ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, September 4, 1996 TAG: 9609040134
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: BEN BEAGLE
SOURCE: BEN BEAGLE
All right, I'll admit it. I've started reading Miss Manners.
She recently was on the cover of Modern Maturity - the magazine of the American Association of Retired Persons - which I tend to read because it has all these scary articles about Medicare.
The cover photo shows her to be an imposing figure of er, ah, um , a mature woman.
I'm not sure reading Miss Manners is going to help. I'm pretty far gone in being a slob.
But I try.
For example, I no longer floss my teeth in public with the edges of matchbook covers. This is because I no longer smoke and no longer carry matches. But a day doesn't go by that I don't want to get my hands on a matchbook cover.
Neither my mother nor my grandmother can be blamed for the way I turned out. They tried to teach me manners. And I'm glad they raised me instead of a village.
I won't mention here other reasons I ought to be known as the Big Loathsome - such as washing down my pills with the milk that's left in the Crispix bowl.
I do this in the privacy of my own kitchen, and I hope you won't go around blabbing about it.
I like Miss Manners' style when she answers questions - ranging from whether it's impolite to talk about somebody else's sunburn to whether it's nice to be fashionably late for a dinner party.
Her questions appear to come from normal people. At least I've never seen one from a cross-dresser.
Her answers are stately, although I sometimes have trouble understanding them, and they are well-written.
For example, I might write and she might answer like this:
"DEAR MISS MANNERS: I'm a world-class slob who would like to do something about it. The worst of my habits is spilling stuff down my front. Recently, I ruined my official 50th high school reunion T-shirt with spaghetti sauce. I could have cried."
"GENTLE READER: It occurs to Miss Manners that you are needlessly inflicting pain on yourself. Miss Manners does not wish to be cruel but she feels - given the fact that you've already had your 50th high school reunion - you are beyond help at your age. Miss Manners sympathizes with your dismay over ruining your T-shirt, although she holds such a garment in low regard as clothing for civilized persons."
I may actually write a letter to Miss Manners one of these days.
But first I have to see if I can Shout the spaghetti sauce out of my T-shirt.
LENGTH: Medium: 56 linesby CNB