Goodness, mind your manners!

Judith Martin, a.k.a Miss Manners, has written a new book of good manners in which she sums up her broad knowledge on the topic and dispenses it for her reading public. I haven't read the book, but the NY Times book review by Julia Reed gives it a thumbs up. I can't imagine writing such a book in our age of neanderthals and troglodytes, but if ever a people and time needed it, it is our people in our time. We've taken to insulting each other in politics (when's the last time you heard a really good political discussion?), avoiding each other in conversation (hello internet), and eating out of a bag. Forget the salad fork, we can hardly identify a metal fork.

Of course, the advice comes off as somewhat elitist (good manners are, after all, the bourgeoisie imitating the artistocrats) and for a feminine readership (how many husbands actually help with the thank you notes or even consider getting monogrammed sheets?) but she doesn't just give the typical 'which cutlery for which course' kind of advice. She also has some very practical advice for the rest of us, i.e. the non-elitist neanderthals:

...and she recognizes that there is a need for such social niceties as the hungover apology letter (you should laud your hostess's own behavior as ''magnificent'' while owning up to no specific behavior of your own).

note to self: write to compliment host, not to apologize for boorish behavior! Yep, got it. And one more thing, screw the monogrammed sheets.

By the way, don't you think Judith Martin looks a 70yr old Paris Hilton?