Episode 344 - Dinner Party Download Reprise
In this episode of Awesome Etiquette
Welcome to Awesome Etiquette, where we explore modern etiquette through the lens of consideration, respect and honesty. On today’s show we take your questions on a modern wedding quandary, a very overly intrusive neighbor, double last name confusion, and addressing envelopes. For Awesome Etiquette sustaining members our question is about saying you’re welcome. Plus your most excellent feedback, etiquette salute and postscript on the early days of Dan and Lizzie on the Dinner Party Download.
DPD archive (first three pages)
00:00:04
Speaker 1: maybe it's just that you don't know how to use social, could you see that's old fashioned,
00:00:13
Speaker 1: Watch how busy post and they're supposed to act as host and hostess. They know that courtesy means showing respect, thinking of the other person, real friendliness.
00:00:24
Speaker 1: Hello and welcome to awesome etiquette where we explore modern etiquette through the lens of consideration, respect and honesty. On today's show, we take your questions on a modern wedding quandary, a very, very overly intrusive neighbor,
00:00:41
Speaker 1: a double last name confusion and addressing envelopes for awesome etiquette sustaining members. Our question of the week is about toasts and clinking glasses plus your most excellent feedback etiquette salute and a postscript where we visit the earliest days of awesome etiquette
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Speaker 1: on the dinner party, download podcast. All that coming up,
00:01:08
Speaker 1: awesome etiquette comes to you from the studios of our home offices in Vermont and is proud to be produced by the Emily Post Institute. I'm lizzie Post and I'm dan post sending, hey, how's it going? It's going well, I'm giggling because I know what our intra topic is today and over the please please
00:01:29
Speaker 1: please. Little batty eyelashes and a head tilt. Tell us what your darling darling second daughter has been up to lately.
00:01:39
Speaker 1: It's very etiquette e aria setting is not a big talker as her sister. Anisha was a very verbal little girl all the time and her little sister is more of a watcher. She's got a lot of confidence, social confidence but she doesn't talk as much and I think that
00:01:58
Speaker 1: probably in the first
00:02:00
Speaker 1: 678 words that she learned were please and thank you.
00:02:05
Speaker 1: And when we were answering the question last week about your welcome, I was thinking a lot about arias vocabulary and at what point she would pick up. You're welcome to go with her. Thank you
00:02:18
Speaker 1: because she gets so much work out of those magic words. She she's able to accomplish so much with them. And it's it's really what I've been watching that that that is sort of bringing up an etiquette thought in me, but
00:02:31
Speaker 1: the easy one of the one we were playing with is that she's got this very coy please that she breaks out now where it's like, it's almost like she's posing for the camera, She cocks her head to the side and draws it out a little bit please. She knows if she makes it cute, it's going to that cookie might come. That's what a cutie was. Another one of her early words wasn't cute. That's
00:02:56
Speaker 1: Q. T. You're like yeah, we call you that a lot, don't we? I know right note to self,
00:03:03
Speaker 1: but I I love the fact that not only is she using them all the time, but it's so reiterates the advice that we were giving last week about kids table manners and it's the repetition and I know you and pooch just every single time
00:03:17
Speaker 1: that she asked for something or you gave her something or even it was an interaction between her and her sister. Like not direct one of you two. It was the reminders of please and thank you were there. So I mean she,
00:03:28
Speaker 1: she definitely not only picked it up because you all used it in your house, but because you were really intentional about it.
00:03:34
Speaker 1: Am I right? Are you fooling me? Do I know I appreciate you saying it because I was thinking something very similar as I was reflecting on it and I think she learned those words from us saying them to her
00:03:46
Speaker 1: Yes. Where it's not, it's not us trying to teach her how to say those things to get the things she wants, you use them with her please please.
00:03:54
Speaker 1: So please please becomes the thing that, that that is her ask and the thank you too, which was um I think more of a surprise because it's the follow, but but it was also something she learned really, really early and it's so satisfying. It's um,
00:04:12
Speaker 1: it's nice to hear it, but it's also nice to see it work for totally. So because for her last episodes, a sustaining member question when she's going to start saying you're welcome,
00:04:24
Speaker 1: it's got to be coming, it's got to be coming. And since last week, I think it's more likely to be coming. It's been in my mind totally. They are such little mirrors. They teach us a lot about ourselves. I was going to say, I bet when she does it will be music to your ears
00:04:43
Speaker 1: and I will be sure to keep everyone posted. In the meantime, let's get to some questions. Let's do it.
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Speaker 1: Awesome etiquette is here to answer your questions. You can email them to awesome etiquette at Emily Post dot com. You can leave us a voicemail or text at 802858 kind. That's 8028585463 You can also reach us on social media on twitter. We are at Emily Post on instagram. We are at Emily Post Institute and on facebook we are awesome etiquette. Just remember use the hashtag awesome etiquette with your post so that we know you want your question on the show.
00:05:29
Speaker 1: Our first question is titled Modern Wedding Quandary.
00:05:33
Speaker 1: Good Morning. I really enjoy listening to your show and recently found myself with my own etiquette question. My son is getting married in a few weeks. However, it will just be the parents with an officiant in attendance at this time.
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Speaker 1: They plan to have a full ceremony later when there isn't so much concern with the pandemic and they have more funding
00:05:53
Speaker 1: as they will be paying for it themselves. We will be traveling to attend and have offered to pay for the lodging for the bride and groom. But should I also have a gift prepared? If yes, what would a customary gift be? We may kick in funding when they eventually have the larger ceremony.
00:06:13
Speaker 1: But we've always told our Children that we would pay for college and they would be responsible for their wedding.
00:06:19
Speaker 1: I just want to be prepared for this event even though they have downplayed it by keeping it quiet and we'll announce it afterwards.
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Speaker 1: Also, as a side note, my husband and I did something similar by eloping and never had a ceremony until we did a vowel renewal at 20 years. So my wedding knowledge is limited. Any thoughts thanks in advance in Nevada. Hey Johnny,
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Speaker 1: my big picture thought is going to be some very simple etiquette advice, which is I'd go ahead and get a gift. It's a great way to celebrate and to bring sort of your full participation as a wedding guest to that ceremony experience. However small and limited it might be at this particular moment and I think that's a really admirable, worthwhile good thing to be doing
00:07:07
Speaker 1: was he posed,
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Speaker 1: I have two different thoughts on this. I think that um it's really common for parents to do or or other relatives or people to do a contribution to the wedding as their wedding gift. But when that happens, that's usually set up and explicitly said
00:07:27
Speaker 1: around the idea of the contribution.
00:07:30
Speaker 1: So in this case, if when you were setting up that lodging and you were going to tell your son and his fiancee that you were gonna do this for them, you would say as a gift to you for your wedding, we would love to contribute to your lodging, you know, for the weekend of the wedding.
00:07:45
Speaker 1: And I think that's how it's nice and clear. It's it's understood there won't be anything else coming. This is our our way of gifting something to you.
00:07:52
Speaker 1: And that's also really common. I've participated in a wedding where someone's gift was to do all the flowers and that it just it does happen. But it's it's clearly spelled out. I am also in Dance camp, I will say so my other thought is in Dance camp of I say just get a gift anyway. If budget is it all a concern
00:08:12
Speaker 1: then I would do something simple or smaller and that's perfectly acceptable since you are contributing to the wedding.
00:08:18
Speaker 1: But I think that something would be a good idea and if there really is no room in the budget for any gift, even even a small gift, I would do your words and I would make them very sentimental and I would make the presentation of them on a, on a really nice card, something
00:08:34
Speaker 1: you know, probably without pre written stuff on it. You know, things like that. I would, I would make it just because it's the sun, you know, the parent child relationship is so special.
00:08:44
Speaker 1: Um I think in a lot of ways words can be an incredible gift um at a wedding. So those are my thoughts and I would say in terms of gift ideas it's a little cliche but it's a little cliche because it works for a wedding gift. I don't think you could ever go wrong thinking about the home, thinking about setting up a couple in a home and
00:09:06
Speaker 1: it can be
00:09:08
Speaker 1: really nice towels, you can spend a lot of money really like for a room in the house. That's what the registries are so nice for. I don't know about towels, verse, dishware or something else. Um, but, but it can also be as small as the best lizzie post present. Um, the engraved picture frame,
00:09:26
Speaker 1: that's my favorite as people come together, they might have pictures of them together and it's a,
00:09:34
Speaker 1: it doesn't need to be a big president to be honoring the new couple and to fit in that home well. And for a wedding this small, you're probably unlikely to have a registry when it's just the parents coming for this part at least. And we know that there are lots of considerations when it comes to being invited to a second ceremony and reception for a couple
00:09:55
Speaker 1: when it comes to gifts. But for something that small, there's not likely going to be a registry. And so this, this is where I I do dan I do. I lean heavily on my engraved picture frame is just such a great way to commemorate the day and celebrate them. And it just, it works as long as you get something that's kind of
00:10:14
Speaker 1: goes easily with most decor. You win with this one today. We can't leave this question or at least I can't leave this question without mentioning one other thing. As a side note, my parents also eloped many years ago and didn't do
00:10:29
Speaker 1: Vows are ceremony until they did a renewal and I think they were a good 30
00:10:35
Speaker 1: plus years in when, when they did their ceremony. But you made me think of my parents with your story and I want to wish you the best of luck with the wedding that you have in your future
00:10:45
Speaker 1: husband and wife who have learned to give freely to each other into their family. Have learned the secret of a happy marriage. That kind of love is not new, but not every man and woman knows where to look for it
00:10:58
Speaker 1: and the only place that exists
00:11:00
Speaker 1: and themselves.
00:11:05
Speaker 1: Our next question is a long one
00:11:07
Speaker 1: over my overly involved neighbor,
00:11:11
Speaker 1: Dear lizzie and Daniel. Thank you so much for your podcast, which I've been binge listening to.
00:11:16
Speaker 1: I am at a loss on how to deal with my new neighbor. It's awkward for me at least, but I'm afraid I need to have an uncomfortable and potentially rude probably on my part conversation and I'm seeking your guidance. A few years ago we moved into our dream home, our Forever Home
00:11:33
Speaker 1: situated on a quiet and private drive off a cold. A sack just outside of Washington D. C.
00:11:39
Speaker 1: Little did we know that it came with a built in security system. Our nosy neighbors,
00:11:45
Speaker 1: the family across the street from us, our home all the time. The husband works from home, the wife doesn't work and the grown Children are home
00:11:52
Speaker 1: over the years. We've become friendly, we speak to them, went outside the wife and I are friendly and she's come over for tea on occasion or we've had wine on my front porch.
00:12:01
Speaker 1: But I think that was a mistake. I'd say that we're more than acquaintances but less than friends if that's a thing.
00:12:08
Speaker 1: My neighbor probably is harmless but she hasn't an ounce of situational awareness or social grace. She text me at all hours of the day and night, often commenting on my work attire when she's seen me in my driveway from inside her house. How late I've been at the office about painting our son's bedroom where I'm putting a coffee table that was being delivered
00:12:28
Speaker 1: and last month she pushed her way into our dining room during my birthday dinner to deliver an unnecessary but kind gift, then proceeded to stand at the table complaining about having to cook for her family.
00:12:39
Speaker 1: There I sat beef bourguignon that my dear husband made on the tip of my fork going cold as my husband stands at the front door, she pops over often
00:12:49
Speaker 1: as her questions became increasingly personal. We've tried to keep our distance and we installed shears on the first floor, which I keep close during the day. I close all the blinds and drapes at night to keep prying eyes out. But on the off chance I forget I get a text asking me about what I'm doing in my house.
00:13:06
Speaker 1: I don't feel comfortable being out in my front yard without receiving a text or hearing a comment later about what I was doing or wearing.
00:13:13
Speaker 1: There can be anything from my sweeping my front porch or my husband taking his motorcycle for a spin.
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Speaker 1: I know I need to have an uncomfortable conversation, but I'm terrible at confrontation and also I don't necessarily want to be rude, but I feel in order to get my point across, I may have to be
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Speaker 1: and then I'm worried about it being awkward for the rest of my life.
00:13:34
Speaker 1: This is our dream house, our forever home. I don't intend on ever moving yet. I don't want it to be awkward with my neighbors. My husband and I hate feeling like we're always being watched.
00:13:45
Speaker 1: How do I address this? It seems like such a strange topic to bring up. And honestly, when she text me inappropriate questions, I just ignore her texts but it never stops.
00:13:55
Speaker 1: Please help. I'm not sure what to do with kind regards Kathleen. This is a doozy. This this is a doozy doozy. And I mean normally we shorten questions but there was just a lot in there that you know that's hard. I mean
00:14:11
Speaker 1: this is a doozy. We should be clear. This is beyond I mean this is well beyond standard hellos and how are used that can sometimes feel intrusive. But this, this, you know what I mean? It's like, like sometimes you're like, I want to
00:14:26
Speaker 1: go out pick up the paper at the end of the driveway and not have anyone say hi to me, which was a person that lived on this planet. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like we all have those moments,
00:14:35
Speaker 1: but this is like people observing your behavior and commenting on it regularly. You about the clothes you wear to work. I mean, I know some of our audience is going to write in hearing this say this really borders on or qualifies for stalker ish like behavior.
00:14:50
Speaker 1: And I agree that it is probably going to be a somewhat awkward conversation. But I do think you can find a way to not have to feel rude when you're delivering this or talking about this. But
00:15:03
Speaker 1: I think that's a really important point. It's so hard because what is happening to you is it's pretty bad behavior.
00:15:11
Speaker 1: I mean pushing into someone's dinner that then clearly is like a sit down, you know, family around a couple around the table eating together for your birthday and you stand there and complain about your own cooking for your family. Like that's just like beyond to me she was,
00:15:30
Speaker 1: I don't know that was
00:15:32
Speaker 1: that's that's a beyond moment. But I was trying to think dan about what it would sound like to confront this issue. And some of the first things that are coming to mind are that there has to be a balance struck here between
00:15:46
Speaker 1: detailing all of the bad behavior and at the same time making her aware of all the things that you are considering not appropriate. Also, the next thought I had was I feel like this is a place where it's necessary to say I'm not comfortable with
00:16:04
Speaker 1: and then do the you know that that when you, I feel, you know when you text me about what I'm wearing, even when you're complimenting my outfit, it makes me feel watched, which makes me very uncomfortable.
00:16:18
Speaker 1: I'm hoping you could choose to share a compliment like that when we're in person in the moment, you know what I mean? If we've crossed paths for the day,
00:16:27
Speaker 1: I feel like there's both going to be like, I don't know how would you balance the vastness of how many kind of issues there are with the needing to have a conversation about it, because I could see this being 20 confrontational conversations or one really big one.
00:16:42
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I actually like the direction that you're going. I think that you respond with an awareness of the
00:16:49
Speaker 1: sort of whole situation and at the same time, I wouldn't try to address the whole situation with someone, I would be as specific as you're being and I would start to address the particular instances
00:17:01
Speaker 1: in a way that I might not if they were isolated. So I would make different choices about how I would talk about the most recent text that came in that was bothersome. And I might not say the way you text me is really frightening. I feel like I'm being watched all the time, which is part of the feeling I get as I read this uh
00:17:22
Speaker 1: and just get it out, say that thing to yourself. But then you can address the specifics of the text. And I liked the certainty of your language. And I also like how specific you are about the thing that happened
00:17:35
Speaker 1: and if someone is dealing with um larger issues or they're trying to sort out a number of things about how they relate to neighbors.
00:17:44
Speaker 1: The details about your specific expectations and boundary setting are going to be really important because clearly they're having a hard time making these judgments themselves. And so you're really trying to help them understand what your boundaries are and thinking about it. Like that
00:18:01
Speaker 1: might be a way to think of the conversation as less of a confrontation about bad behavior and
00:18:07
Speaker 1: help you put it into that category in your own mind of this is the work that I'm doing to be comfortable in my forever home and it's work I'm really invested and that's important because
00:18:19
Speaker 1: these are my neighbors and I can't control them, but I can have some agency in my relationship with them. I think so. And part of that agency for me when we go past the like
00:18:31
Speaker 1: the observational stuff where someone's commenting on on what you look like when you didn't actually physically interact with them that day. One of the lines that gets me is that pushed your way into the dining room on my birthday dinner
00:18:43
Speaker 1: and that's a hard moment when someone shows up at the door with a gift for you and our Kathleen acknowledges this is nice, but not expected an unnecessary gift, but it's still a thoughtful, nice thing that she's doing. That can be a really hard thing to balance right because you're good
00:19:01
Speaker 1: recipient skills are telling you I need to be grateful. Someone just gave me something
00:19:06
Speaker 1: and you're, I'm fed up with how this person pushes their life onto me or push it pushes themselves onto me is also in the mix for me, that's a moment where if I can't stop this person at the door, if they do, if I can't say something like open the door a crack
00:19:25
Speaker 1: and say, oh, you know, hi, is everything okay? You know, you're over here and oh yes I'm just here to give you a you know a birthday gift because it's your birthday.
00:19:33
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh now is not a great you know you have to do the thing where you accept the gift but then don't welcome them in. Oh my gosh thank you so much. That's so thoughtful of you. Now actually isn't a good time.
00:19:45
Speaker 1: Could we do the exchange later this week? I could give you a call, we could set something up or you know I'd love to catch up with you a different time and that's the you know now you're starting to close the door and and thank you so much or receive the gift and close the door whichever way feels most natural. But if they've actually pushed past, if she makes it into the house
00:20:05
Speaker 1: now is where at some point when she makes a comment, I think you have to say, oh I hear you on the dinner thing, that's why it's so nice. My husband cooked for me tonight. I am going to have to say, do you mind if we carry on another time or catch up a different time? This is a really special moment for us.
00:20:24
Speaker 1: And I really, I really want to be in it with just my husband or just my family. And I think that when when someone's pushed that far and isn't picking up on the clues that being clear about that, I need to redirect you out of my home right now is fine. I probably wouldn't be as keen to do it if there were a lot of other guests at the house. Does that seem fair dan?
00:20:46
Speaker 1: I agree lizzie post. And it's not always easy to do, but it's important that you assert yourself in those moments. And it's not impolite to do that. It's impolite to
00:20:56
Speaker 1: feel bad about having to assert yourself
00:20:59
Speaker 1: to lose control emotionally and to say something you regret. But to tell someone that now isn't a good moment. There's nothing rude about that. That's that's really something it's okay to say. I was thinking about the way that you would address a particular problem with someone like this. The other piece of advice I wanted to give is to be very specific about
00:21:19
Speaker 1: the behavior it is that you would like corrected.
00:21:21
Speaker 1: So I was thinking about asking someone not to watch you when they're a neighbor. And that's potentially difficult because watching is something that someone else gets to decide for themselves. And
00:21:34
Speaker 1: you could drill down and ask
00:21:36
Speaker 1: for the person not to contact you. It's hard to ask someone not to look out their window or to watch your house. I think you take control the way you can in those situations, you get the blinds, but you can very reasonably ask someone not to text you about it and you can very reasonably give people times that it's okay to text. I think you can
00:21:57
Speaker 1: Very clearly say to a neighbor around 8:00. I really trying to not be on my device and
00:22:04
Speaker 1: it's potentially going to wake me up. I'd like to ask you not to do that and I wouldn't go around telling everyone I meet not to call me after a time when they should know not to call me. You're in control of your exhibiting that behavior consistently. I think it could be a part of repairing that relationship in a way that you don't need to flee from it.
00:22:23
Speaker 1: And I'm also hearing that and I don't want it to deteriorate to the point where
00:22:27
Speaker 1: you're scared to have any kind of contact with this person who
00:22:31
Speaker 1: is a neighbor like you say less than a friend more than an acquaintance in a forever home instance, you know where you're going to really be here for a long time
00:22:39
Speaker 1: and the final, final parting bit of advice and we say a lot of as a part of a lot of our answers. I think it's particularly important in this case. Make your good intentions explicit frame the entire conversation with an explicit statement.
00:22:54
Speaker 1: I want to have a good relationship in here. I want to have a good really, I want to the best possible relationship with my neighbors. That that matters to me. And
00:23:03
Speaker 1: there's something I want to talk to you about as a neighbor. Absolutely dan. Absolutely. I think that is really, really good language for setting it up well as well can be at this degree of correction,
00:23:16
Speaker 1: Kathleen. We are so sorry for the situation that you find yourself in and we really hope that chunk by chunk bit by bit this can get better and that you can really feel comfortable in this beloved forever home.
00:23:31
Speaker 1: The black widow is a menace on five continents in years. When warm weather is prolonged, her numbers increase. She's a constant dweller in many places around homes or other structures
00:23:45
Speaker 1: the widow usually attach is her web in dark corners.
00:23:49
Speaker 1: The black Widow has eight eyes through which he looks into her own world, A world from which man with all his intelligence and research has much to learn.
00:24:03
Speaker 1: Mhm.
00:24:09
Speaker 1: Our next question is titled last name confusion. Dear lizzie and dan. First of all, let me tell you how much I admire you and your show. I've been listening to the podcast for at least three years now and I love the way you address all etiquette matters with good humor, love professionalism and compassion. Thanks for everything I've learned from you.
00:24:27
Speaker 1: Here's my question.
00:24:29
Speaker 1: I recently got married and decided to adopt my husband's last name, but I added it to my maiden name.
00:24:36
Speaker 1: My first struggle was to make sure that people understand. I have one first name and to non hyphenated last names.
00:24:45
Speaker 1: Now that my husband and I are starting to write our christmas card, how should we print our address labels? Are we john and mary jones smith? Or is it better to say we are john smith and mary jones smith.
00:25:00
Speaker 1: Are we the jones smith family? Neither of us have Children and we are well past the childbearing age. By the way,
00:25:07
Speaker 1: I hope you can help me. It might be too late this year, but I hope to get it right for future occasions. Thanks so much. And the happiest of holidays to you and your loved ones. Best regards identity confusion, identity confusion from someone else who
00:25:22
Speaker 1: often uses his mother's last name and his father's last name together as a non hyphenated last name. I appreciate the subtleties of this question. Have you been in this position, sir? Not this exact position because I used that name professionally. Not socially, but it's definitely a choice that I also made at one point, early in my professional career,
00:25:44
Speaker 1: I like the option of john smith and mary jones smith, the option of john and mary jones smith in some ways, communicates the idea that john and mary share the last name, jones smith, that might be entirely um possible or maybe at some point in the future, john decides he would like to be jones smith like you. Yeah, totally. And if that were the case, john and mary, joan smith would work
00:26:12
Speaker 1: just nicely. But given the current situation where I'm assuming that
00:26:17
Speaker 1: john retained the last name smith and we're going to say mary is using joan smith, that I would use the ant.
00:26:23
Speaker 1: I completely agree
00:26:26
Speaker 1: identity confusion. We know that we're long past the holidays, but we hope that this answer helps with future mailings and I will also just add in a little P. S definitely tell people that it's a non hyphenated last name, a lot of people will assume it's hyphenated. I appreciated you including that in the question.
00:26:49
Speaker 1: Our next question is another short one about titles. This one addresses addressing envelopes.
00:26:56
Speaker 1: How do you address an envelope to a couple when the man is a senior junior or third.
00:27:02
Speaker 1: So for this answer a little bit depends on how his partner is choosing to use the last name. So if his in the situation where a a wife goes socially informally by her husband's first and last name,
00:27:19
Speaker 1: this is where you can do the thing where you do Mr and mrs john Jamison and then you do comma Jr period capital J lower case, R period for junior.
00:27:30
Speaker 1: If she doesn't go by his first name, then you leave the junior to only him in all the other circumstances. So you have mr john Jamison, comma junior, abbreviated and then and mrs Eliza Jamison, if she has his last name but doesn't use his first name.
00:27:50
Speaker 1: And then if she has totally her own name kept her own name, it's
00:27:54
Speaker 1: Mr john Jamison comment Junior. And mrs sorry Miss Eliza huck step or whatever her maiden name is. That makes sense. So essentially if the couple is using his full name, first and last, you would also use
00:28:11
Speaker 1: those, I don't want them supplemental titles but those other titles, those suffixes. Yeah, exactly, exactly. And there is a little bit when you, when you research this, there's a little bit of discrepancy between between the comma or not. The comma. Do you want to fill us in on that dan? I was a little alarmed when I discovered that the newspaper style guides, the Ap style guide say omit the comma. I'm just saying to myself that's about efficiency writing for the public and newspapers and for an invitation or addressing someone where it's not all about economy and preserving characters. I would go with the traditional comma comma.
00:28:49
Speaker 1: And what about when we're using like the second or the third or the fourth or fifth?
00:28:54
Speaker 1: Not necessary. No common necessary
00:28:58
Speaker 1: anonymous. We hope our answer helps you when you are addressing couples with suffixes.
00:29:05
Speaker 1: Mm
00:29:07
Speaker 1: mhm.
00:29:08
Speaker 1: Thank you for your questions. Please send us updates or feedback on our answers to awesome etiquette at Emily Post dot com. You can leave a voicemail or text at 802858 K. I N. D. That's 8028585463 Or reach us on social media on twitter. We're at Emily post inst
00:29:27
Speaker 1: on instagram. We are at Emily Post Institute
00:29:30
Speaker 1: and on facebook were awesome etiquette. Just use the hashtag awesome etiquette with your social media posts and we know you want your question on the show.
00:29:42
Speaker 1: Mhm.
00:29:44
Speaker 1: If you love awesome etiquette, consider becoming a sustaining member. You can find out more about this by visiting us at patreon dot com slash awesome etiquette. You'll get an ads, free version of the show and access to bonus questions and content
00:29:57
Speaker 1: plus you'll feel great knowing you helped to keep awesome etiquette on the air and to those of you who are already sustaining members. Thank you so much for your support.
00:30:05
Speaker 1: It's time for our feedback segment where we hear from you about the questions we answer in the topics we cover, and today we're hearing from Katherine regarding the child's safety question from episode 342.
00:30:17
Speaker 1: Hi dan and lizzie, I love love, love the podcast. I am listening to this week's episode and Claire's question about intervening when she saw her friend's car seat installed incorrectly. I have been in this situation so many times, especially with my kids grandparents. It feels so awkward to point out any mistake, but I always hear dance voice in my head saying safety trumps etiquette.
00:30:40
Speaker 1: So I always say something, I try to keep it light and breezy and not accusatory as if pointing out that they did something wrong because I know they care very much that their grandkids are safe.
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Speaker 1: One time in particular, I was driving my mother in law's car with a car seat that she had installed and it just didn't seem right
00:30:57
Speaker 1: despite feeling super uncomfortable about it. I actually called her to ask if she had followed the manual when she said she didn't and had essentially made it up. I knew that I had to take it out and reinstall it the right way.
00:31:09
Speaker 1: My mother in law was very gracious about it too, and I knew I had made the right decision.
00:31:14
Speaker 1: Thanks for everything you do to make the world a nicer place stay safe and take care. Catherine, Catherine, thank you so much that such, it's such a good piece of feedback to here where someone else has executed this well and it worked, you know what I mean?
00:31:28
Speaker 1: Absolutely. Catherine, thank you for the feedback.
00:31:32
Speaker 1: Thank you for sending us your thoughts and updates. Please keep them coming. You can send your feedback or update to awesome etiquette at Emily post dot com. Or leave us a voicemail or text at 802858 K I N D. That's 8028585463
00:31:55
Speaker 1: It's time for our post script segment where we dive deeper into a topic of etiquette and today we're going to be talking about
00:32:03
Speaker 1: the beginning.
00:32:06
Speaker 1: This podcast has origins almost a decade old now cause it feels so old thing. We were babies when we got started in this on air, question answer format. But you really definitely this week have brought the two of us back to the beginning because you've been exploring
00:32:28
Speaker 1: our earliest DPD, that's dinner party download episodes, which is where the show idea, like spun off from.
00:32:36
Speaker 1: Absolutely. It all started with a freak occurrence on google and a search that I was doing turned up an old episode of the dinner party download as a high search result, and it was so, it was so much fun to see it. I
00:32:56
Speaker 1: followed the link and went right down the rabbit hole and I had to grab you and take you down with me and then I said, hey, can we please do a postscript about this? It was so much fun. So I've got to explain a little bit about how the exploration went because it's it's part of why I wanted to do the postscript today. It started off with
00:33:14
Speaker 1: meet in an archive, a search of the dinner party download
00:33:18
Speaker 1: podcast show that was based on lizzie post name. So I got every episode that was catalog with lizzie post name and it was several pages and it looked like a pretty complete showing of our appearances on the dinner party download. I said this is so much fun, I have to share this with lizzie and
00:33:35
Speaker 1: I should share it with the podcast audience because we hear from people that the
00:33:40
Speaker 1: Archive has been binge. That's our archive, 340 something episodes now. But there are more episodes. There are more shows with Lizzie and I answering etiquette questions and
00:33:53
Speaker 1: I tried to go to the very start of that list and
00:33:57
Speaker 1: the show, there clearly wasn't the start. We were referring to the show as a regularly occurring segment at that point, because we should probably break and just explain that the dinner party download started off as a half hour podcast and it was a culture and art show that would hopefully give you fodder for your dinner parties over the weekend.
00:34:18
Speaker 1: And it grew to an hour long show that actually was starting to, that really did air on the radio. I was produced by american public media. So just just to clarify what the show was and what we were on. So when I got to that first, that what appeared to be the earliest episode with lizzie and I on it, we were already opening the segment
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Speaker 1: talking about
00:34:39
Speaker 1: how good it was to be back on this regularly. So, it was one of the show. Okay, so it wasn't like our first appeared like as far back as you could go, you couldn't even get our first appearance on the show up. No, So I went to the longer archive online. There's a longer one, tried. Some different searches went back even further and I managed to get back into 2000 and 14
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Speaker 1: and
00:35:02
Speaker 1: Sort of ran out of links at that point within that archive, went back to the podcast itself and found a show in 2013 where I was able to search through descriptions and find the show. And that episode already had lizzie and me
00:35:18
Speaker 1: again talking about the segment as a regularly occurring segment. So now I've got to go back even further in time and I no longer have descriptions to use to figure out what happened in the show. So, I actually had to listen to the early episodes of the Dinner party download. It was so early in the show that they didn't have the format
00:35:37
Speaker 1: fully established yet they weren't describing the show in a consistent way. The same way the early episodes of this show looks a little different than the regular episodes now.
00:35:47
Speaker 1: Were they the half hour shows? Because we I know we joined them roughly when it became an hour show. Right? I don't know if we were on before the, before the switch, where we
00:35:56
Speaker 1: We were a couple of times, but the archive for the show really starts when they went to that hour long format. So if you go all the way back to our very first episode, your way back in 2012, if you can believe it almost 10 years ago
00:36:13
Speaker 1: and we know the guys already, they refer to us as and the guys are Brendan and rico, the hosts of the dinner party download
00:36:22
Speaker 1: part of what was so fun about it was
00:36:24
Speaker 1: hearing their voices again. They became such good friends. It was like running into old friends again.
00:36:29
Speaker 1: But
00:36:30
Speaker 1: in that very first show they refer to us as the kids family. Do you remember when they adjusted that to say the etiquette ninjas? And I was like, I love that title, it was so much better
00:36:43
Speaker 1: there and then we had capes at one point, I think we were like etiquette superheroes at one point, but they were so much fun. I loved it when you shared the link and told me where to go
00:36:53
Speaker 1: uh listen in the file that you shared with me hearing their voices here, hearing how young and vibrant we sounded. I mean it was like
00:37:03
Speaker 1: pre pandemic, you know, just like so pretty, so many things. But it really brought me back. It really brought me back to talking to the two of them and also
00:37:14
Speaker 1: to laughing about how those conversations that we had with them were then edited, like the particular one that you show, like, I mean we are, we're like slinging insults with a lot of joking going on that like
00:37:30
Speaker 1: you wouldn't necessarily hear us do that same way on on awesome etiquette, but being with the boys, being with the guys, it was like, we don't know, there was this thing about how everyone was kind of like
00:37:42
Speaker 1: laughing about how how rude people could be kind of, you know what I mean? Like that it was like a choice, you know, and I don't know, it was I thought I thought it was a lot of fun, but it was also it was it was fun to hear that kind of almost like make fun of etiquette while also finding the useful true answer that I felt like that show had, you know,
00:38:02
Speaker 1: it really did and it's worth mentioning and should be noted that
00:38:06
Speaker 1: the show was often humorous, that it was designed to feed your dinner party conversation. It was your weekly dinner party download.
00:38:15
Speaker 1: And there was a regular segment on the show about etiquette that we visited monthly, but when we weren't there, they would have celebrity guests answering the etiquette questions as metallic. I think the very first episode had tim Gunn answering etiquette questions. Uh
00:38:35
Speaker 1: also I was going to say depending on who it was. Sometimes it was really great advice. Sometimes it was purely humorous. You know, I happened to find the show because I was doing a lot of etiquette searching where Judith martin was a guest on the dinner party download. I'd love to hear that one. When we're talking about feeding your
00:38:54
Speaker 1: uh dinner party conversation, there is a great feature on the show where guests share a favorite joke as the opening for the show. The show opens every week with a joke icebreaker. Absolutely. I was going through and I was reading show descriptions and the
00:39:13
Speaker 1: length of time it took me to read a show description was about how long it took them to tell the opening joke. So I was just sitting there show after show after show after show joke cracking up. Just loving it. Did you ever find one that you did? I know they asked us to submit them a couple of times. I don't know that ours were ever used.
00:39:32
Speaker 1: They used my three knock knock jokes. They did, they did. Oh, do you have them or do do we want to send people to go for? I'll never tell you have to go find the three knock knock jokes. Okay,
00:39:44
Speaker 1: fair enough cousin. Fair enough. Um, it really, it really is fun to think about that show, as I said before as the origins for this show, that the couple of questions, the debating things back and forth, the exploring different elements of a question.
00:40:03
Speaker 1: Well, it's all stuff, you know, we're familiar with her before doing interviews, that sort of thing.
00:40:09
Speaker 1: Doing it with two very bright and funny individuals doing it together as a team, which was pretty rare for us. Typically back then when we did interviews, we did them solo unless it was requested that two of us join. And it happened to be that the guide, our company who was setting up interviews at that time
00:40:28
Speaker 1: set us up to do it together and we thought it would be a good thing together.
00:40:31
Speaker 1: And it we were so delighted when they came back and said, could we do a regular running segment with you? It was the kind of thing we'd always hoped for and these, these, we felt like we're the perfect hosts to do it with and it was just so much fun
00:40:47
Speaker 1: and it really did. I think prep us well for getting to the point because we did that show for years before we started
00:40:53
Speaker 1: awesome etiquette and I think it really prepped us to do awesome etiquette. Well, I think of them as like a big brother cousins show that big sisters show that we look up to, you know, and emulate and then like branched off on our own. I think that's really well said. And we were talking earlier about how it was sort of a humorous take, something about their type of humor didn't make etiquette the butt of the joke. And it's something that we always
00:41:23
Speaker 1: worried about when we talked about mixing etiquette and humor because it's such an easy thing to do
00:41:29
Speaker 1: and ultimately there so respectful. Their their humor was was quick and witty, but it came from a good place and that that worked really well with our material. And I think the best evidence of that, how how natural a fit it was was that people started very quickly writing in requesting that their questions be delivered to
00:41:48
Speaker 1: lizzie and dan from the Emily Post Institute. And they can the post kids answer this because people like the humor, but they also wanted the good answer to went well together
00:41:59
Speaker 1: well. And the humor to that was like a lot of the times we were able to make fun of the rudeness. Like in in the clip that you showed me. I mean we're bringing up the idea of how are you complimenting someone when you say certain things
00:42:14
Speaker 1: and most of the actual like, answer we give is us joking about the thing you wouldn't say to somebody, like
00:42:21
Speaker 1: and in case you're ever wondering. Yeah, exactly, just like no, we don't recommend this and and we do say like we actually say it rather than not say it. Um but it's, it was a lot of times making fun of the bad etiquette and they're they're just was an element with those two that made that really fun to do.
00:42:41
Speaker 1: I miss I miss them a lot. I miss those segments.
00:42:44
Speaker 1: Well, I'm looking forward to sending a little clip of this postscript to both rico Gagliano and Brendan Noonan of,
00:42:52
Speaker 1: well, formerly of the dinner party download, we'll definitely be putting up links over on Patreon, so jump on over to Patreon slash awesome etiquette to check those out. And we once again highly recommend looking through this archive not only for more awesome etiquette style content,
00:43:09
Speaker 1: but also for those opening jokes, knock knock.
00:43:12
Speaker 1: I'll never tell.
00:43:14
Speaker 1: Here we are at a nice friendly party. Watch carefully everything the people at this party do and say then ask yourself would I rate them plus a minus as friends
00:43:26
Speaker 1: ready? Here we go.
00:43:31
Speaker 1: Yeah,
00:43:32
Speaker 1: we like to end our show on a high note, so we turn to you to hear about the good etiquette you're seeing and experiencing out in the world and that can come in so many forms. Today we have a salute from Kesha.
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Speaker 2: I went to the grocery store back in May and this was during a time when I mostly was doing my grocery shopping online, but there were always those few things that I had to go to the store to get because they were unavailable or for whatever reason.
00:44:00
Speaker 2: So I went into the store and proceeded to decide that I didn't need a car. It was just a couple of things,
00:44:08
Speaker 2: but I started stacking things into my arms very precariously might I add? And sure enough, after five minutes of this I had a tower that was passed my mask
00:44:21
Speaker 2: and up to my eyes and it toppled to the ground and it was so embarrassing. And so my etiquette to loot is for a
00:44:31
Speaker 2: police officer who was in plain clothes and just had a local police cap on like a baseball cap. That must have been his day off.
00:44:40
Speaker 2: And he was pushing an empty cart with what appeared to be his teenage son
00:44:45
Speaker 2: and he saw all of this transpire all of my items I've been holding on the floor and said
00:44:51
Speaker 2: ma'am would it be okay if I approached to help you pick those up? And I said, yes, thank you. Uh so first of all, that was so kind that he even asked to make sure it was okay to get within my six ft bubble there.
00:45:04
Speaker 2: And so after he proceeded to pick up most of the things that I had dropped, he just
00:45:10
Speaker 2: kicked him right into his empty cars there and said, I'm going to go ahead and give you this Carson, would you go grab another one? So I just thought that was so kind in a time when when people's anxieties were just really up and
00:45:24
Speaker 2: we all can just really benefit from being kind to one another. So
00:45:30
Speaker 2: hats off to you sir, thank you very much for your help and dan and lindsey. I am a super fan of the show. I'm an added listener of podcast and yours is one of only two
00:45:41
Speaker 2: that I stay completely current with. So thanks for all the great work you do and I hope that the next generation of little cousins takes on the mantle and continues all the wonderful things of Emily post. Thank
00:45:54
Speaker 1: you.
00:45:55
Speaker 1: Oh keisha, That is such a great example of just when, when someone truly does in a very gentle and respectful way, come to your rescue and just make your life here, you know, just everything. It's like it sued the embarrassment. It sued the issue of now I still have all these items but what am I gonna do with them? And it just,
00:46:15
Speaker 1: and then a great example of a like, you know, probably teen or preteen being helpful like it. That's just, it's lovely. It's a lovely example of
00:46:23
Speaker 1: kindness and compassion out out in the world and especially this was back in May. So during times that are difficult and confusing.
00:46:32
Speaker 1: Kita, thank you so much for the salute.
00:46:38
Speaker 1: Mhm
00:46:39
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening and thank you to everyone who sent us something and who supports us on Patriot.
00:46:47
Speaker 1: Please connect with us and share this show with friends, family, co workers and on social media. You can send us your next question feedback or salute by email to awesome etiquette at Emily Post dot com. You can leave us a message or text at 80285 A kind. That's 8028585463 on twitter. We are at Emily Post inst on instagram. We are at Emily Post Institute and on facebook were awesome etiquette and the Emily Post Institute,
00:47:14
Speaker 1: please consider becoming a sustaining member by visiting patreon dot com slash awesome etiquette. Where you are also going to find some pretty awesome bonus content. You can also subscribe to the ads version of our show on Spotify or your favorite podcast app.
00:47:28
Speaker 1: And if you love awesome etiquette, please consider leaving us a review that helps with our show ranking, which helps new people find awesome etiquette.
00:47:35
Speaker 1: Our show is edited by chris Albertine, an assistant produced by Bridget Down all the way up in Alaska. Thanks critics, Bridget Bridget.
00:47:47
Speaker 1: Mhm.
00:47:50
Speaker 1: Mhm
00:47:52
Speaker 1: mm.