In a comment, children’s librarian Abs notes that parents “insist on calling the children’s librarian ‘Miss Abby’.” Abs lives in New England, so this form of address is not sanctioned by any cultural norms. Furthermore, Abs is married and calls herself “Abs,” making this completely nonsensical. What’s going on here? Why do people use such icky, stilted, obviously incorrect forms of address?

Mr. Crankypants believes he knows what is going on. Many adults today feel that they don’t want their children to refer to other adults with such formal forms of address as “Mr. Soandso” or Ms. Soandso.” Yet these adults also feel that they don’t want their children to get too chummy with other adults, and therefore refuse to tell the child to address another adult by first name only. Therefore, these adults make up icky stilted forms of address like “Miss Abby” for married middleaged women.

Mr. Crankypants can solve this problem. If you are an adult trying to figure out what your child should call another adult, don’t just make something up; have the decency to ask that other adult. Like this: “How should my child address you?” Isn’t that easy?

And if some other adult tells their child to refer to you using some icky stilted form of address, it is perfectly correct to say, “Please tell your child to refer to me as Ms. (or Mr.) Lastname,” or “Please tell your child that s/he may refer to me as Firstname.”

If an adult persists in telling their child to refer to you with an improper form of address, Mr. Crankypants gives you permission to slap them with a fresh wet trout.