Miss Manners: When should one respond to an RSVP request if not planning to attend?

I send regrets for small group invitations, but am not sure what's expected and most helpful when included in a mass mailing ...

Miss Manners: I break out my best china and finery for these dinners, the least you can do is RSVP

Miss Manners hopes, however, that you will not otherwise dumb down your charming, seated dinner parties because of a few outlaws. We, the purveyors of fish knives and strawberry forks, are a dying ...

Miss Manners: They don’t RSVP but still show up to my formal dinner parties expecting a seat

I hold formal dinner parties with limited place settings. But there are friends who never respond to my invitations and show ...

Miss Manners: I’ve been told to banish these guests from the main table

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am a single man who inherited, from my parents and grandparents, both a love of entertaining and also a great deal of the trappings needed — china, crystal, linen, silver — that ...

Miss Manners: They graciously allowed us to stay at their lake house ... we privately vowed to never return

Our friends graciously offered us use of their rustic lakeside cabin, as they no longer can travel there themselves. We had a disappointing time and cut our stay short due to the terrible odor, ...

Miss Manners: As they say, unexpected guests don’t get fish knives

I am a single man who inherited, from my parents and grandparents, both a love of entertaining and also a great deal of the trappings needed – china, crystal, linen, silver – that other relatives didn ...