Dear Mary | 31 October 2009

Q. I am in the lower sixth at school. The following problem arises quite frequently and I would like your advice. When we pupils go to get our lunch it is self-service and by the time you have loaded your tray you are in no mood to hang around with it before sitting down. What happens to me is that I often can’t see any of the other guys in my house and then I will sit down with some of the girls in my year but I won’t really have anything to say to them and then suddenly I will see the people I was looking for in the first place sitting quite nearby. At that point I can’t get up and move because it would be too rude. Do you have any suggestions as to how I could move without being rude?

Name withheld, Wiltshire

A. Let’s say one of the people you would ideally sit with is called John Smith. Always make sure you sit down with an empty space next to you. Then, as people come towards you with their trays asking, ‘Is anyone sitting there?’, you can reply ‘Do you mind if I save it for John Smith. I said I would sit with him for lunch.’ In no time one of the beady-eyed girls will say, ‘There’s John Smith! He’s sitting over there.’ At this point you can legitimately get up and move to John Smith’s table without causing offence. Adults may like to use this technique at wedding parties where hosts have been idiotic enough not to arrange named places. Too often in this case guests end up sitting, out of politeness, with the person with whom they have been talking when the call came to go through to the banqueting zone, and with whom they have exhausted all conversational potential.