Q. I am a very busy person. Consequently I find it maddening when I am talking to someone on the telephone and I realise that they are not concentrating on what I have to say, but instead are staring at their computer screen. A case in point is a younger friend who is a junior member of my own profession. He has consistently missed out on good advice I have given because he has not been listening properly, but has been trying to multi-task instead. What is your solution?
—F.W., Aldeburgh,Suffolk
A. Teach the youth a lesson next time you are on the telephone to him by simultaneously sending him an email saying ‘Concentrate! I am talking to you.’
Q. The widow of a friend is generous to a fault. I want to go on meeting her for lunch but every time we do, I find she has rung up beforehand and given her card details and therefore squared the bill with the restaurant before we have even sat down. She refuses to allow me to pay anything. It is obviously something of a neurosis, since I can well afford it and I know she cannot. Indeed I happen to know that her finances are in chaos. What should I do, Mary?
—A.W., London W8
A. You can easily acquire the number of this widow’s bank account and her sort code by asking her to write a small cheque for a charity. Henceforth you can sit back and enjoy your lunches and pay the relevant sums into her account by BACS afterwards. If, as you say, she is chaotic, she will not notice your input, but at least your conscience will be clear.
Q. Upon taking our seats on a BA flight to Nice earlier today a business friend and I were addressed by a chap neither of us know particularly well from an adjoining row. He is an elderly gentleman resident in Monaco, as are my friend and I. We returned his greeting in an appropriately friendly and civil manner. ‘I see you’ve dropped right off the list,’ he went on, addressing my colleague by his first name quite loudly whilst waving his copy of the Sunday Times Rich List. ‘is everything OK?’ We were dumbfounded, of course, but how might my friend have replied to break the rather embarrassing silence which followed?
—Name and address withheld
A. The discerning rich have always considered not appearing on the list to be a superior achievement. Bearing this in mind, your friend could have given a knowing nod as he replied, ‘very much so. Especially now I’ve dropped off it.’ This answer would have been enigmatic enough to leave all interpretations open to eavesdroppers, let alone the elderly gentleman. Should the latter have probed any further, your friend need only have raised one finger to his lips and winked meaningfully. This should have been enough to discourage any further inappropriate questioning.
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