DEAR MISS MANNERS: A few years ago, we got a panettone from a distant family member for Christmas. We said thank you enthusiastically.

The next year, we got one again. Receiving the gift, it didn't seem appropriate to say, "Oh, now that we've tasted this, we really don't see how marketing men managed to pass dry, tasteless bread off as a Christmas cake," so we said thank you again, and if with markedly less enthusiasm, it wasn't noticed.

Now, it seems, this has become a tradition. We see the gifter once or twice a year, and so the options seem to be keeping our mouths closed and getting a gift we don't appreciate, saying something right before Christmas when perhaps the miserable stuff is already bought, or saying something now, which would make it clear the gift was a failure.

What is the right thing to do?

Note, I'm not aiming for a more expensive gift, just something I'd enjoy consuming. I find wasting food psychically uncomfortable, so unwanted food gifts are unpleasant to me, not what the gifter intended.

GENTLE READER: Ah, a new version of the classic Fruitcake Problem. The difference is that a fruitcake can be passed around pretty much forever, while panettone has a limited life span.

Wait, Miss Manners just remembered another difference: You can soak a panettone in zabaglione. It softens it up, and anyway, you can eat the custard and skip the cake (although she disagrees with your critique of it).

However, this is not the household hints department. The etiquette question is whether you can call off an unwanted annual present. The answer is that you probably cannot. It only gives the donors an unpleasant retrospective look at their continuing misjudgment. On the bright side, Christmas is an excellent time to make food donations to organizations that feed the poor.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am 14 years old and have very little money of my own. For the holidays, my dad usually gives me some cash to buy presents for family and friends, but I also enjoy giving handmade gifts, such as the socks I am currently knitting for my grandmother, and I try hard to avoid the commercial side of the holiday season.

Twice this December, my mother, who I do not live with, has mentioned out of the blue that she wants me to buy her a food processor for Christmas. I think this is a highly unreasonable request to make of anyone, but particularly of one's teenage daughter. It was a rather shocking thing to hear her mention it and left me quite flustered as to what to say.

How do you recommend that I handle such situations? My mother has never seemed to follow any of the etiquette guidelines I have been taught, or, for that matter, be aware of them. I doubt she even realized that asking me to buy her a food processor was such an inappropriate request. What can I say when she mentions things like this?

GENTLE READER: How about, "I wish I could, but frankly, I can't afford it"?

This is, after all, your mother, who has an idea of what your financial situation is. And that gives Miss Manners the ugly suspicion that she is using you to tell your father that he should spring for more. However, that is no concern of yours. You need only answer, as above, on your own behalf.

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Universal Uclick, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I've sent nearly all my Christmas letters out this year by email (hard copies to those whose email addresses I don't have). A friend said this was impersonal; however, he also said that he and his wife had culled their list considerably.

My list was nearly tripled. Who would you say was more "impersonal," one who "touched" three times more of their friends, or those who touched far fewer of their friends than they did just last year?

GENTLE READER: You are being more impersonal. Sorry.

Quantity is easy with email -- only too easy, Miss Manners believes. Everybody's inbox is cluttered with polemics, jokes, warnings and copies of memos that concern only the primary addressee.

The only touching going on here is your finger on Send All and perhaps the recipients' fingers on Delete.

In contrast, your friends are presumably culling their lists in the interest of quality, dropping the exchanges that have, over time, become meaningless. Miss Manners submits that saving others from having to wonder, "Who on earth are these people -- I don't know them, do you?" is a form of thoughtfulness.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: When enough money is put into a wedding envelope to cover your meals, drinks and extra for bride and groom, and your meal is not up to standard or good, how do you handle this? Do you let someone know, and who? Or do you just forget it and say nothing, so you don't hurt anyone's feelings? I'm confused because this is happening when meals are picked ahead of time by mail.

GENTLE READER: Oh, dear. Miss Manners really shouldn't be surprised at this, although that doesn't lessen the shock.

It is, after all, the natural outcome of the false, vulgar and widespread idea that wedding guests are supposed to pay for their meals through the money-laundering system of calling their payments wedding presents.

If you were, in fact, contracting to buy a meal from a commercial establishment, you would be right to complain. But instead, you accepted the hospitality of people about whom you presumably care enough to attend their wedding and present them with a token of your affection. If not, you should not have gone. But you did, so you have no right to complain.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My brother and I (who live in different cities) are exchanging gifts via the Internet. Each of us thought that the retailer we were ordering from would gift-wrap before shipping the selected gift to the other one's address, but it turned out not to be so.

Now we are each faced with having to wrap our own presents (we each live alone), then unwrapping them and pretending surprise. Not that we aren't up to the task, but we were wondering what is the proper etiquette for gift wrapping when sending gifts via Internet.

GENTLE READER: As you and your brother are old enough to live on your own, Miss Manners would think you would be old enough to dispense with the charade of faking surprise on Christmas Day. If not, she suggests that you leave all pre-Christmas packages unopened in their mailing wrappings until then.

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Universal Uclick, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am a recent widower and will be dating a lady for the first time. We will be attending a performance of "The Nutcracker," and I'm wondering if it may be appropriate to give my lady a corsage for the occasion.

GENTLE READER: Even if your late wife was your high school sweetheart, and you remember how thrilled she was when you pinned a big purple orchid on her, this is not a good idea.

To the post-prom set, corsages are associated with weddings. For a first date, or even a fifth one, Miss Manners is afraid that you are more likely to frighten a lady with such a decoration than to thrill her.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My mom thinks it is inappropriate to give my boyfriend a foot massage and a shoulder massage in front of her. Do you think this is inappropriate?

GENTLE READER: Personally, Miss Manners wouldn't even want to watch you give yourself a foot massage.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: With the holidays approaching, I find myself torn. In the years past, I have taken my son to purchase presents for my ex and his family. I like being able to take my son shopping and to see him get the gifts for "his" family that he sees as appropriate.

However, I feel that perhaps his father should be responsible for this task. I don't feel appropriate being the one to purchase these gifts, as I would not continue to give gifts to the family if not for my son.

I am wondering if it would be appropriate for me to ask my ex to take our son shopping, or if, because I have been the one to purchase the gifts, I should just continue to do so. I normally give a monetary allotment to my son, and he finds gifts within that allotment for his aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents for that side of the family. I will say the allotment is equal to the amount that he spends on my side of the family.

GENTLE READER: Your repeated use of the word "appropriate" puzzles Miss Manners. Do you mean to inquire whether there is an etiquette rule about who does this shopping? Or are you asking how others would react?

But this is a case in which you are on your own. Do you want to continue, as you say that you like doing it? Do you want to turn it over to the child's father? Do you want to do the shopping but have the father subsidize it?

The etiquette problem arises only if you decide to make a change, and it has to do with how you present this to your son. If your former husband accepts this, it can be explained in terms of his being better able to advise about pleasing his relatives.

However, if he balks, you will have to make sure that your son does not feel that he is the cause of friction between you. And this may involve your continuing the precedent you have established, unfair as it objectively seems.

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, dearmissmanners@gmail.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Universal Uclick, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)