DEAR MISS MANNERS: Is one obligated to participate in the principal activity at a party to which one is invited?

A couple of friends often host hot-tub parties, where all hot-tub bathing is totally nude. I am open-minded and have no objection to others getting into the hot tub together, but I have no desire to join strangers or even some friends in the hot tub myself.

But quite a bit of socializing goes on at the parties outside of the hot tub, and I enjoy that aspect of the parties very much.

The hosts have indicated that no one is required to doff his clothes and jump in, but I wonder. I would very much like to attend the parties and socialize outside of the hot tub. If one were invited to a dinner party, I suppose one would be expected to eat. But if one is invited to a hot-tub party is it socially acceptable to enjoy the party fully clothed and out of the tub?

GENTLE READER: This is not exactly like tagging along on a ski weekend when the only sports you practice are reading and rum toddies. Or going along on a picnic and saying, "Oh, I'd just like to watch" when the touch football game starts.

Miss Manners can think of no respectable social activity in which some people are clothed and others are not. Unless your friends give two-tiered parties, so to speak, where clothed guests gather elsewhere while naked guests are in the tub, you should decline.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My husband received an invitation to his ex-wife's wedding. The invitation was addressed only to him. He is considering going, and I am hurt that he would honor and support an event of this nature that excludes me.

My husband says people have the right to invite whomever they want to their wedding, and if his ex-wife or anyone else does not like me they probably have a good reason for it. He says he should maintain a good relationship with these people (the kids are all grown). He does not "hang out" with them socially at all. It isn't that I really want to go to the wedding. I feel that leaving my name off the invitation was very rude, and my husband is supporting his ex-wife's rudeness to me. Feelings aside, what is the proper etiquette for inviting a married person to a wedding? Is it appropriate to invite an ex-spouse who has been remarried for over 13 years and not invite his wife?

GENTLE READER: In your place, Miss Manners would be more concerned about that comment of your husband's that "they probably have a good reason" for not liking you. Unless his explanation is "because the contrast is so unfavorable to her," both of you should stay home, worrying not about other people's marriages, but your own.

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DEAR MISS MANNERS: Please advise on this ongoing controversy regarding how one eats raw fruit: apples, pears, peaches, etc. Shall one simply hold the fruit in the hand and eat of it, like Eve partaking of the forbidden, or is it more mannerly to slice off segments with a knife?

I prefer to the latter way, and point out that whenever we see a still-life painting, there is always a knife.

GENTLE READER: Eve lived in a garden. Still life paintings generally have tables in them.

What Miss Manners is trying to tell you is that, in this case, how depends on where. At the table, the fruits you mention are eaten with fork and knife; without a table, you would only succeed in cutting yourself, so they are finger food.

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DEAR MISS MANNERS: What do you do about friends who call from cell phones in grocery lines (I can hear the cash register), the lingerie department in a department store, or stuck in traffic (I can hear the honking)? I find it so rude and impersonal. I often feign a lie and say, "I'm sorry, we have a bad connection. When will you be home and I'll call you?" What do you suggest?

GENTLE READER: Having long maintained that the annoyances generated by cellular telephones are covered under long-standing etiquette rules, Miss Manners is compelled to declare a new rule.

It is not about creating noise that disturbs others; that one was covered. So is ignoring the people you are with, doing business during social events, and a host of other uses that drive people so crazy that they hurl invectives at an instrument that -- when properly used -- is a great convenience.

The new rule is: Stop using your telephone to bore other people every time you happen to be bored.

It is true that life offers a lot of downtime -- waiting in line, taking transportation -- that can be spent making calls, as long as it does not constitute rudeness toward those in the vicinity. That is no excuse, however, for making idle calls -- ones that serve no purpose to either party and would not be made if you had anything better to do.

Your solution is a fine one. It is not a lie to say that the connection is a bad one -- the personal connection is, even if the telephonic one is not.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I live in Amsterdam and an acquaintance from college who I am friendly with (e-mail contact, lunch together when we are in the same city) lives in London.

She e-mailed two days before she was coming into the city saying that she was accompanying her husband on a business trip but was coming two days early to spend more time in the city. She wanted to have some hotel and restaurant recommendations and let it be known that she would be looking for a basic place for just herself on the two days that she would be on her own.

I felt that she was fishing for an invitation and felt obligated and irritated to extend one. Could it be that she was just trying to be polite by not asking explicitly? I would have much preferred it if she had said, "I was thinking of coming a few days early, could I stay with you?" Later when I spoke to her, she let it be known that she hadn't even bought her tickets yet. If I had known that, I might not have extended an invitation.

Which is more polite? To indirectly "fish" for an invitation or more directly ask to stay over?

GENTLE READER: Fishing; no question. All you have to do then is to answer the question that was asked -- supplying names of hotels -- while appearing to be too thick-headed to understand the subtext.

And don't tell Miss Manners that you would have had no trouble replying to "Could I stay with you?" by saying, "Heavens, no -- why don't you go to a hotel?"

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