Pomposity

I have this friend who lives way beyond her means as the wife of a doctor banking on the fact that "In 2 years he is going to be making $367,000 a year." The figure changes everytime we talk about it, but the line is always the same. This is how she justifies a lot of poor financial decisions (like credit card debt, Cole Hahn shoes, and an interest only mortgage). What she does not see in her gravy train husband is that he is kind of an ass. The best word to describe him is pompous. He is going into a field of medicine based soley on the salary, and of course he knows everything there is to know about medicine. He totally gets off on introducing himself as Dr. Soandso, and is a shell of the fun loving cool guy he used to be.
Today we had lunch with Dr. and Mrs. Materialism and their kids.
It was actually quite nice, the kids were good, the food was fine, the conversation was as good as to be expected.
Until he looked at me and said, "Would you call me pompous?"
Oh shit, does he know that I do it all the time? Did their neighbors who I used to be friends with rat me out? Did I even call him pompous to them? Does he have some medical technology that makes him able to read my mind and he could hear me thinking that all through lunch? Am I waiting too long to answer. Here is all I could come up with:
"Not to your face."
I then blubbered all over myself trying to tell the truth (yes, if I were to look up pompous in the dictionary, your picture would be there next to it) without hurting his feelings. I told him he was a doctor, he knows a lot about a lot of things. He has an expensive education. He should know stuff. My husband is cocky. We all have our faults.
But here is the thing about the pompous, they don't care about your answer, anytime anyone else is talking that is just filler for when they get to talk again.
In all I think I gave a fairly diplomatic answer, without lying blatantly and telling him that he was down to earth or anything crazy like that.
I also breathed a huge sigh of relief when he told me that Mrs. Materialism's mom had said that he was pompous and it wasn't their horrible Alpha Parent neighbors (who I used to be friends with) ratting me out for talking shit.