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THE CELTIC CONNECTION • OCTOBER 1992
Dear Emily Post: I Need Your Help —Desperately!
By PATRICK TAYLOR
Emily Post, that great arbiter of etiquette, usually had an answer for every social dilemma. I could have used her expertise when I was formally introduced to my wife-to-be's extended family.
At that time, I was an impecunious medical registrar and the light of my life was a student nurse. She came from one of the
older Ulster families and, in the Sixties, we were still a bit class-conscious.
On the night in question, her mother, father, and her mother's sevensisters had arranged a dinner for us. I was duly introduced to the armada of aunts. All had pet names. "This is Do-Do, and this is Buffy, this is Poodles, Nonie, Mole, Ratty, and Jean."
I could not for the life of me imagine addressing any of these imposing dowagers as "Poodles," never mind "Ratty," and was heartily relieved to be seated beside Aunt Jean at the dinner table. She was a pleasant lady, of indeterminate but advanced years, definitely sprightly. Indeed, she may even have been spry.
We chatted throughout the meal.
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I don't think the subjects were of great consequence, but I was smugly gratified that I was making a good impression.
My thoughts were confirmed when, as coffee was being served, she leaned over and whispered, "Young man, I have a little present for you," pressing a bundle into my hand. Convinced that I had just become the recipient of a family heirloom, I surreptitiously unwrapped the gift below table level.
Emily Post, Emily Post, please tell me the correct method, at a very formal dinner, surrounded by your intimidating in-laws-to-be, of returning to a gentle old lady, her dentures.
Not Exactly Brotherly Love
A recent visitor to e casulty department of UCG Regional Hospital was a farmer with a broken arm. When he arrived he was still verbally abusing his brother, who'd brought him in.
Earlier in the day, the two men had been storing hay in a barn. The victim was seen with his arm against a wall where there was an electric socket. He had his leg in the air and his whole body was shaking.
Seeing his "plight," the brother grabbed a stick and hit him on the arm to knock him away from the wall. All the man had been doing was trying to shake a small stone out of his shoe. This did not appear in the press and may be just a good story!
— Liatn Ferrie
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