Service of Persnickety People
July 9th, 2026
Categories: Destination Wedding, Entertaining, Persnickety, Too Much, Wedding
We all know or have heard of a persnickety person or one with unreasonable expectations or habits.
I knew a husband who followed his wife around the kitchen as she made dinner. If she stirred a pot of pasta or sauce and put down the spoon, he’d grab and wash it.
Friends who entertain a lot hate it when, after a dinner party, guests wash the piles of dishes, [they don’t want a dishwasher], because nobody’s hand dishwashing skills meet their standards.
What inspired me to cover the topic was a reader of the New York Times Social Q’s column who asked Philip Galanes, “We received two wedding invitations recently that requested attire more specific than the usual cocktail, formal or black tie optional. One invitation requested that we “dress in a specific color palette. The other asked that we wear a shade of blue.”
The nerve!
“Shop your closet,” advised Galanes who thought that the request was a “friendly suggestion” inspired by a wish for color coordinated photos. He wrote that the reader should do her best but not to feel obliged to buy something new.
So many brides and grooms have an overblown view of the importance of their special day. They drag people to expensive resorts, expect them to attend countless peripheral events, anticipate outrageous gifts and are incredibly self-centered.
Have your friends or acquaintances exhibited persnickety habits or irritating requests?
They wouldn’t be friends for very long…
Jeanne, most of my friends have what I call “the cleaning disease”. They would do what the husband and friends in your stories do–and more. One rinses dishes in vinegar in addition to running them through the dishwasher! Imagine his shock and dismay when he brought his children to a birthday party at my house and saw that we were were drawing on my patio with sidewalk chalk! I promised him I’d have the children wash their hands before we sent them home. He said he wasn’t as “bad” as I thought he was, that six months ago his children had received sidewalk chalk for Christmas. I asked him if the chalk had been taken out of the package yet. No comment. But to his credit he allowed the children to stay and draw. I do not have such an affliction but when I asked one of my “cleaning disease” friends how they all can put up with me she answered, “We are all looking for permission to calm down a bit. Permission granted!
I TOO LIKE TO SHADOW BETTY CLEANING EVERY POT AND UTENSIL SHE USES. COMPULSIVE/FORCE OF HABIT? TIMES A CHANGING…LIKE THE YOUNGER GEN, WHEN INCLUDED IN FAMILY INVITE, ASSUMES RIGHT TO BRING BOY/GIRL FRIEND ( FROM WHO NARY A THANK YOU ).
TC,
WOW! Homer did most of the cooking and would have removed me from the premises post haste had I shadowed him although it would never have occurred to me. He didn’t like anyone around him when he cooked, and he was quite a chef.
As for thank you’s, I predict that in a few years the words will have little meaning. People showing up uninvited is a curse. There was another reader of one of the advice columns who asked how to tell friends who automatically bring kids to an adult party to please not do that.
I just remembered something that happened when I was a teen. My mom, a cleaning disease sufferer, threw out all of my shoes one morning while I was sleeping! She quietly crept into my room and threw out every last pair. As I fished a pair of leather clogs out of the garbage and started cleaning them with lemon scented oil (to get the cat food smell out) I asked her why on earth she did such a thing. She said that all of my shoes were falling apart and she was afraid people would think I wasn’t loved. Her heart was in the right place but what was I supposed to wear in the shoe store while shopping for new shoes? Lemony cat food smelling clogs I guess! I still laugh when I think about it and other things that happened (one time she cut up a brand new credit card that had come in the mail because she was so busy clearing the clutter she hadn’t read the expire date of the card she was cutting up!).She would empty an ashtray 3 times if someone had a cigarette in our house. RE; the wedding people I agree that it’s a suggestion and that people should wear what ever they have. You have to meet people where they are at. If the bride and groom have their priorities straight they won’t remember who wore what.
Nancy,
I used to wear my shoes until they were falling apart, and it drove my mother nuts. However, she never tossed any of them. She just asked me to replace them.
Some friends have whistle clean and perfect homes while others live in a jumble and I’m in between. Once we were going on vacation with a plane to catch. I usually had to move Homer along but this time he was at the front door and I was at the kitchen sink. “What are you doing?” he asked. I said there were a few dishes in the sink and I didn’t want folks to think I was a lousy housekeeper if the plane went down.
Never had that happen! Some kind of nerve! Think I would have worn black!
BC,
I used just those words in the blog—Nerve!!!!!!!!!!!
You make me laugh! I get it if the wedding is on a beach, asking for summer casual or in a formal club, choosing the words so you don’t get a bunch of ripped jeans, it helps a guest know how to fit in, {and not die of heatstroke wearing a jacket on a beach} –but that’s it.