DEAR MISS MANNERS: The houses in our neighborhood have very outstanding “No soliciting” indicators on the entrance doorways.
This normally doesn’t cease varied salespeople from ringing our doorbells and regularly knocking on our door, as they will see via our open curtains that we’re house.
They at all times appear incredulous once I yell “The sign says ‘No soliciting’; that means you!” at them when they’re standing in my yard, trying proper at me via my lounge window.
It feels impolite to yell at strangers, nevertheless it additionally seems like they’re trespassing and violating my privateness after they disregard my signage and look into my house.
What would you may have me do sooner or later?
GENTLE READER: Your request for stronger measures — after admitting to the follow of yelling, at strangers, loudly sufficient to be heard via a closed window — not unnaturally makes Miss Manners cease to suppose earlier than she responds.
Is that this a case of 1 straggler per week who, although annoying, could possibly be both ignored or turned away on the door with a brusque “No, thank you”? Or is there a line of salespeople jostling on the gate, day and evening, whose comings and goings are preserving the infant awake?
Earlier than we begin constructing fences, investing in locks or calling the police, have you ever tried figuring out the corporate whose representatives these are? If the repetition and intrusiveness is as severely invasive as you counsel — and you may hold your tone icily civil whenever you complain — you possibly can let the corporate’s attorneys cope with potential illegalities.
DEAR MISS MANNERS: We attended a charity occasion for a homeless shelter — an occasion we have now gone to for a number of years. This time, there was a visitor speaker who was a former consumer of the shelter.
This gentleman had gone there when he was homeless and recent out of jail. He spoke for 45 minutes, which I assumed was method too lengthy, and he included particulars about how he was a gang member, how his spouse stole vehicles and the way his youngest youngster was conceived on the shelter. He additionally talked at size about how all of this led to him changing into a born-again Christian.
Would it not be unsuitable to present suggestions to the shelter director that this speech was too lengthy and too detailed? It was a turnoff for me!
GENTLE READER: Previous to dinner, did you make two on-line purchases, register at an internet site, drop a toddler in school, and go to a physician’s appointment? And in each one in every of these encounters, had been you requested if the alternate met your expectations and to present suggestions?
Had been you then in a position to publish your opinion about each different side of your day in your varied social media feeds?
Miss Manners suspects that if she has the specifics unsuitable, she has the gist proper: You have got had greater than sufficient alternatives to voice your opinion about all the things.
Must you additionally inform the individuals who fed you concerning the stuff you didn’t like at their occasion? Did they even ask?
