DEAR MISS MANNERS: I live in the ground-floor apartment of a condominium building with seven floors. The sons of the tenants on the sixth floor had a party, and they started throwing drinks, cigarettes, food, etc., onto my terrace, which is my private property.

I wrote the parents an email asking them to have that stopped, and asked the doorman to let them know about my complaint. As is customary in our small building, that email was sent with copies to all the other neighbors. The mother of the kids answered that it had been unintentional, and that she had asked them to stop.

However, they continued throwing drinks and spitting on my terrace, even when I walked outside to see what was going on. I then told her that I did not believe it was unintentional, since they had continued to throw things even with me present on the terrace, and that even though I don’t mind anyone having parties and making noise, I thought that throwing waste and drinks on someone’s private property was almost a criminal practice since it could be considered vandalism.

I expected an apology and a stop to their actions, but instead I got an angry email, with copies to all other neighbors, asking me to stop slandering her children.

Am I mistaken? Am I missing something here? Does she have the right to be offended?

GENTLE READER: Even assuming, for the moment, that it is not the custom in your building to send emails accusing you of slandering people’s children, Miss Manners questions the wisdom of sharing complaints so widely.

It seems that your neighbor was initially apologetic and willing to take action to correct the offense. This is as it should be. But things escalated for two reasons. First, you argued with her apology, which was both unseemly and, as you discovered, unflattering. Second, the wide circulation of the correspondence added a wholly unnecessary element of public flogging to what should otherwise have been a simple problem.

It is time to change the custom, and write a note to your neighbor thanking her for addressing (or attempting to address) your original concern, and yourself apologizing for making your complaint so publicly. It is to be hoped that there will not be a future, intentional occurrence to give you the opportunity to test your theory about what constitutes vandalism -- or assault.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am attending a wedding that is the third for both bride and groom. I know, generally speaking, you should not wear white or black to a wedding, but in this case, is it all right to wear a dress that is both?

GENTLE READER: Since this is not a rule that Miss Manners enforces vigorously, she is willing to stipulate that black and white make gray and that the dress is therefore acceptable -- assuming, of course, that it will not lead to confusion about the identity of the bride, who may herself be graying after two previous weddings.

(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, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I’m interested in whether I should say hi to a comrade or somebody I know when I randomly meet him/her on the street, but he/she is on the phone and doesn’t see me.

In another scenario, I’m walking somewhere and I happen to see somebody I know walking few a steps ahead of me. Do I say hi while I’m behind him, or catch up to him so he can see me? This usually happens with my older neighbor, so I think giving him a pat on the shoulder so he turns back isn’t appropriate.

GENTLE READER: You really love to say hi. Miss Manners does not mean to discourage this, but as polite as the instinct is, when the person is not looking or is otherwise engaged, the effort -- on each party’s side -- can be more than the gesture is worth.

In the first scenario, it seems to Miss Manners that if the person is on the telephone already, the number of steps it will take to wave the speaker down and off the telephone is entirely too many. If it is someone with whom you really want to connect, call them yourself -- preferably with at least a 30-minute lag time, so as not to disturb the current conversation.

In the second instance, catching up to someone is generally preferable to shouting out a name in public. And back thumping, whatever the person’s age, could be startling, if not frightening.

But again, people would not blame you if you did not take these measures for a relatively inconsequential act. Or if they did, you could rightly say that they seemed otherwise occupied.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: My husband and I are retired. My husband is popular with other men, and there is a regular crew with whom he golfs, meets for happy hour, meets for breakfasts, and so on. I am glad his retirement has been so successful. My problem is that these men have made it clear that they are signed up for fun stuff, and that is all. I invited them and their wives to our daughter’s wedding, and none of them RSVP’d or came. Yet I felt I had to invite them, because these are my husband’s friends.

I can’t imagine calling one of them if we had a real problem, like an illness or one of us falling off a ladder. Is this just a guy code I don’t understand, or what?

GENTLE READER: “Fair-weather friends” was a phrase coined for a reason. That these gentlemen consider a wedding a chore and not worthy of a response does not make them true friends. However, if your husband has no objection to the arrangement, Miss Manners does not see why you should. Presumably you have your own friends who could come to your rescue, if necessary. If not, cultivate them quickly.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: How long after someone’s passing is it all right to send a condolence card?

GENTLE READER: Although condolences should be sent shortly after the news is received, Miss Manners recognizes that it is not uncommon for some time to elapse before one hears of a death. That can be stated in the letter, but she frowns upon explanations that you simply did not get around to it until now. Nor should you excuse yourself from writing because time has passed.

(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, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)

GENTLE READERS: A term now in common usage that puzzles Miss Manners is “a real wedding.”

She recalls from 19th-century drama what a sham wedding was: A cad would persuade a virtuous lady to elope, produce an imposter to act as a clergyman and pretend to marry them, and shortly after, abandon her to ruin. The planning always seemed to take more time than the enjoyment.

More recently, and more sympathetically, people who were not legally allowed to marry held ersatz weddings, called commitment ceremonies, to mark their unions.

Silly Miss Manners would have thought that a “real wedding” was one in which a couple actually got married in a legal and optionally religious ceremony. Some sort of celebration almost always follows, but while that is called a “wedding reception” or a “wedding breakfast,” it is an add-on.

But now people want to divorce the marriage from the wedding. What they mean by a “wedding” is only the pageantry. The white dress, the costumed attendants, the “giving away,” the huge cake and, of course, the presents -- these may be produced without benefit of matrimony.

These events are not staged so often by couples with no intention of actually marrying (although there are instances) as they are by couples who are already married. Some are recently married and want to repeat the event for different spectators; others are long married but complain that they now want the trappings they missed at the time.

The targeted “real wedding” guests are no more charmed by this than Miss Manners. It seems that the emotional element of witnessing a binding union is essential. The legal part is so crucial that emotions do not seem to be dampened when the bride and bridegroom have previously been living as a couple. Miss Manners cannot blame them for their lack of enthusiasm for re-runs.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: The other night, when we were having dinner at our neighbors’ house, my husband, without checking with me first, told our neighbors that they could help themselves to anything they wanted to harvest from our garden.

I was not happy about that at the time, but didn’t know how to say that I didn’t want them helping themselves to my hard work. I am happy to share with them, but I would like to pick the veggies myself and take them over to them as a gift. I would also like to have plenty to give to my family members and other neighbors, too.

Now, I am finding that not only are there not enough veggies to share, there are not any for me! When I go to pick the nice tomato that I have been watching ripen, it has already been picked! This happens repeatedly.

Is there any polite way I can rescind my husband’s offer?

GENTLE READER: No, but he can do so. If you tell the pickers that he was unauthorized to make the offer, you will sound mean. If he says sheepishly, “I should have asked my wife what she wanted you to leave,” he will sound sweet.

Of course this is unfair. Miss Manners only wants you to know how people react.

(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, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)