DEAR MISS MANNERS: Am I the only one who finds this phenomenon confusing?

"Miss Lucy Bainbridge and her fiance of 5 years, Mr. Michael Bagley, wish to announce the arrival of a baby boy, Sweetums Bainbridge-Bagley."

Are women these days, living with a partner without the benefit of marriage, playing fast and loose with the term "fiance"? Are they just cockeyed optimists, waiting each Valentine's Day for a ring? Has there been a lot of talk about marriage and no action? I always thought having a fiance went right along with having a ring and a date. Can one be called a fiance year after year?

GENTLE READER: Long ago, when pseudo-marriages first became openly admitted and widespread, Miss Manners asked her Gentle Readers for help in devising a presentable term by which each person in such an arrangement could refer to the relationship with the other.

She is sorry to say that although she was flooded with suggestions, many of them were not presentable. Those that were not lewd or downright nasty were hopelessly complicated or pure treacle.

And the presentable ones used words that meant something else. One of them was "partner." She didn't choose that one (the truth is that she got discouraged and didn't choose anything) but society did.

It spread, and Miss Manners soon got caught in the very confusion she had predicted. She was about to invite an interesting acquaintance to dinner when he mentioned how happy he was with his new partner. As she was amending the invitation in her mind to include the partner -- the hard part was avoiding a gender-specific pronoun -- the gentleman happened to mention his wife.

Now, Miss Manners is not given to snooping into people's living arrangements, but she does need to know how many people are coming to dinner. It took her a great deal of conversational maneuvering before she discovered that the gentleman's domestic life was not as hectic as she supposed. He had one wife and one business partner.

Perhaps similar confusion has inspired the widespread use of "fiance" and "fiancee" among those without marriage plans. Perhaps they believe it sounds more grown-up or more serious. Or just more French.

In any case, it is now widely used, as you have observed, for arrangements that do not seem to be moving along to marriage. Confusing, yes. But minimally so, Miss Manners would say, as neither long engagements nor broken engagements are new, and these arrangements do sometimes lead to marriage.

Anyway, she has no better term to suggest.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: If a 90-year-old known-to-be-senile person asks, "Is today Sunday?" is it rude to answer, "All day"? My husband claims that it's not, but I feel it's being sarcastic.

How do you feel about this?

GENTLE READER: Normally, Miss Manners doesn't probe the feelings of those whose surface behavior is polite. But with behavior toward someone unable to judge it -- making faces at a blind person would be another example -- motivation counts. So if he thinks this is funny, then it is rude. (And if he doesn't, he wouldn't insist on repeating it.)

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DEAR MISS MANNERS: Our son (finally!) brought home a lovely young woman, a fellow attorney in his firm, to meet us. She is intelligent, charming and we were delighted with her.

They stayed the weekend, and my husband and I realized she has likely not been brought up with all the privileges my son has had. I tell you this as background to the following:

I stock each guest room with a range of nice soaps, a selection of toiletries of various brands, plus any necessary items (toothbrushes, razors) a guest may have forgotten. When restocking the guest room after their departure, I was surprised to find not a single item in the drawers -- they had been cleaned out. Even the basket of soaps.

The two will be guests at a partner's summer home in a few months. I feel this behavior will not enhance her future -- or my son's, should they share a room.

My husband says I should speak to the young woman at the first opportunity. I believe it would be more appropriate to speak to my son and let him decide what -- if anything -- is to be done. I feel very awkward about bringing it up with a young woman I hardly know.

What do you think? Him? Her? No one?

Miss Manners, I do not in any way begrudge the items -- I'd have happily gifted her with all of them.

GENTLE READER: You cannot, Miss Manners supposes, warn the young lady's other hosts before she cleans them out.

Evidentially, she is one of those people -- and there are great numbers of them -- who drive up hotel prices because they believe that the bathroom toiletries are little prizes for the clients rather than supplies to be used on the premises.

Still, she is a guest and a prospective daughter-in-law. As you get to know her, you may have occasion to give her a present, in which case a well-stocked travel case of toiletries might occur to you.

In the meantime, you might mention the situation to your son in a manner that does not require him to defend her -- "Zenobia is such a dear, and we hope she comes often. Incidentally, did you or she need the whole basket of soaps and razors and toothbrushes and such? I'm more than happy to give you whatever you want, but please let me know so I can replenish the supply. I only keep it in case a guest has forgotten something."

And lock up your jewelry case.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: The hostess served iced tea at a recent luncheon in her home. After the luncheon, the following question arose: "What do you do with your iced tea spoon if the tea is served in a glass without a coaster or saucer under it?"

One of the guests had carefully rested her damp spoon on her used sweetener packet. All of us agreed that we didn't know the proper etiquette, but that Miss Manners would.

GENTLE READER: The proper etiquette is to protect your hostess and her possessions from the consequences of her lack of foresight. It was her job to provide saucers or those stemless spoon heads that serve as spoon parking places. Since she did not do so, Miss Manners is grateful that you did not conclude that the lady was planning to tint her linens anyway.

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DEAR MISS MANNERS: My in-laws and I are not close. I am polite to them, and, for my dear husband's sake, try to be cordial. My husband's stepmother died three months ago. At the visitation and funeral, his father behaved quite boorishly. Within a month, he was dating again.

Since then, he has dated at least two women (serially, not simultaneously) and is corresponding with another whom he found via a popular Internet matchmaking site. Incidentally, he and his late wife had a 13-year-old daughter.

Despite the modern view that everyone grieves in his own way and time, I am appalled by this rapid moving on, especially since he has given little time (or apparently thought) to his daughter's grief and loss. Naturally, I do not voice my disapproval.

During a recent visit to our home, he made several comments about getting a neighbor to check his mail for a letter he was expecting. I knew from the context he was referring to his lady correspondent.

Unsure how to respond to his comments about the anticipated letter, I simply acted as if I heard nothing and changed the subject.

How should I have handled this? It is likely to recur.

GENTLE READER: Fortunately, you are not required to handle either your father-in-law's mail or his social life. Miss Manners knows that this will come to you as a relief.

What would be kind would be for you to direct your attention, instead, to your young and not-so-incidental sister-in-law. If her father is preoccupied, she would doubtless be grateful for some sympathetic family life.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My nationwide gym is getting me heated in more ways than the one I'm there for. While rules for the gym go unheeded and unenforced, I guess it is no surprise that common sense manners are not far behind.

When an exercise class I attend ends, another starts. Like most gyms, the workout room has several glass walls, including the one with the only door to enter and exit the area. The starting class will stay outside the door and watch while the ending class puts away their equipment. But as soon as someone from the ending class opens the door to walk out, the starting class takes this as their cue to start pushing their way in, leaving the ending class to bottleneck and wait for a chance to walk out.

Am I wrong to think the strategy and etiquette for the changing of members to be consistent to an elevator's exchange of users or bus/train passengers? It seems to me the ones leaving should be let out first. After all, the starting class can't start until the ending class clears the studio. I'd love to hear your opinion on this.

GENTLE READER: As soon as Miss Manners can get out of the way of all those frightfully fit hordes charging at each other.

Being right about the procedure, as you are, can't be much comfort if these people are, as you say, chronic rule-breakers. You might try enlisting the help of a burly classmate, who will stand at the door calling out, bus-conductor style, "Let 'em out first, please."

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