European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - April 19, 1992, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Odds amp ends miss m mks Judith Martin dear miss manners three months ago i attended a nieces wedding and i still have not received a thank you for the present i gave. The Mother of the Bride told me that it is not necessary to Send thank you notes anymore. I have never heard of such a rude thing before. Gentle Reader a fatal problem with Amateur etiquette advisers is that they do Only half the Job. If the writing of thank you letters is to be declared defunct then the giving of presents must also be declared defunct. You cannot have one without the other. Miss manners suggests you Stop giving these people presents and that you Stop taking etiquette advice from them. Dear miss manners i am writing on behalf of myself and a female colleague both of a certain age about certain assumptions our husbands of a certain Era make in regard to their right to intrude in the professional lives of spouses. Most particularly we wonder if calling ones wife at work to Tell her what is desired for the evening meal or asking that she leave a meeting to be informed about a plumbing malfunction in the Home is acceptable. In addition we would like to know if it is proper for a spouse to complain to an administrator at his wife s place of business about the fact that his wife must occasionally toil past the time that her contract states she is expected to be on duty. Gentle Reader at a certain age you May have forgotten a certain routine you once used in order to teach the children manners. This was called a How would you feel if a miss manners suggests you learn o play it again. Typically this went a a done to take away your brother a toy. How would you feel if he took away your toy done to shove your sister. How would you feel if she shoved you a and so on. It Wasny to sparkling dialogue but a certain Primi Tive understanding eventually developed. Now is the time to Trot it out again Quot please done to interrupt me at work. How would you feel if i interrupted you at work How would you feel if 1 complained to your Boss about your hours a miss manners recognizes that it is barely possible a husband May be slightly quicker at this sort of thing than a Small child and May arrive earlier at the traditional crisis Point. This occurs when lulled into that Way of talking you say something like a a done to pull that cats Tail a How would you feet if she pulled your Tail a and the child proudly announces a i done to care a i done to have a Tail a so perhaps the husband with a Smirk Only too similar to his child a Long ago replies Quot i done to care if you Call my Boss a i am the Boss a or a go ahead and interrupt me at work a in a retired a the reply to the tailless child if you recall was to pull a bit of hair and say Quot Well that a what it feels  with the husband too you May have to find something equivalent. If he is the Boss you complain to his Deputy in front of him that he must be sent Home on time and discouraged from believing that he is indispensable. If he is retired you have him paged on the Golf course and ask him to do an errand on the Way Home. Miss manners has a feeling this May not actually be necessary. Husbands Are usually More experienced than children and have Learned to accept the Mere mention of retaliation in place of the deed. Dear miss manners i have been perplexed for More than a year about finding the appropriate term for the Man i have been dating. He is 44 and i am 39 we Are certainly too old to be referred to As a Boyfriend Quot and  when we introduce each other i can say a this is eds but it sometimes helps to clarify that we Are not married engaged or otherwise related i acknowledge that this is of minor consequence when one takes into consideration the rest of the worlds problems but hey we Are All entitled to Retreat to the inconsequential once in a while. Gentle Reader inconsequential miss manners has been working on this one for years with the help of countless Well meaning and hard working gentle readers but with no notable Success. By All Means use the gentleman a name when introducing him. But when it is necessary to Point out that you Are a social unit the Best that miss manners can come up with is that you add a we Are a  United feature Syndicate Pokost oils Aries March 21-april 19 ask yourself Are you living by the principles you believe in its time to be yourself. Taurus april 20-May 20 take on a leadership role and teach those things you want to master Lead by example. Gemini May 21-june 20 Wake up to change and bid the past Farewell. Your future looks Bright. Cancer june 21-july 22 make a map of where you be been in order to decipher where you Are going. Follow it. Leo july 23-aug. 22 choices and changes Are on your weekly menu. Choose wisely and go with the allow. Virgo aug. 23-sept. 22 stick closely to the Virgo theme Quot ii it is Worth doing it is Worth doing  Libra sept. 23-oct. 22. You re in the Eye of a storm. Learn from what you see going on around you. Scorpio oct. 23-nov. 21 when you sense discomfort in a relationship Don t run the other Way. Give it a Chance. Sagittarius nov. 22-dec 20 instead of looking outside for guidance look within. Everything you need to know is there. Capricorn dec. 21-Jan. 19 your hard work begins to pay off. Now you can consider taking a vacation. Aquarius Jan. 20-feb. 18 your primary responsibility is to yourself. Don t Compromise your integrity stand your ground. Pisces feb. 19-March 20 use your creative talents to come up with a plan for generating More Cash flow. Copley news  computer virus but not songs attention Erma Bombeck being a hypochondriac of some stature i called my big shot computer son in los Angeles to Tell him my computer gave new meaning to the word  a what Are you saying mom a he asked. A i am saying that the Michelangelo virus that struck a few weeks ago has taken its toll and its Only a matter of  a a what a a matter of time you be never used your computer a he said tiredly. Quot How could it possibly have a virus a a so do you have to play basketball to get a Tom hamstring in a telling you the computer is  a have you been practising Safe soft Wear a he asked. Quot speak English a i demanded. A have you shared a floppy disk with anyone whose soft Wear could have been infected a Quot i done to think  a when was the last time you used your computer a he asked. A a it a been a  How Long a a a in be Only had it four years. In a still setting it  a a you re worrying Over  a you Call my almost losing grandmas family recipe for cabbage Rolls almost nothing Lucky i did no to enter it in the computer. Actually i called to say i done to feel so Good  a a what a the matter a a i done to know. I can to seem to store anything in my memory and the other Day i started to work and everything went Black. I think in be caught  a mom you can to catch a computer  a you told me i could t die from Jet lag but you almost lost me five years ago coming Home from  i Hung up before he told me to a get a life As he usually does. People bom in the computer age can to fully appreciate what its like to live in a foreign world of technology that buzzes and beeps when you make a mistake blinks at you when you done to know what for and talks to you in a language you cannot begin to understand. They have no compassion. Here i am sick As a dog from a virus and can to get Well until i can explain what in be got and where it hurts. I left a message on his answering machine if he should Call and i done to answer in a resting uncomfortably. Urge real press Syndicate it k 11 i 1 \. / the person behind.,. 1. K rations a for inventor Ancel keys 2. Hellmann s Mayo a Deli owner Richard Hellmann 3. Pap test a George Papanicolaou 4. Kit cat clubs a Christopher a a kit Catt 5. Dom Perignon a name of Monk who created Champagne source world features Syndicate Page 10 a sunday april 19, 1992