DEAR MISS MANNERS: Is it rude to turn off or ignore your phone, ignore a knock at the door, or ignore an IM on your computer screen when you have left your computer and messenger on at night while you were sleeping?

I say that it is elective to answer (or even make possible) these summons to attention, and they may be ignored at will for any number of reasons, including sleeping, resting, doing homework, doing telecommuting work, and even just taking some private time when you do not wish to be interrupted.

I have a friend whose mother has taught her she must always answer door knocks, phones ringing, IMs on the computer, regardless of what she is doing or why, or she is guilty of rudeness. Please enlighten us.

GENTLE READER: All right: Your friend's mother has a hard time getting in touch with her. Possibly for good reason.

It is true that everyone gets impatient if unable to reach anyone else immediately, now that there are so many ways of attempting this. However, Miss Manners has noticed that when the matter is considered in the abstract -- Do you believe that everyone is obligated to be on call to everyone else all the time? -- few would agree. And, funny thing, those few tend to be suspicious parents, lovers and bosses.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: The waiter at a high-dollar restaurant asked me, in reference to my salad, if I was "done working on that."

I grimaced a little and said, "No, I'm enjoying it. I don't work on my food."

My husband said, "That's a pet peeve of hers."

The waiter said, "Well, everyone is entitled to their own pet peeves, I suppose, but I work on my food," thereby managing to both disagree and insult me at the same time.

I didn't point out that she was also, in fact, working for tips, so a less negative response would have been self-serving.

I labor when I clean my kitchen floor and when I rake the lawn, but tend to enjoy the process of "eating" as opposed to "working" on my food. Other phrases in her repertoire that evening included, "no problem," when being thanked for bringing something she had forgotten to bring earlier, "Can I steal your plates?" when we had finished eating, and "'Bye, you guys" as we were leaving.

I am, I know, an aging English major, but I do long for more precision in our language. Am I asking too much?

GENTLE READER: You are asking a hard-working person to work on her language skills while trying to get your dinner on and off the table. Yes, that is asking too much.

Mind you, Miss Manners dislikes these expressions as much as you do, and finds the idea of "working on" food particularly unappetizing. How this expression originated and instantly made its way into restaurant parlance everywhere, she cannot imagine.

All the same, it is you who insulted the waitress, not only by correcting her, but also by taking umbrage at her attempt to defend her dignity.

:

DEAR MISS MANNERS: When I stay overnight in friends' and relatives' homes, I often find three to seven decorative pillows on the bed and pillow shams on the pillows. I usually look around for a chair to put the decorative pillows on or an open shelf in the closet. If there is no chair and no open space on the closet shelf, should I put them on the floor?

Can they ever be used? Are pillow shams removed from the pillows before using them? Sometimes additional pillows with just the usual pillowcases are underneath the ones with pillow shams and sometimes not. Some pillow shams are made from stiff brocade material, and I don't think I am supposed to use the pillow with the sham on.

All of these decisions are too much for me when I am sleepy and want to go to bed. Please give me the quick course on pillow etiquette.

GENTLE READER: The first rule is that guests should be able to find the bed under the pile of pillows. Miss Manners considers it the responsibility of the host to make it possible for them to go to sleep without first redecorating the room.

However, the polite guest who encounters a puffy mountain range is obliged to stay awake, sorting things out. The rule is to sleep only on pillows protected by pillowcases, wherever they may be found, and to toss the ones in pillow shams back on the bed in the morning so that no one will be able to detect where they spent the night.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: Who enters and exits an elevator first, the lady or the gentleman? (Exiting, of course, seems to be governed by the practical principal that the person nearest the door leaves first.)

I understand that the social norm of "ladies first" governs many situations like this. However, I was once informed by a well-bred Southern lady that the gentleman always enters and exits first, because doing so is a step into the unknown and, in the event of mishap, the gentleman should be the one to take the fall, so to speak.

This makes sense to me in light of the historical development of social conventions. Unfortunately, when I have acted upon this theory and entered an elevator first, I have occasionally received the icy glare of the sort usually directed at boors.

GENTLE READER: A gentleman allows a lady to precede him into an elevator. For his own safety, as well as the lady's, Miss Manners acknowledges that a fastidious gentleman might check first to see that there is actually an elevator there, and not an empty shaft.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My boss's daughter was getting married. I sent her a very expensive gift, but a few days before the wedding I was fired for no reason. The daughter kept the gift rather than return it to me. Was this proper or should she have returned it?

GENTLE READER: Only if she fired the bridegroom would she be required to return it. Or if he fired her.

Whatever your motivation, Miss Manners is afraid that your offering still counts as a wedding present, not a gesture to ingratiate yourself with your boss. Thus the only rule that applies is that presents must be returned if the wedding -- not your career -- is canceled.

:

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am in my late 20s, and a lot more of my friends are becoming engaged, and something has really been bothering me.

I am an activist and really have issues with diamonds due to their origins. It is actually one of the main reasons my husband and I did away with the idea of rings altogether until we could find a jewelry company that thinks along our lines. (I have found several recently.)

I am happy for all my friends' engagements, but when they go and show me the diamond and ask my opinion on the ring (i.e., "Isn't it beautiful?"), I really want to explain my position on these stones.

I know that at parties in mixed company, it is definitely not appropriate (nobody wants an activist to spoil a wedding or engagement party), and I usually end up stammering and saying, "Very nice." This usually makes me feel very uncomfortable and hypocritical, like I am accepting these stones as being OK.

How do I get away from the constant feeling that I should let them know how I really feel about the ring, but that it has nothing to do with the actual engagement?

Most of these people know that I am actively involved in clubs like Sierra Club and Amnesty International but do not fully understand why my husband and I have no rings. Most just think it was because we eloped.

GENTLE READER: "Isn't it beautiful?" is not a question; it is a prompt to give the conventional compliment. But if you used the opportunity to state your position, what do you think would happen?

Struck by the righteousness of your stand, the new fiancee would pull off her ring in horror and fling it away.

No? Then what would you hope to accomplish?

Miss Manners assures you that people do not absorb moral lessons from those who trample on their feelings. Rather, they forever associate the unpleasantness of the spokesperson with the cause itself. So if the certainty that you would hurt your friends' feelings is not enough to satisfy you into mere murmured politeness, how about the certainty that you would hurt your cause?

DEAR MISS MANNERS: In two recent instances, I've received notes from friends on personalized note cards in which the writer strikes through the embossed name at top.

Is this standard practice, i.e., does one strike out one's embossed name if one is going to sign one's signature? This strikes me as odd, since I can't imagine the reverse: where one would write a note to someone and not sign it.

GENTLE READER: Ah, but Miss Manners can. Not imagine it, that is, but recall the tradition that fastidious people continue to use. And please don't try to mash the following into something logical -- it's just the way things have long been done.

Cards with the formal name on top are called informals. (Go figure.) They may be used the way smaller personal cards are, for relatively informal, telegraphically worded invitations ("Tea Thursday at 4") and replies ("accepting with pleasure") and to accompany presents ("Best wishes to you both").

The signature is omitted, as this is not a letter and the writer's name is already there. Such cards are not properly used for letters -- brides, please note.

But they may be used for breezy notes ("Loved your speech yesterday," "See you at the beach"). If these are signed, a diagonal line is drawn through the formal name.

: