Rude Bitches Make Me Tired: Slightly Profane and Entirely Logical Answers to Modern Etiquette Dilemmas Read Online Free Page B

now he runs the show. Press the Call button and ask the flight attendant to stow his obnoxious ass overhead. Owing to the ski jackets you insisted on storing overhead, you won’t even hear his muffled screams. Winning!

 
    chapter 4
The Grand Old (Dinner) Party: Bring Wine and Trivia
    I’m a huge fan of the dinner party, as long as I don’t have to host it, of course. As a matter of fact, Duh Hubby and I have become quite adept at soaking up invites without reciprocating. It’s the height of rudeness, but it does make life so much less complicated, yes?
    So our New Year’s resolution this year was to do better, and by that, I mean to realize that while we consider ourselves to be exemplary dinner party guests (translation: we totally bring on the banter, and more important, we know when to leave), we realize that we’ve been selfish creatures and must return every invitation with a soiree of our own, or at least a few of them.
    Right now, there are several friends who are laughing at this and saying, “Ha! It’ll never happen.”
    It’s true. We tend to round up everyone we “know and owe” and throw a big backyard get-together every so often that, we feel, takes care of the social obligation without the endless menu-planning, napkin-ironing, silver-polishing woes of actually hosting a proper dinner party.
    Do as I say, not as I do, or did. Really, we promise to do better, starting … now.
    Question: Every time we host a dinner party, my friend asks who else is going to be there before she says whether or not she’ll come. This makes me absolutely furious. I usually say: “We’re still asking folks, so I’m not really sure.” If she persists, I make an excuse and hang up. She’s implying that we’re not interesting enough company by ourselves, isn’t she?
    Oh, my, yes. Let’s just stipulate that your friend was raised by wolves. And not the kind of wolves who use fine china and cloth napkins, the real rowdy kind that devours Boy Scouts on a forest camporee. Someone really should’ve told her this is extremely rude. That said, there might be a reason for her crassness. I’m thinking maybe she’s a single lady and she’s terrified that you’re doing another one of your ambush-style fix-ups with one of your dreadfully dull cousins, what with their male pattern baldness and Klan Nazi tattoos. Am I getting warm?
    I’m giving her the benefit of the doubt here. If she’s a married lady, then we’re back to our wolves theory. Look, I don’t like the way she’s acting, but there’s a very simple solution. Before you invite her, have a good working understanding of who has accepted and start the invitation with “We’re having a dinner party on the twenty-sixth! We’d love for you to come. Bill and Marge are coming, and so are Julian and Kate. Can you make it?”
    If she says, “Anybody else coming?” you are within your rights to simply hang up on her impossibly rude ass.
    Question: My husband and I argue about this all the time. If we take an expensive (really!) wine to a dinner party, is it rude of the host to put it aside for themselves instead of serve it to the guests? I say it is; he says it isn’t.
    If you take an expensive wine and hand it over to your host, he has the right to (really!) (a) smash it against the wall if he likes, (b) gush and open it immediately, or (c) say, “Wow! I love this stuff, but we can never afford it!” and hide it in the washing machine so others can’t find it.
    Simply stated: A gift is a gift. If your host wants to peel off the label and wipe his naughties with it, it’s his decision, disgusting as that might be.
    And while we’re on the subject of party libations, to those guests who drink other people’s pricey microbrews when all they brought to the party was a two-pack of Busch: This isn’t college anymore. Grow up already.
    Question: How do you deal with couples who stay too long at a dinner party? We have two sets of friends that we almost hate