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Dear Mary

Dear Mary: How can I make my polite English husband interrupt like a German?

Plus: What to do with all those first editions from book launches, and how to deal with a fellow guest who drinks from your wine glass

24 May 2014

9:00 AM

24 May 2014

9:00 AM

Q. My dear English husband has never mastered the knack of timing his interventions in conversation. He hesitates politely, and by the time somebody pauses, his comments are no longer to the point so he shuts up. After 45 years I always know when there’s something he wants to say, and it’s become a sort of party turn that I butt in and call for order for the next speaker — which doesn’t reflect well on either of us.

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