The correct method, she writes, is to accord a foreign guest the most importance, followed by a stranger (usually a guest brought by a friend), someone who has held an official position in the past, and a guest invited for the first time. "Constant guests," relatives, and children bring up the rear, and people of great age or who still hold official positions trump everyone. She also warned that particular care must be taken with foreigners and officials, not necessarily because they're so wonderful, but because they'll know the rules.

My favorite senator, Thad Cochran, couldn't make it until the wedding day, but had he been there for the rehearsal, I certainly would've seated him next to my mother, in accordance with Fenwick's rules. We did give all the foreigners (the best man and his wife were from Madrid) excellent seats and swell partners, but the fact that they all happened to be fabulous company had at least as much to do with their placement as with their personalities. Though not listed as a factor in any official rule book, being good company puts you up there with generals and octogenarians -- the real difficulty of seating is making sure that personalities mesh.

At the most important dinner of my life, I wanted the people I care about most in this world to have a wonderful time. When I asked my father who he wanted to sit by, he said, "somebody who hasn't heard my act yet." In other words, a woman with whom he could flirt and who would hear his stories with a fresh ear. So I sat him beside the sexy and funny Australian partner of my good friend, artist John Alexander. And for the rest of the week, he couldn't stop talking about the femme fatale his thoughtful daughter had placed him beside.