How Social Is Normal?

[jayseven]

A compound of reasons has left me quite aware that I am not as social as I have been previously.

 

Typically, I'll see a friend maybe once a week, and my girlfriend once or twice a week. I repeatedly reject invites for nights out as I can't afford it, and once a month I invite my mate over for some beers and games (he never replies the favour, but it doesn't really bother me).

 

I have maybe four or five people who infrequently say hey on facebook chat, and when my phone rings it's invariably my mother or the job centre.

 

Most of my social life is here, on this board. I've been a bit of a lurker the last month or so, because I think my affinity to this place in combination with my lack of a real social life has bothered me. lack of money means that the rare occasion I say 'yes' I feel slightly put-out as I don't know what everyone is up to anymore.

 

However, if I really wanted a chat then I'm fairly sure that most of my friends would answer the phone if I called them. Even if I could afford it, I still wouldn't be going out each night.

 

One of the factors is the season. When summer rolls around then social activity picks up - trips to the beach or park, bbqs, country walks, festivals and so on -- so I sit and wait for that to arrive.

 

SO ANYWAY!

 

What sort of social life do you have? Do you have set times/places for some mates? Are you the one that always arranges everything, or are you the one who always has to say no?

[S.C.G]

Social... life...?

 

...

 

*goes back to playing Pokemon*

[Eenuh]

Don't really have a social life heh. Only talk to two people on msn, one of which is Jim so he doesn't count. =P

I only see my friends every few months. Some other friends I haven't seen in 13 months now heh. Don't have anyone to meet up with or do things with really. Only one friend lives close (only during the week) and she doesn't have any money to do things. Well neither do I haha.

 

I lead a boring, a-social life I guess. I do more with my mom than I do with friends haha.

[Murr]

Pretty social guy really...

 

Mondays I go to the gym and parents so don't see friends.

 

Tuesdays I play pro-5 football, and my 2 best mates are in the team so that's cool, plus theres 5 other guys I get on with, so we play football, watch football after and have a beer

 

Wednesday usually go to the cinema with girlfriend and my best friends and their girlfriends.

 

Thursday normally go to the pub with girlfriend and her friends / my friends merge into one big group

 

Friday varies. Some friday's I play skittles again with one of my best friends, and my girlfriend and his girlfriend will be there, along with another lad and lady I get on with.

 

OR if not skittles and Mrs Murr and my best friends girlfriends go out we have a xbox or game night. Or we'll go to the pub and have the crafty 1 or 2, as we know we'll have to pick our drunken womens up at stupid o clock in the morning.

 

Saturday Usually again with best friends watching some form of football or sport and our girlfriends all go out together, then in the evening usually all hook up for food or dvds at someones house, or both

 

Sunday I play football again with the same group of friends on tuesday. then go to my girlfriends parents house with her for food.

 

 

In the times i'm playing football my girlfriend is either with her friends, or my friends girlfriends (who are her friends, but aren't her school friends, I dunno it's a different category)

 

within that schedule I'll fit in 2 gym sessions, some causal xbox or game time, on evenings watch TV.

 

EDIT - Living with the girlfriend means I see her all the time, so we're actually both pretty happy with the setup of seeing friends alot be it together or without each other, cause end of the day we'll always be the last people we see on a night, and first person we'll see in the morning.

Edited March 17, 2011 by Murr

[Tales]

I don't have much of a social life, and that's not because I don't want to. I'm very shy and don't talk very much, which makes people uninterested in me and rather talk and do stuff with other people that are much more fun to talk to. The result is that I spend most of the time alone in my room or at college, occosianally saying "hello" to people I know(sometimes for them to immidieatly start a conversation with someone else close by) It has really been getting into me lately, because I want to spend a lot of time with friends, but because I'm not able to talk a lot, I'm ignored. The only time I actually get to "spend" time with others is on Saturdays when you don't have to talk a lot to join a pre-party (I happened to be considerably more social when I'm drunk). But that still leaves six days and a half.

[ReZourceman]

Meeeehhhh.

 

It was pretty much non-existent, then cool people joined my old work (Molly + Spenno + co) and then we went out at least once a week, usually a couple times, for at least a few cheeky pints after work. Then some left, others left, and we have drifted a little apart I guess. We do occasionally make the effort to all get together though. The last time was a couple months ago now...well three months I guess, around Christmas, as I arranged something this week (although it looks like that'll be next week now)

 

Other than that, a friendship with one particular guy (I met at the comic shop) has strengthened tenfold over the last year or so, and we'll be "working" together in some capacity (I'm editing an ezine for a model game my other friend makes, and my friend, ~the aformentioned one~ is basically the company...sorter/designer) so thats awesome.

 

I kind of made a conscious effort to say NO to LESS things, and its definitely helped.

 

So yeah I see him and his friends pretty often now. I guess I/we just realised that we live at opposite ends of a road, that although is 20 miles apart or so...can be done in 20 minutes easily, its really not far.

 

Apart from that its not hugely existent, but I'm a busy chappy anyway, and live with a girlfriend that I have to entertain/that she has to tolerate me.

[Cube]

I've been out twice since I left Sheffield nearly two years ago. Twice.

 

I need a life.

[Serebii]

Mine is rather on the other end of yours. As I'm self employed, I don't have an excessively large group of friends so rely on the half a dozen or so close friends. Unfortunately, the lynchpin of the group always is "tired" so never wants to do anything. Meet up like once a week usually, but sometimes not even that. It's very rarely doing anything outside of going to their house.

Edited March 17, 2011 by Serebii

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

Mine is rather on the other end of yours. As I'm self employed, I don't have an excessively large group of friends so rely on the half a dozen or so close friends. Unfortunately, the lynchpin of the group always is "tired" so never wants to do anything. Meet up like once a week usually, but sometimes not even that. It's very rarely doing anything outside of going to their house.

 

Can't you decide to do some things without him, then? I know I'm not up for stuff as often as some of my friends, but I'd hate to let that stop them.

 

I'm not awfully social. I've always enjoyed spending time by myself, surfing the internet, reading, playing games or watching movies. But I also love spending time with my friends when I see them, though the past year 8 months or so they've all moved further away - my best friends the furthest, as irony would have it. Still, I'm not often out on the town, and sometimes I just prefer to stay in. It does bother me a bit, though, since I have this fear of missing out on stuff I feel I should be a part of. It's one of those psychological things I'm battling.

[Serebii]

We're getting there, but my friends were hesitant to do things without the whole group

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

We're getting there, but my friends were hesitant to do things without the whole group

 

I do understand, but one person shouldn't constantly dictate what the others want to do. There has to be room for flexibility in a group.

[drahkon]

Typically, I'll see a friend maybe once a week, and my girlfriend once or twice a week.

 

Same here.

 

It was different some time ago when I went out regularly with others but lately I found out that

 

So, social life? Girlfriend. That's pretty much it. And it's more than enough.

[Paj!]

First year of uni so...my life is spent surrounded by my friends.

 

It's usually me and (one of) my Bestie(s) who ORGANISES gatherings, which is annoying - it's like...what if we didn't do that? Would people really just spend all their time alone? Or maybe cause everyone knows we do it, that they don't bother. Kinda "..." though. But I'd rather have them than not. My entire course (30 people) get on extremely well and we're basically each other's main friend group (generally), which is awesome. A small group of us (who I'm living with next academic year) often (like every 2 days) will hang out (outside uni). There was a period of a week or so we hung out for hours every night.

 

One of my besties down here is annoyingly averse to having fun. But then he's like bipolar is his moods (not literally, but it's like you have to coax out the insanity, as it's always there, but usually dormant). He's kinda like a child in that sense. After like...2 drinks, he's insane. (in a good way...we have a friend/on my course who is QUITE LITERALLY a danger to herself and others when drunk. In all seriousness.)

 

[/tangent]

 

But yeah. No I'm good. I turn down things since I guess being in uni you've got invites shoved in your face every day.

Edited March 17, 2011 by Paj!

[Serebii]

I do understand, but one person shouldn't constantly dictate what the others want to do. There has to be room for flexibility in a group.

Exactly my point, which is why we're going out without him on Sat :p Going to a night here, We Are Your Friends. I've been trying to get them to go for the last six months, but my other friend Ozzy is also annoyed at the fact that nothing ever happens anymore and so he made sure we're going to this one too

Edited March 17, 2011 by Serebii

[Rummy]

I've always been quite social, and always tight enough with my money for it to stretch for me to be social when I want/need. I used to pretty much be out every night, except the weekends as I worked them due to hating being out in public on the weekend. Monday was pub night, thursday was pub night, tuesday was aikido night, wednesday tended to somehow turn into a pub night. Even sunday was pub night! I'd also try and hang with people in the day if they were about. I can't cope without company, it seems(online or irl, that is).

 

Recently though, I do feel like I'm less social. I feel like everybody's growing up and apart, people are always all free/busy on different days and it can be hard to get everyone together. Fortunate for me I roll in many different circles so I tend to have stuff keeping me going regardless, but it does feel very much like...I dunno, things getting stale? People doing other stuff? Also more and more people have less and less money, apparently, and it makes it hard. You have too much time and no money, so you get a job, then you have all this money but no time to spend it.

 

I'm also quite lazy, sometimes I don't want to do anything too far or too expensive away(to help conserve the monies so i can do more things) but I'm trying to push myself to do different things atm.

[Goron_3]

My housemates can be idiots sometimes. They are all relatively simple (love chart music, know nothing outside it) so only go to the big mainstream+cheese night on a friday. What's worse is that they pretty much only go with each other and only recently have made other friends to go out with. I'm the complete opposite, which obviously causes issues when it comes to going out. I have labs pretty much every day at uni which is a great time to socialise with people from my course and i've kept in contact with people from halls too (when we were in first year) so i've got a fair few more options than them.

 

Tonight is pretty typical. There is a special 'St. Patricks day' night at the afore-mentioned club (same night, different day) but I've got a group of friends coming over for drinks and one of the housemates has work to do, which leaves 3 of them to go out. One will probably pull out because he hates it anyway so they'll probably end up either going as a 2 or just not going out at all because they know no one else going.

 

Haha.

[Brian Mcoy]

Mcoy dosen't know why but alot of people don't seem to understand Mcoy.

[Jimbob]

Social life, meh.

 

I have tried to improve mine this year, and i suppose it has improved.............. a little. I see a mate down the pub twice a week, chill at anothers on a Friday night and chat to a few people on Facebook and Twitter. If i see someone i know out and about, i'll say hello and have a chat.

 

I chat to some peeps from here, but not on NE itself. Mostly on FB, but only as updates on statuses.

 

Only people to call my phone is either a mate, or my parents. No-one else really.

 

I need to socialise a little more.

[dan-likes-trees]

Interesting question / thread I feel.

 

I find it strange how some people feel the need to be constantly surrounded with people. I've never felt this fear of being alone. I put it down to being an only child I guess.

 

Social life massively varies. Do quite a lot with the housemates so it's never completely empty, but I go through phases of being busy every evening then not being atall. Tend to be a lot more active at summer, as jay said, there's just more to do. Not much to do in leeds daytime aside from cafes / cinema.

 

I would say I definitely don't meet enough new people, particularly considering I'm at the point in my life where it's easiest to do so (uni) but there we go. Everyone else on this thread has said similar to that though. What came first, the lack of sociability or the forum?

[Rummy]

I'm not sure I'd call it a fear of being alone as such, hell you can be very social and have lots of friends yet still feel quite alone sometimes. I think for me it's just boredom, I've gotten so into the habit I'm not quite sure what to do otherwise.

[Charlie]

I think my life is pretty sociable. I go out a couple nights a week with either my school friends/flatmates or uni mates.

 

Other than that I obviously talk to my flatmates a lot. At work I talk to a lot of people there although never do anything with them outside of work. At uni I've got a good group of mates who I see a lot in class, go to lunch with between classes and go out a bit.

 

Last night I was through in Edinburgh going to a ceilidh with some old friends from school who I haven't seen in a while which was great fun. Spent the night talking and dancing with them and their friends. By the end of the night the girl I was staying with had actually gone up so I was just out with her flatmates and friends, none of who I actually knew properly before then. Great fun.

[Beast]

I used to be quite popular and sociable until I learned that quite a lot of my 'friends' are either let-downs and time-wasters, just plain rude or our personalities just clash and we have nothing in common. For me now, I have a few acquaintances and a couple of people who I would call friends who I see on a regular basis, at least once a month or so. I would say I don't have a bad social life really.

 

I used to be best friends with two of my mates but I hardly hear from one anymore and the other is basically a let-down who I've just given up on meeting now because I'm fed up. However, we do still talk so all isn't lost but I'd most likely not arrange anything with him again (or at least for a VERY long time).

[Diageo]

I love my (social) life. Especially now that I'm in college.

 

I have a good amount of new friends in college and we see each other everyday. Then I have the activities and waiting around, which I always have someone else to wait with me so it's never a chore. Then there's the nights out, once or maybe twice a week, and they are the best fun ever. And on week ends or even week days when the workload is low then I hang around with my friends from my area who I have been friends with for ages. Then I get to see the boyfriend every now and then. I really have nothing to complain about.

 

So yeah, I would say I'm a very social person.

[Ashley]

I really have nothing to complain about.

 

Then why are you a miserable crunch?

 

 

If I were not at uni I'd probably be a lot less sociable. Although I'd presumably have a job and thus money so who knows. But most of my socalising happens in the studio or at the pub afterwards on a Friday.

 

Although at least living in London I know some more people so I go for meals and drinks and what not but I can't be bothered to hazard a guess as to frequency.

 

And gaming events, does that count?

[EddieColeslaw]

Then why are you a miserable crunch?

 

 

He doesn't complain about his social life, but there are plenty of other things to complain about :p

 

(Diageo: just kidding )

 

Anyway, I am extremely bad at being social, mainly because I don't ever mind doing things alone. My main "social life" is college, I love my class, there are so many funny people.

 

Also, pubs and parties don't appeal to me, which I suspect majorly hurts my chances of having a social life here (pub culture etc.).