The women sit, getting colder and colder, on a seat getting harder and harder, watching oafs, getting muddier and muddier.

It is not done to let anybody be too happy. The moment two people seem to be enjoying one another's company, a good hostess introduces a third element or removes the first.

The women sit, getting colder and colder, on a seat getting harder and harder, watching oafs, getting muddier and muddier.

Say something idiotic and nobody but a dog politely wags his tail.

suppose you invest time and effort in designing a new image for yourself. You get home and your husband takes one look and screams, 'Was the other person hurt? I see you've been in a head-on collision.' ... Men hate any change.

England is the only civilised country in the world where it is etiquette to fall on the food like a wolf the moment it is served. Elsewhere it is comme il faut to wait until everybody has helped himself to everything and until everything on everybody's plate is stone cold.

On the whole, and providing one is in good spirits and feeling reasonably bright, it is not hard to converse for a short space of time on subjects about which one knows little, and it is indeed often amusing to see how cunningly one can steer the conversational barque, hoisting and lowering her sails, tacking this way and that to avoid reefs, and finally racing feverishly for home with the outboard engine making a loud and cheerful noise.