"Everyday Etiquette"
This week's etiquette lesson comes to us from the chapter entitled:
Let's join our lesson, already in progress...Some of the fellows in our neighborhood have a habit of calling up girls they don't know, trying to make blind dates. Sometimes they call me and some of my girl friends, saying they know who we are through fellows in high school. My mother says I should have nothing to do with them, but it seems all right to me. I said I'd ask you. -J.W.I., Newark New Jersey
Your mother is right. Blind dates are very dangerous unless they are arranged by someone you actually know and can trust. Even then it is safer to take another couple along on a blind date. This way you have some protection in the event of some disagreeable occurrence. Boys who do their blind dating in packs on telephones are usually pretty poor pickings themselves, or they wouldn't have to get dates this way.
-Okay, who are these boys and where were they when I was dating? I didn't even know you could "do blind dating in packs on telephones"! That would have been a whole lot less awkward than being stuck in a restaurant praying your friend calls with an "emergency" so you can get the heck up outta there.
-I'm dying to know what a "disagreeable occurrence" is.
-Did it ever occur to Miss Vanderbilt that maybe these boys were calling "in packs" because asking someone out is completely terrifying?
-That being said, who are the jerks in high school giving my phone number out to people I don't know anyway?
-I bet Miss Vanderbilt's head would explode if she could see how the internet has taken "blind dating in packs" to a WHOLE new level.
And that concludes another lesson in "Everyday Etiquette". Please tune in next week when we will learn what to do when going to a wedding without an escort.
**Questions and Answers from "Everday Etiquette: Answers to Today's Etiquette Questions" by Amy Vanderbilt, 1952-1956**
Just a side note, there are a few illustrations in the book that are credited to a Mary Suzuki and an Andrew Warhol
Back then, everyone was listed in the phone book.
ReplyDeleteA confident young man shouldn't be scared to call a young lady out on a date as long as his intentions were honorable. If he's scared, then perhaps he wouldn't make a good date, or that was the thinking at the time. Ha ha =)
Check out youtube for some hilarious 1950's "how to date" videos. They are a riot!
This is great! I'm not sure if it's still there, but there was 1950s a series on archive.org called "How to be a Teenager." My personal favorite was "Going Steady?"
ReplyDeleteohhhhhhhhhhhhh this is funny!! I want to know where they were too!!! LOL! :):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):)
ReplyDeleteMaggi, your writing always cracks me up in the best sort of way. I'm with you 100% when it comes to wondering (*shuddering*) just what Ms. V was implying when she said disagreeable occurrence. Is that a really discrete way to say the sort of situation that nowadays might involve Chris Hanson?
ReplyDeleteOodles of thanks for your marvelous comments this week, sugar pie, it's such a treat when you stop by! (Wish we lived closer and could visit each other in person, too!).
Wishing a gorgeous Sunday!!!
♥ Jessica
I went on a blind date with a man I met through the Personals in the Berkeley Barb (this was back in the '70's in San Francisco). Like an idiot I gave him my address so he could pick me up at my apartment, then we went IN HIS CAR to dinner where he promptly completely embarrassed me by screaming at the waitress, calling her an incompetent moron and demanding to see the manager. All this because she hadn't brought us the proper glass for the red wine! I took a cab home and that was the first and last blind date I ever attempted.
ReplyDeleteI've never been on a blind date...and a disagreeable occurance, what on earth could that be?!
ReplyDeleteThe phone was popular back then but now...with my 16 year old it is all about the texting. Text text text that is all they do!
Who knows what is next?
I've never been on a good blind date...NEVER. But the ones I did go on were set up by people I did know.One I went out with took out his false teeth and set them in a napkin so he could eat his fried oysters.This was in the sixties in New Orleans at the famous T-Pitaries.I was never so embaressed when the waitress ran after us when we left the restrunt yelling Sir Sir you forgot your teeth!!! This is a true story.I Swear!
ReplyDeleteThanks Maggi for the words of encouragement about my dolls Hon.
XXOO Marie Antionette
hello partner! :) can't wait to get to know you I love your blogs! I'm excited about building you a package!! <33
ReplyDeleteMy goodness times have changed haven't they? So funny!
ReplyDeleteHA! I could see guys that admired girls from afar doing this. And.. you could find EVERYONE in the phone book back in those days!! Dang it.. why didn't I think of that cool dating strategy?
ReplyDeleteHa! You are so hilarious! I love your response.
ReplyDeleteiamemmamusic.blogspot.com