Q. I look after 60 little girls at a boarding prep school. We have an ongoing struggle with headlice and nits. Combing these pestilential creatures out of long hair with nit combs and conditioner is almost a full-time job. (The parents do not want us to use organophosphates.) What can I do, Mary? Even if
Q. The most recent dog to arrive uninvited at our house, a little terrier, happened to behave impeccably, but in the past I have opened the doors to a variety of hounds from hell who have climbed on furniture, left messes and stolen food from the larder. You cannot very well turn people away when
Q. I am at a co-ed day school and have been going out with a boy in my year for six months. Last week he dumped me. What has made it worse is that everyone in school has reacted by saying that they could not understand why I was going out with him in the
Q. I am in the process of restoring an old barn and want to use only environmentally friendly, locally available or recycled materials. However, the clipboard Nazis at the local council have told me I must coat my exposed beams with fire-retardant paint. I am very anxious to avoid the chemicals contained in these paints.
Q. I deeply fancy someone in my office who sits near me. Our exchanges have always been businesslike and I doubt she has noticed my interest. The other women I work with appear to find me congenial and we socialise outside the office although none seems to perceive me as a ‘sex object’. Having said
Q. A dear friend has been going to Pilates classes. She is very proud of her newly taut torso, but I fear she has been taking the discipline too seriously. She now has the rigid bearing of someone wearing an invisible neck brace, and the last time we hugged I was left with the sense
Q. Some friends and I have been discussing the vexed question of vegetarians, and opinions are divided as to whether they should announce this (or any other dietary requirements) when an invitation is given, or wait until they arrive. The former suggests that something special needs to be prepared for them, while the latter could
Q. My new husband has baggage from his previous life in the form of two best friends, a couple he has known for over 20 years. The female member of this couple drives me nuts. My husband, who adores her (and definitely does not fancy her), says she is not trying to wind me up,
Q. Speaking of pellets, as you did last week, may I ask something else? Whenever I have eaten birds, it has always been quite an informal occasion where one didn’t have to worry about, well, what to do with shot. One could simply more or less neatly take it out of one’s mouth. But if
Q. Two years ago I dispatched a spoof Christmas letter to a select handful of friends thinking this might amuse them. I committed all the standard crimes: blow-by-blow accounts of (fictitious) holidays and activities; an insistence on the good looks, academic prowess and remarkable musicality of our children; my own successes; our soaring incomes; hilarity
Q. I have an aversion to shaking hands. How should I avoid this, without giving offence? My doctor informs me that more germs are passed by hand than by kissing. At my club no one shakes hands, unless they are being introduced to someone for the first time. However, even that I find trying. I
Q. I belong to a small reading group in the village in which I live and have always enjoyed our meetings. Recently, however, one member of the group took it upon herself to invite a new neighbour to join us. We wanted to be welcoming and so said nothing; unfortunately, however, the newcomer has rather
Q. A friend in the fashion world telephoned me to say that she was sending round a handbag worth £400 for my Christmas present. She told me frankly that she would not normally spend £400 on me but she had been given this bag by a public relations person representing a certain designer and did
Q. Having been well entertained by the ‘pyjama gaping’ problems and solutions, may I briefly insert my neat response? Gentlemen should obtain comfortably large pairs of Directoire ladies’ knickers in acetate fabric. Discreet shops do have them. Carefully snip into the single thickness hem where elastic is gathered at the knee. Draw out the elastic
For her traditional Christmas treat Mary has invited some of her favourite figures in the public eye to submit personal problems for her attention. From Robert HiscoxQ. Christmas time brings the threat of having to dance at a staff party. As a chairman in my sixties I wonder how to maintain any dignity when dragged
Q. Recently I agreed to a male friend of mine’s suggestion to take out a couple that we both know. I said that I would pay for half the dinner as the couple had entertained me many times. The male friend had recently joined an old established club and wanted to take the couple there,
Dear Mary… Q. Despite misgivings, and only when further evasion would have been offensive, I accepted an invitation to a dinner party from a successful architect with whom I have a perfectly amicable business relationship. My wife and I arrived and were introduced to two other couples — friends of the hosts of apparently fairly
Q. I was rather hurt yesterday when I delivered my 80-year-old mother to the Carlton Club at 3 p.m. to meet her friends and have tea and the porter would not allow me in. ‘Madam, are you wearing jeans!’ Too true — Armani jeans, Jermyn Street shirt, Burberry mac, flat ankle-length leather boots and small
Dear Mary… Q. As an elderly art-lover, I was thrilled to be invited to the private views of exhibitions by both Julian Barrow and his brother Andrew. Alas, I see these take place on the very same night next week and, as I am now nearly 90 and practically bedridden, I really cannot risk the
Dear Mary… Q. My wife and I have an old and dear friend who lives abroad. She divorced her husband some years ago and lives alone. We are both very fond of her and are usually delighted to see her whenever she is in England. My wife has a timeshare in the Lakes which we