappointed when we already have plans? -- BEACH DWELLERS IN CALIFORNIA
DEAR BEACH DWELLERS: Tell them that you are disappointed, too, and the next time they plan to be in the area to please call sooner because you make your plans in advance and can't cancel the ones you already have.