Politeness -v- Personal Responsibility for Choices

A friend dropped round today to bring me some flowers and to borrow the net connection briefly. I’d had lunch early, but as it was around lunchtime and I had some home-made soup to offer, I offered both coffee and soup. It led to one of those conversations which seem like hard work for such an easy question.

“Would you like some coffee?”
“Are you having some?”
“Yes, it’s already made” (I’d made it when I got the phone call priming me to expect the visit).
“Yes please, then”
“How would you like it, black or white?”
“I don’t mind” (this gave me pause for thought, seeming like a re-run of what happened on Sunday when I’d asked Vic about when the freecyclers should come round and he’d said ‘I don’t mind’, then not been happy when I arranged it for later in the day).

To add to the confusion, I made the offer of the soup.
“Or I could just have a banana” suggested my visitor, spotting the enormous pile of bananas.
“Yes – which would you prefer, soup or a banana? Or you could have both!”
"Whichever is easiest for you" came the answer.

Aaaargh! It was very difficult to ascertain from the overly polite responses my visitor’s honest preferences – which set me thinking. Are there times when I have been reluctant to take responsibility for making my own choices? Why do we consider it is more polite to say “I don’t mind” when we really do have a preference?

Have you ever had an exasperating conversation like this, where someone won't voice their preference? How do you deal with situations like that? Please feel free to use the comments link (below) to respond, or drop me an email.