DEAR ABBY: I lived with my mother, who passed away recently. I invited my cousins over to the house for Thanksgiving. One of them invited a cousin-in-law I had never met.
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When I woke from a nap, the cousin-in-law was here and asked me about our walk-in bathtub, which means that while I was asleep on my mother's bed, she had entered my mother's bedroom and private bathroom. I was flabbergasted.
She also asked to keep a program I showed her from Mom's service. I wanted to refuse (I still haven't sent programs to out-of-state friends and relatives and am unsure how many I may need), but I let her keep it.
Should I say something to let her know how inappropriate it was for her to give herself a tour of my home before she even met me? -- INVADED IN CALIFORNIA
DEAR INVADED: No, but you should absolutely say something to the cousin who invited a stranger to your Thanksgiving dinner without permission, and compounded it by leaving that person unsupervised while you slept. While you may not be able to teach either of them better manners, at least you will have made clear that you won't tolerate that kind of rudeness in the future.