DEAR MISS MANNERS: When flying, I often find myself subjected to the unintentional elbow jabs of my seatmate.

I always make a conscious effort to remain within the boundaries of my seat, carefully avoiding encroaching on anyone else’s space. However, on my last flight, I was elbowed repeatedly while attempting to sleep. (For the record, I have been assured I am not a snorer!)

I’m certain my fellow passengers aren’t doing this on purpose, but the repeated nudging is becoming unbearable. I don’t wish to create a scene or risk being removed from the flight, but I’d also love to know if you have any elegant, perhaps even quippy, way to handle this situation without resorting to calling a flight attendant.

Also, I wonder whether your advice would change depending on the seat I’m in. I am typically a window-seat traveler, though I’ve found myself in the middle seat more than once, much to my dismay.

GENTLE READER: The annoyance is the same no matter which seat you are sitting in. It just feels more injurious when you are suffering in the middle already.

Miss Manners suggests you react to the jabs by looking startled and even producing a small yelp. When your seatmate realizes what caused this, you may say good-naturedly, “We’re packed pretty tight in here.” And if you are awoken? Add, “I hope my being asleep wasn’t bothering you.”

DEAR MISS MANNERS: How should you respond to a mother-in-law who always calls you fat?

We only see my MIL a few times per year, either when we fly her here to visit or we fly to visit her. Every time, I jokingly make a bet with my husband on how long she will last before making a rude comment about how much weight I've gained.

She said I was fat when I was in great shape. She said I was fat when I was carrying baby weight from giving her two perfect grandchildren.

Before we visited her last summer, I worked hard and lost some weight. She still said I had "gotten fat." I corrected her, saying I had actually lost weight and was wearing size 10 jeans, which was a great accomplishment for me. She thought I was exaggerating and said that I can’t wear a 10 because she wears a 14-16 and is "not that much bigger" than me.

Now I’m NINE MONTHS PREGNANT, and she has arrived to help with the older two children when we go to the hospital. It only took about a half-hour before she started laying into how much weight I’ve gained, saying she’s never seen me this big before.

I never thought she would be so insulting when I am literally days away from delivering. It’s getting under my skin this time, and I have been crying over it. Next time she comments, I think I need to put her in her place. What should I say?

GENTLE READER: Miss Manners suggests starting with, “I’m nine months pregnant!”

When this response is no longer accurate, you may say, “Please do not comment on my weight. I would never dream of saying something about yours.”

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, gentlereader@missmanners.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am a college student who lives in the dormitories on campus. The hallways are average-sized -- about 5 feet wide -- and are never crowded, though residents often have conversations in the hall.

Often, two or more people will be leaning on opposite walls, making it impossible to go around the conversation. I always walk through the opening, which is wide enough to go through without coming in contact with either party, and I say “excuse me” to both for interrupting them.

Is this proper etiquette, or is there a more polite way to go down the hall?

GENTLE READER: Your solution is proper. But it does leave Miss Manners racking her brains for any other possible solution that would not involve climbing gear or coming into closer contact with the floor than might be desirable.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I was always taught that one’s bread plate is placed to the left. Whenever I am with a large group at a table at a wedding (or another function), at least one person always takes the bread plate to their right. Their neighbors then follow suit, eventually meeting the side of the table using the left plate, leaving someone without one.

I usually just quietly go without bread if I’m the stranded guest, and I don’t really get upset by it. But this seems like such a basic element of table manners that I can’t believe so many people don’t know it.

Can you please weigh in, just for public education, assuming I’m right?

GENTLE READER: You are right. The good news is that most dinner tables are not flush to the wall. If diners are evenly spaced around the edges, then once everyone has, incorrectly, grabbed the plate to the right, the unused plate will be found to your right. All that will then remain will be to clear space to the left for your plate -- and seeing if there is any butter left.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I have a neighbor who texts me on a fairly regular basis, asking me for all kinds of different things -- usually food items.

She is not poor; she seems to go out multiple times a day and has delivery trucks at her house daily. I am not sure why she can’t make her own grocery runs, as we live very close to multiple stores.

If I respond that I don’t have whatever she is looking for, she usually replies, “That’s OK, I found something else to use,” as if it is my fault she doesn’t have something in her house.

It is very irritating, to say the least! This is a neighbor who, when she is out of the house, is more interested in her phone than in talking to my husband or me. I have blocked her in the past, but am not sure this is the right thing to do.

GENTLE READER: What she is doing only works if you are responding "in real time" -- as one apparently says these days -- which is not yet a requirement of being a good neighbor.

If you take a long time to respond to these texts, she will stop sending them.

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, gentlereader@missmanners.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I live in a four-family apartment building in a middle-class neighborhood. All of the tenants are very nice people, but the landlord is notoriously unresponsive.

I live on the second floor, and the young lady in the apartment next door to me has everything delivered to her. We share a common front stairway.

The other day, a delivery was made to her front door (a few feet from mine) from a local coffee shop. From the trail of evidence left by the delivery person, the lid of the coffee cup must have come loose on the front porch, then the drink spilled through the foyer and up two flights of stairs, terminating at her door.

It was a mess. The coffee must have been an extra-large with milk and sugar. My neighbor told me about the spill, that she had apprised the landlord of the mess needing to be cleaned up, and that she had left bad feedback for the delivery person.

And that was the end of the story -- a coffee-splashed stairway floor for everyone to try to tiptoe around.

How should I have handled this situation, and who do you think should have been responsible for cleaning it up: the delivery service? the landlord? my neighbor? other?

GENTLE READER: Your neighbor should have cleaned it up, or the building management could have, if they have regular arrangements for such things -- although it sounds as if they do not.

But if this goes on much longer, Miss Manners is going to come over and clean it up herself, if only to put an end to the discussion. Even if this was an extra-extra-large coffee, we are not talking about a Superfund site.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I was in a subway station waiting for my train, standing near a column, when a gentleman emerged from the other side of the column. I was instantly face-to-face with this man, whose face was missing most of its features, presumably as the result of some trauma.

I am sorry to say I gasped. Very audibly.

We continued to wait for the train, and I didn’t know what to do. I stood there silently, smiling in what I hope was a friendly manner.

I can only plead that the gasp was completely involuntary and reflexive. Should I have apologized? At the time, I thought doing so would just make the situation even more awkward.

I was honestly at a loss as to how to remedy my poor behavior. This happened some time ago, but I have been bothered by it ever since.

GENTLE READER: That is understandable, but Miss Manners believes that you can stop now. You recognize that your reaction was involuntary, that you felt sorry, and that drawing too much attention to it would have made things worse.

The correct response would have been, “I’m so sorry; you startled me!” suggesting that you would have had an identical reaction to any visage at equally close range.

(Please send your questions to Miss Manners at her website, www.missmanners.com; to her email, gentlereader@missmanners.com; or through postal mail to Miss Manners, Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106.)