Q. My son is on his gap year and travelling around India. While having lunch with a friend she showed me a website on to which her son has posted a blog of his gap year. By the looks of it virtually every 18–19-year-old public schoolchild in the country has done the same. Endless faces in various states of stupefaction leer out against tropical backgrounds accompanied by descriptions of how ‘chilled’ everyone is. I am only human so when she suggested typing my son’s name into the search box I naturally concurred. I was initially shocked to see that he too looked stupefied in his photographs and he too is boasting of being ‘chilled’ and describing how ‘wasted’ he feels each morning. Now I realise that my son is almost certainly not at all wasted or chilled — but just as subject to peer pressure as the next person. Nevertheless I do resent him posting these misleading bulletins. How can I put a stop to them without his feeling I have been spying on him?
Name and address withheld
A. Why not act daft and tell your son, in your next communiqué, that you have heard that all his friends have posted their news on this website. Give the address and suggest that he look on it. Then drop a casual (and truth-based) bombshell — ‘but do be careful if you post something on it yourself. Apparently universities and employers are starting to look on it too.’
Q. I am self-employed and for professional reasons I often attend formal dinners linked to my particular trade. At a recent one I was put on a table where everyone else worked for a trade magazine which, being free, depends entirely on advertising revenue. The people I was seated with, having found out in pretty short order that I was not interested in placing advertisements with their publication, completely lost interest in me and continued talking among themselves. I responded to this ill-mannered behaviour by getting up from the table and going home. Should the situation in which I found myself recur, how should I respond, making the point about bad manners on the part of my fellow diners without committing the same offence?
B.L., Barnet, Herts
A. Next time come prepared with an iPod preloaded with a talking book or radio programme of interest. Use the time profitably to catch up on your listening. Sooner or later one of your fellow diners will catch your eye at which point you can withdraw an earphone and, smiling sympathetically, explain, ‘I could tell you are all very tired so I thought you would be happier if I amused myself and let you get on with networking or whatever you are doing.’
Q. I am 12. I am going skiing over Easter. I am worried that some of the other children in the resort will be rude about my friend who is going too. What should I say if they say she is a saddo — not realising that I am friends with her?
Name and address withheld
A. Do not be defensive. Instead issue a cry of amazement. Then say, ‘How interesting that you have formed that impression! You’re quite wrong — she’s not a saddo at all. Quite the contrary. She’s just rather subtle in her personal presentation.’ Then shake your head and chuckle as though you know something they don’t.
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