I was invited to a formal dinner party two weeks ago. I opened my closet, dug through piles of T-shirts and boxer shorts and realized I hadn’t worn a suit since senior prom.

Frustrated and confused, I headed out for a soothing slice of pizza. I pondered my fashion emergency, devoured my grease-soaked delicacy and realized I hadn’t eaten a formal dinner since … ever.

Good thing professor Norm Faiola is here for me. His grandmother was a stickler for table manners, and today he is the chairman of the nutrition and hospitality management program in the College of Human Services and Health Professions. Yesterday, he taught a dining etiquette seminar in the Schine Student Center and transformed me from a gluttonous, uncultured slob to a prim, proper gentleman. Grandma would be proud.

‘There is a difference between dining and eating,’ Faiola explained.

Eating, he said, involves racing down the highway and chowing down on a drive-through cheeseburger. Dining means impressing interviewers, employers and dinner guests with your extensive knowledge of etiquette and procedure.

Faiola, who teaches courses in guest hospitality and employee relations training, created his seminar when students from the College of Law expressed their discomfort in formal dining settings. They’d have to interact in these environments frequently and didn’t want their etiquette ineptitudes to get in the way of landing a job or impressing a client.

‘It is a lost art, and people are nervous,’ Faiola said. ‘They just don’t know what to do.’

He handed out a 27-question quiz entitled ‘Flatware for All Occasions,’ and I had no clue what to do either. If anyone in the room could correctly identify each fork, knife and spoon, he challenged, he’d treat them to lunch at the faculty dining center. I had just spent my last four SUpercard dollars, so I needed this.

I studied the flatware intently, perusing each curve, corner and serrated edge until I was sure I had that free meal in the bag. I got four right, and I’m still hungry.

It was close to five, though – in a momentary lapse of focus I labeled a tiny piece of silverware as the ‘coke spoon.’ I wasn’t quite correct, but Faiola did explain the origin of this drug paraphernalia.

Back in the day, salt was served to each diner in a small dish. When a shaker replaced the miniature serving spoon, Faiola said, it was reallocated for use by cocaine addicts. To prove it, he held Spoon 21 up to his nose, plugged one nostril and sniffed.

Despite this drug diatribe, Faiola’s seminar was interesting, informative and an important step on the way to cleaning up my act. He taught me how to politely spit out an olive pit, when to season my steak, how to spoon my soup and how to silently signal a waiter. And when I drop my napkin, he said, don’t do the table dive.

‘You’re going to be feeling up the leg of the lady next to you, or the guy, and that’s not cool.’

But a dropped napkin isn’t just an inconvenience – it’s also a health hazard. Faiola focuses his academic research on food safety, and he described the horrors of touching your mouth and wine glasses with things that have been on the floor.

His work in food safety has even provided him with a clever motto: ‘I keep your colon rollin’.’

Faiola gave me some valuable fashion advice, too – he believes that comfort is just as important as outward appearance, and warned me to choose a wardrobe that could withstand a few stains.

In that case, who needs a suit? I’ll just wear my boxers.

Published on October 2, 2003 at 12:00 pm