Unsolicited Advice #21: How to develop and deliver an apology

When you have done something deeply wrong, for example picked a fight with your boyfriend at four AM, reparations are in order.  It is your responsibility to demonstrate that you have a scheme to avoid future peregrination down the path that led to your reprehensible behavior.

Step-by-step instructions:

1. Stop it!
2. Say you're sorry
3. Set aside some time for self-reflection, either in solitude or in the company of a helpful friend (not the aggrieved party)
• Identify the pattern of thought or deed that induced you, an otherwise kind and caring person, to comport yourself like a selfish fool
• Describe that pattern in precise, nonjudgmental human language (i.e. "lack of compassion" not "being dumb as a stump")
• Draw up a self-improvement plan that directly addresses the pattern in question*
4. Express your contrition to the injured party again.  Take responsibility by laying out the etiological relationship between your unfortunate pattern and the crummy thing you did.
• Consider sharing your self improvement plan with the target of your onslaught**

*The Dewey Decimal number for Self Help is 150.  The more enterprising, or less literate, might also look to hermit in a cave.

**User discretion is advised here. It is often unnecessarily self-indulgent to share your plan.

Unsolicited Advice #17: Instant Message Etiquette

Nobody likes feeling snubbed.  But with the casualness of the instant messaging medium sometimes one gets involved in a conversation at an inopportune or inconvenient time.  This is particularly true because a conversation can be started by one party without the other party's consent.  The protracted process of polite conversational extrication can in those instances be too much.

We give you permission to sign off abruptly with no real excuse.  

Just be sure to include a salutation and to sign your communication with your initial or name.

Invite to Opine #3: facebook

This blog's editorial staff is married on facebook.  We find that our faux-union is a pleasing simulacrum of our real-life long term, committed best friendship.  But we also know that marriage is a real state for some folks and that our misapplication of the "relationship type" function on that website is perhaps dishonest.  

What are the taste issues involved in misrepresentation on social networking sites?  

Restaurant Ethics

Several guidelines for restaurant-going:

(1) Always take the less advantageous chair (i.e. the one with the worse view, back to heavy traffic, etc.).

(2) Ask the person you're with whether they're ready to order before proceeding to order yourself.

(3) Interrupt your conversation when the server approaches your table.

(4) Thank the server for everything, including water refills.

(5) Never ask for a different table once you're already seated.

(6) Wait until after you've ordered to use the bathroom.

(7) Never ask what someone at another table is eating.

(8) Order a coffee for dessert at the very least, so your companion feels comfortable getting something if they're so inclined.

(9) Never leave a restaurant once you've already been seated.

(10) If you're paying for another person, never suggest that they get the cheapest thing on the menu.

(11) Assume that you're splitting the bill, unless otherwise discussed.

Dresses

As someone who wears dresses and skirts most days, this arbiter of taste would like to weigh in on the comments characterizable by the phrase "Oh, I love to see a girl in a dress."

It's tasteless. I'd love to see you in a dress, Buddy.

I'm looking fine today because I want to, not because I want you to be pleased by my conformist femininity.

Unsolicited Advice #7: Cite the Economy

Blame "the recession economy" for all poor fashion, relationship problems, and purchasing mistakes.

It's the new "mercury in retrograde."

Theory #4: Aguste Comte

From The Positive Method and Its Application to Social Phenomena: "... respect for our ancestors is the basis of a sound social order."  He also pretty much thinks that revolution is the result of increasing specialization in the absence of religious communion.

Your grandmother wanted you to have good manners.  So unless you want to destroy the social order, you'd better demonstrate your respect for her by figuring out which forks to use when and how to write a thank you card.  This blog can help.

If you are one of those kids who wants to set the social order asunder and you're not content with using the fish fork for your salad or skipping church to get really good at algebraic topology, please contact the editorial staff of this blog immediately.  We've got advice.

Unsolicited Advice #6: Prerequisites for Party Attendance

Never arrive at a party without a gift.  My mother, a woman of little planning and huge generosity, regularly picks up stones from the driveway on her way to a gathering.  Gifts of stone, plant, or pastry are especially welcome.  Call them hostess gifts even if the recipient is male.