It is wrong to wear diamonds before luncheon, except on one’s marriage rings. Before, after, and during breakfast, luncheon and dinner, it is vulgar to wear a mixture of colored precious stones. It is always a comfort to know that so many things one can’t afford to do anyway are vulgar.

Allowing an unimportant mistake to pass without comment is a wonderful social grace.

People say when you're in love, you don't need etiquette. Well, you need it then more than anything. Or they say, "At home I can just be myself." What they mean is they can be their worst selves... They always mean they will save all their anxiety about how to behave for somebody like the head waiter of a restaurant, someone they'll never see again.

People will say, 'Seventy isn't old, it's middle-aged,' and I think, middle of what - 140?

Fairness does not consist so much of everybody's doing the same thing, but of everybody's being willing to do something that others don't want to do.

Email is very informal, a memo. But I find that not signing off or not having a salutation bothers me.

Adorable children are considered to be the general property of the human race. Rude children belong to their mothers.