Dear Serena: MODERN MANNERS: YOUR CUT-OUT-AND-KEEP GUIDE TO SURVIVING THE MINEFIELD

Dear Serena, What is a Cheshire Set? And how do I go about buying one of my own? Vicky, Wilmslow; A: Cheshire Set, as far as I have been able to gather, is a type of matching bedroom furniture consisting of two white walk-in wardrobes like Barbie used to have, one for clothes and one for shoes, a divan bed tented with pearly-white net curtains and an array of animal print covers and scatter cushions. This is best combined with a personal collection of glass animals bought in five-star hotels around the world. You can buy a Cheshire Set practically anywhere - Homebase, Harrods, Everything for a Pound Shops - though it's best to pay someone else 30,000-odd pounds to buy them for you, as you might get those crucial details wrong. A warning: Cheshire Sets are costly to maintain, which is why you should only commit yourself to owning one if you have, at the very least, a footballer's salary.

Dear Serena,

What is the polite way to eat oysters?

James, Cardiff

Don't. Oysters are a huge practical joke practised by the food industry on the punter. They are put on menus so that people in the know can have a jolly good laugh. Look around next time you order them and see how many of the staff are still on the floor. They will all have disappeared, hiding in the kitchen, clutching their sides and going "I can't believe he fell for it!".

Dear Serena,

I am shortly to spend a period of time in gaol for tax evasion, and am, naturally, dreading it. Can you give me some words of solace before I face my fate?

Billy, Mayfair

It doesn't behove me to offer words of my own to prisoners when others have done it so beautifully for me. Britain has a long and proud tradition of prison poetry, from Walter Raleigh through John Bunyan and Oscar Wilde to our own generation's captive bard, Mr J Aitken. There is so much to choose from in his latest opus, but perhaps these will bring most solace, and perhaps a little inspiration:

Bars sharpen senses; tune the ear/ To whispered cadences of Truth/ Whose gentle message casts out fear/ Rekindles fire and faith of youth... Some dawns I hear you call with names/ of children loved, yet far away./ Or friends whose loyalty proclaims/ Bonds that will hold till Judgment Day.

The part about the children I find particularly affecting. It took a full minute for my shoulders to stop shaking after I had read it.

Dear Serena,

My husband is pretty good about the division of domestic labour: he doesn't mind cooking, ironing, nappy-changing, bedtime story reading. There's just one thing. Why, oh why, is it always me that changes the cat's litter tray?

Bobbie, Kent

You know why. Because if you didn't, the house would fill with flies and maggots, the children would die of horrible diseases and your friends would turn down dinner invitations. Ultimately, you would end up dressed in plastic bags and start to feature regularly in ITV's pre-watershed documentary slot. The cat would leave, and you would have to start getting each other to chase after things on bits of string to keep amused in the evenings.

Dear Serena,

My sister has a glamorous job in London and I am going to stay with her in her interior-designed flat for a week. I am nervous about how to behave. What I should watch out for particularly?

Janie, Middlesbrough

Yes. She will probably give you cranberry juice. Take care, when you first taste it, that you avoid standing anywhere within spitting distance of a white rug or carpet.

Knotty problems with the world today? Send them to Dear Serena, The Independent, 1 Canada Square, London E14 5DL where they will be treated with the customary sympathy