Dear Mary: how can I cut chats short without being rude?

Q. I have been in the wine trade all my working life. This has its pros and cons – dining at friends’ houses, for example, they invariably try to catch me out by serving decanted wine which I have to try to identify.

My problem is that I am 50 this year and we have decided to celebrate with a large party. I realise, from comments made, that the pressure is on to serve top wines. I simply can’t afford these. How can I get round this without appearing stingy?

– Name and address withheld

A. Redirect the pressure by designing the party around wine discovery. Ask each guest to bring along their favourite best-value wine for under £20. You will judge and award a small prize to the ‘best in show’. Once opened, the bottles will be shared among the guests. This should cut costs considerably.

Q. Please advise on how to navigate what I see as the curse of the ‘seat nabbers’ at literary festivals. It seems it is now standard practice for the otherwise educated upper-middle classes to bung anything from dodgy-looking hankies to hair clips on to the better seats, before honking off in search of pre-lecture flat whites, in a desperate attempt to perpetuate ingrained assumptions of entitlement. Exasperated, I eventually just started to move the ghastly detritus and sit down, on the ‘first bum first served’ principle, but found myself almost in fisticuffs with a nice lady from Wells.

– N.C., by email

A. Seat-bagging is nothing to do with entitlement or being German – it is just endemic in human nature. Royal Ascot forbids seat-bagging but no one takes a blind bit of notice. The organisers of the 23rd Aldeburgh literary festival (29 February-3 March) have found that some of their regulars expect ‘their’ same seat and woe betide if a newcomer has the temerity to sit there.