DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am in a quandary what to do about giving a Christmas present to my cleaning lady. I had to cut her hours back from every other week to once a month. At Christmas, I always gave her a small present and a check for one week's work. What do I give her now -- the same amount as before? I don't want to lose her, as I really like her.

GENTLE READER: Then increase the amount. Not because you don't want to lose her, but because it's the right thing to do. Times are hard for you, Miss Manners realizes, but they must be all the harder for your cleaning lady, especially since you had to cut her hours back. Please think of other ways that you can economize.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My brother and his wife got married in April of this year. For Christmas I received a card with three pictures from their wedding on it saying Have a Merry Christmas.

I found this very tacky. Am I right? Or is this normal? As in it's been less than a year. It's their first Christmas as husband and wife? Or more my thought: The wedding is over. Now move on!

GENTLE READER: Here is a minimal Christmas-spirit suggestion from Miss Manners: Let's not critique the personal photographs on the cards.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I was raised where we bathed at night before going to bed, and washed/changed our bed linens weekly. My husband and I have raised our children to do the same. I was also raised that when visiting, you always removed the bed linens and took them to the owner's laundry or left them folded at the foot of the bed.

We have so many visitors and family that come to our home, and they do not bathe until the following morning. We have seen this even after some have traveled all day visiting restaurants and rest stops along the way.

We have even had extended visitation, a couple of weeks where the couple never washed or changed the sheets, even making the bed with these bed linens on them before they left.

It has been decades where so much emphasis has been put on the spread of germs and flu that we are exposed to, the sloughing of our skin, personal hygiene and bed begs.

Should my husband say something? If so what? Or should we just go out and buy vinyl mattress protectors for all the beds that are used by the visitors?

GENTLE READER: Or install a car wash outside of your guest room? Miss Manners gathers that you don't much care for your houseguests. They must be relatives. There is much honest confusion about what guests should do with the sheets when they leave. Would the hosts prefer to have the sheets in a pile ready for the laundry, or would they rather have the room look intact even though they will have to strip the bed later?

Miss Manners' Solomonic solution is to pile up the sheets but also cover the bed with the bedspread or duvet. She thinks that your guests merely guessed wrong about which method you wanted rather than figured that you would go on using their sheets. As for the two-week guests, what you should have said, part way through their stay, is "Here are some fresh sheets."

However, you do not get to choose whether your guests prefer morning or evening showers. A polite hostess does not take notice of such things.

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DEAR MISS MANNERS: I'm a 16-year-old girl, and while I love my mother, she complains about things WAY too much. And things I can't help her with: how busy she is, how much her back hurts, how bad other drivers on the road are -- jeez!

At least half of the conversations I have with her are like that. It's so annoying to have to listen to someone complain all the time, and even worse, when I don't do a good enough job faking interest, she gets annoyed with me for "not caring."

I wish I could just tell my mom, "You complain too much. I don't enjoy listening to it" but of course, she would get very offended and make a fuss about it (she's really touchy too, which also gets annoying).

I feel like living with her is like walking on eggshells, and she is a bit of a baby about things. How can I get her to stop acting in a way that bothers me -- without her taking it personally?

GENTLE READER: By showing you care, just as your mother said -- but not just as she hopes. Feeding her moroseness by commiserating is not only tiresome, as you well know, but counterproductive.

"Mother," Miss Manners suggest you say the next time you hear a complaint, no matter how trivial, "I'm worried about you. Every little thing seems to bother you. There must be something deeper that is wrong. I'm too young to know how to deal with it, but please find someone who can."

Now there may or may not be something deeper wrong. Some people are just in the habit of grousing, and mighty tedious they are, too, Miss Manners agrees.

In either case, your mother is likely to deny that she is doing anything more than reacting to stupidity of others and the injustice of fate. However, if you repeat the Deeper Concern statement each time she voices a meaningless complaint, she may think about it. It could lead her to deal with her emotions, but at the very least it will make her aware of how easily and often she complains. And it will remove her ability to complain that you do not care.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: We are having a Christmas Party on Saturday night. We have lived in this neighborhood for almost a year.

The party will be large (125 people), and we will be outdoors in the backyard (we live in a warm area). We do not want to disturb our neighbors.

But we also want to play music and be festive and have fun. We do not know our neighbors well on either side So, do we invite them? Send them a courtesy note of our plans? Or just party away?

GENTLE READER: Party away until they call the police to complain about the noise? Why would you want to do that?

This strikes Miss Manners as the ideal way to become acquainted with the neighbors. The party is large, so it can absorb them even if they're not destined to become your friends. Furthermore, if they decline, they either have other engagements that night, in which case you won't disturb them, or they will feel bad enough about rejecting your overture to put up with the noise.

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DEAR MISS MANNERS: Is it proper for a lady to button or unbutton her jacket in a business interview?

GENTLE READER: Madam, please! Make your clothing adjustments before you arrive. You would not want to draw attention, in a job interview, to your chest.

But then again, Miss Manners is presuming that you are applying for a respectable job.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: See, I can use someone's preferred title, even when I do not prefer it for myself.

Seriously, though, I am becoming increasingly annoyed of late with my social circle, many of whom insist on addressing me, a thirtysomething unmarried woman, as "Miss" -- a title I associate with small children and genteel ladies of another generation, such as yourself, who prefer it.

It's bad enough when I'm given a choice of how their small children should use "Miss" -- either with my first or last name -- rather than allowed to state my own preference (and always in the children's presence, when an argument would be in bad form); but I loathe it when women, always other women, who know perfectly well what I prefer insist on addressing envelopes to me with "Miss."

If pressed into a choice on conversational address, I will accept the common Southern form of "Miss" with a first name because that is given to women of all ages in the South, regardless of marital status.

But is there anything I can do to make known my dislike for "Miss" on envelopes? I've thought about misaddressing those who know full well what they are doing as "Ms." on social invitations to them. (They, of course, prefer "Mrs." with their first name and last, rather than the correct form of "Mrs." with their husband's full name.)

I might feel better at the moment, and if it is mentioned, I could feign ignorance and say, "Really? Let me write down your preference. Good, got it. Here's how I prefer my invitations addressed."

But would Miss Manners allow it or think this form of social revenge to be rude? I'd appreciate your help in remaining gracious under pressure.

GENTLE READER: You cannot imagine -- evidently -- how weary Miss Manners is of hearing idiosyncratic interpretations of female terms of respect: "It makes me feel old," "It's disrespectful to my husband," "My husband doesn't own me," and so on.

These are courtesy titles, ladies (and no, please don't tell Miss Manners how bad "ladies" makes you feel). They are not intended to characterize you, other than as a female who is due respect.

The trouble is that there are too many of them. Uncharacteristically, etiquette has offered a choice.

Bad idea. It has only led to squabbling when no insults were intended and declarations of feelings when no such outbursts were required.

Funny -- gentlemen just have "Mr.," and yet most of them manage to open their mail without carrying on about how the envelope makes them feel.

You are right that people should address you as you wish to be addressed, and that it is ridiculously complicated to find out, in each case, how that is. So a lot of tolerance is required when people guess wrong.

Chances are that if the message isn't insulting, the address is not meant to be, either.

That's why we prefer standardized etiquette rules, folks.

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