Q. I have a problem with a much older friend who is slightly insecure and super-sensitive to criticism and I don’t know how to tell her an uncomfortable truth about her guest lavatory. The lavatory shaft has a coating of thick brown limescale, inches deep. She is not short-sighted so clearly both she and her cleaner think the lavatory is perfectly presentable. I am going to stay with her in London and you might think I should just buy limescale remover but, were I to do so, she would notice the transformation and would then feel she had been foolish not to have known that such a product exists. She would worry endlessly about what I must think of her. Any suggestions?
– Name and address withheld
A. While staying, go to visit a fashionable friend (who she doesn’t know) and come back gushing that this man was over the moon as he has some sort of insider knowledge and has managed to get his hands on a product that safely strips limescale from loos. He says that his own loo and all his friends’ are transformed from brown to white and he even gave you a free jar of it. Would she like to try it? In this way she will not feel her limescaled loo is unusual and will be pleased, rather than anxious, when you tackle it.
Q. I know my husband very well and when we are at lunch or dinner I can usually tell when he is about to say something tactless/ reveal a secret/ cap someone else’s story with a better one of his own.
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