DEAR MISS MANNERS: I'm a cashier at a local grocery store. This is the first job I've ever had, and I enjoy it a lot. Occasionally, however, when a customer has alcohol in their order and I don't ask to see their ID, they will ask, in a very serious manner, why I didn't.

I usually blush and stammer over "um"s and "ah"s, which isn't the most eloquent answer, I know, but is the only thing my mind can come up with after being caught off-guard. Sometimes, I can awkwardly manage to change the subject by telling them their total, but then they spend the rest of the transaction glaring at me, or they'll actually press their case and repeat their question.

How do I answer without insulting them?

GENTLE READER: What would the insult be -- that they looked grown-up? Miss Manners finds the jokey pretense to youthfulness terribly tedious. Don't these people know that asking to be carded is a sure proof of being over age?

But you still have to deal with them. The kind explanation would be, "You look honest, so I assumed you wouldn't be attempting anything illegal, but you're right, I should have checked."

Or since they have that silly age sensitivity, you might cure them of this habit by asking, "My mistake (now your voice gets louder) -- exactly how old are you?"

DEAR MISS MANNERS: At the first family wedding I have been to in years (basically because of cost considerations), I asked my sister (mother of the bride) when the presents were going to be opened and placed for viewing.

I was informed that "we don't do that anymore; the bride and groom open them the next day."

When I was growing up, at all weddings and showers, the gifts were opened and placed for others to see.

Is this new? I realize that this is not an obligation to display the gifts, but I have always thought it was a courtesy, because others might enjoy seeing everything.

GENTLE READER: It is true that etiquette did used to sanction the display of wedding presents, although not, as you seem to have experienced, with the children's birthday-party routine (also used at showers) of opening them in front of the guests. Nor would they have been opening them "the next day," when the couple would be off to enjoy their first sanctioned privacy, not hanging around with nothing better to do.

The presents would be opened as each arrived -- and the letters of thanks written and sent immediately. At the time of the wedding, when the bride's parents were likely to be receiving, and perhaps even holding the wedding at home, they were displayed on tables covered by white damask cloths, with, or, more discreetly, without, the cards of the donors.

Miss Manners does not doubt that it is also true that guests relished inspecting them, but not because they found it heart-warming. You know they must have been checking to see how much was spent, and whether, in comparison, they spent too much or too little on the presents they sent.

As this is not a particularly seemly activity, etiquette was already condemning the practice decades ago. Miss Manners considers that a custom justly killed.

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DEAR MISS MANNERS: How does one go about introducing a new eating utensil?

I have great problems eating pizza, onion soup and spaghetti neatly. What I need is a delicate pair of scissors, which would be called "cheese scissors." They could resemble the small scissors that hairdressers use. On the place setting, they could be placed to the right of the knife.

How can I go about making these scissors acceptable? Shall I just buy a pair and start using them?

It seems to me that discreetly cutting the cheese string would be much more lady-like than pulling a long string of cheese or wrapping it around my finger until it finally breaks. What do you think?

GENTLE READER: Great idea. You'll be a social pariah, of course, but at least you won't have strings of food hanging down your front.

Don't get Miss Manners wrong. The hostility will not come from silver snobs, who would be delighted to add another useful tool to our (ah, their) collections. The idea behind specialized tools is, naturally, to make life easier for the diner, not harder.

However, it is unfortunately true that there was a nasty time during the 19th century industrial revolution when guessing the uses of peculiar flatware served as an entrance test for moving up into the middle class.

This is no longer the case. The table has become simplified, to put it delicately -- possibly because so few people sit at it. But the sting of the old days has a peculiar afterlife. People still speak with mysterious pride of "not knowing which fork to use" as if nearly all those specialized Victorian pieces hadn't been melted down to finance World War I, and now they would be lucky to get a metal fork instead of a plastic one.

Those are the folks who may at first admire your originality and daring, but will turn on you if your idea catches on. They'll brood that you look down on them for not recognizing, using or owning the new tableware tool.

But at least you won't have cheese on your chin.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: It's that time of year again. My in-box gets cluttered with solicitations for donations payable to the young lady or young man that is graduating from high school, college, beauty school or the school of hard knocks.

These are children that I will most likely never meet, and I have had to cover the workload when their parents (my co-workers) missed work because said child was sick.

Why is this practice used? Am I right to be mortified that complete strangers solicit me for my hard-earned money?

GENTLE READER: Mortified? No.

If these really are solicitations, not just invitations that you interpret as such (in which case you owe nothing more than politely declining and wishing the graduate well), all you have to do is to throw them away. It is the parents who Miss Manners believes should be mortified that their children, whom they cannot throw away, are out begging.

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DEAR MISS MANNERS: Our adopted son is in kindergarten, and at school there was a discussion about President Lincoln. The topic turned to slavery, where he was singled out for having "brown" skin (he's biracial) and that his relatives were slaves, versus the relatives of the other students who were slave owners because their skin was white.

When he told me the story, it made me cringe. Clearly he's learning about his self-identity, and that is certainly important, but I am uncomfortable with him being pointed out as different because of his skin color in order to illustrate a story.

I try to emphasize when he is making comparisons to why our family looks different than others that we are all like M&M's -- different colors on the outside, same on the inside. Should I approach his teacher about this topic, or let it go?

GENTLE READER: You should get yourself down to that school immediately and explain to the teacher why it is wrong to single out a child like that; and if that doesn't help, you must explain it to the principal. Perhaps you should go to the principal anyway. It strikes Miss Manners that aside from the rudeness of embarrassing a child, someone who does not realize that not all blacks were slaves and not all whites were slave-owners should not be teaching even the most elementary history.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: Upon our marriage, my fiance will be taking my last name.

He has a last name that is constantly mispronounced and misspelled. For years, indeed long before he met me, he planned to take his wife's name and luckily, my last name is easy to pronounce and spell. As I would never have changed my name upon marriage, it is a situation that works incredibly well for us.

While we have told our close friends and family of this already, should we inform family friends, colleagues and more distant relatives of this unusual situation before our marriage? How would you suggest we do this? Any advice will be greatly appreciated!

GENTLE READER: You are going to get plenty of advice from just about everyone, and Miss Manners is afraid that your appreciation will soon wear thin.

For that reason, she suggests telling people when the change is an accomplished fact. At the wedding reception, for instance, when people start calling you Mrs. Twiddledom, you can say "No, I'm still Mabel Harris, but now he is Alexander Harris" -- and then move on to greeting the next couple while they process this.

Another way is to send out At Home cards after the wedding with both your married names. (Ms. Mabel Harris/Mr. Alexander Harris/At home/address/ after the thirtieth of July"). And to keep sending your full names on every occasion you write. Your husband might have cards and writing paper made with his new name.

And you know what? Many people will get your names wrong anyway, but fewer of them will chime in with their opinions. Please try to be patient with all of them.

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