america's most wanted

My etiquette handbook is really lacking for the situations I find myself in. For example, when my customer invited me to go shoot RPGs tomorrow, I really wasn't sure how to respond. So I said maybe we should stick to guns and archery. The customer said "oh, but it's so much easier to hit the target with an RPG". When my manager got wind of this invite, he said I couldn't go. I can't say I'm too disappointed.

And today, I accidentally stuck my hand out to the wrong guy, and was completely humiliated by his reaction. This happened in a group of my customers. I apologized profusely but then one told me afterwards not to worry about it. I would like to point out that my etiquette book SAID I should offer my hand first as most ME men will not take the initiative. That was completely wrong, and in fact it's the opposite. I'm supposed to wait until they offer their hand to me.

And, I'm never quite sure what to do when people bring me things. One of the frogs has started calling me "the don" because people bring food to my desk all the time (today I was brought a Thai banana from a frog, a normal banana from a brit who gets fresh fruit at his hotel, a sandwich from one of the officers who doesn't even work in my building and whom I've met once, a bag of sesame sticks, a breakfast bar, and a coke). He jokes that he is my tea boy, and made a big production in the office the other day, shifting my tea cup around saying "Today, she wants her tea here. Tomorrow, if she is not happy, I will move her tea here. And every day I will clean her desk." The tea boy in our office cleans my desk every morning and then arranges my cup exactly where it was when he started cleaning my desk. I don't know why he does this. He doesn't clean anyone else's desk. Maybe because my desk is always sticky from eating grapefruit.

I've started calling the frog that fixed my hotel room, and that pretends to be my tea boy, "Cheeky". He calls me "darling" (well, he calls everyone darling). I've nicknamed one of my colleagues "gangsta" and the other one "kid Texas". The brits call me blondie, the MEs are all starting to call me Freddie, and the scots, I just found out today, refer to me as "america's most wanted". Who knew they were fans of Ice Cube.

My etiquette book, BTW, says that nicknames are considered inappropriate since they are normally reserved for family because they are considered too informal for outsiders.