Avoid mentioning money on social media

DEAR MISS MANNERS:

I posted on social media that I was excited to have received a stimulus check. One comment on my post said that others were giving their checks to those more in need, “maybe even family members.”

The comment was from the wife of my cousin. She clearly implied that I should consider giving funds to her husband, whom she has long been separated from, and from whom she is financially independent.

My wife and I disagree about the propriety of the comment. One of us thinks the public solicitation crossed the line. The other thinks the comment placed the wife’s reputation at risk for the benefit of another, and so was actually praiseworthy.

GENTLE READER: Demanding that people hand over their money or they will get hurt, where the threat is to harm their reputations rather than their bodies, is the social equivalent of a crime. How the money is then used does not justify the means of getting it.

However, it is never a good idea to post about your financial gains.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I’ve gotten some unsolicited advice on how one drinks tea, and now I’m worried that it will be cold before I figure out how to drink it.

A distant acquaintance told me that when you stir sugar into your tea, you’re not supposed to let the spoon hit the side of the cup and make a noise. Is that true?

This same acquaintance has also told me that the milk and sugar have to go into the cup first, or I’m doing it wrong. But is there really a protocol for that sort of thing?

When I’m drinking tea and eating a cookie at the same time, may I put the cookie on the saucer next to the cup, or does it deserve its own separate plate?

Last of all, may I dunk the cookie in the tea, or is that sort of thing not allowed?

GENTLE READER: Before you blithely break cookies with these people, you should realize that you have entered a controversy so heated as to make American politics look bland in comparison.

This matter of the MIFS (Milk In Firsts) vs. the TIFS (Tea In Firsts) is of great concern to people who have nothing better to do. Scientific arguments about beverage temperature are cited.

Miss Manners sides with the TIFS, if only because they are able to make the more devastating characterizations.

But surely she can trust you to stir in the middle of your cup without clanking and to dip your cookie while no one is looking.

Submit your etiquette questions to Miss Manners at dearmissmanners@gmail. com.