I play a game with myself where I try to interject "It's a trade-off" into as many conversations as possible. I once decided it was the most widely applicable phrase possible.
"Who would win in a fight between Euler and Gauss?"
I went to a luncheon seminar last week and sat at a table of 5, clearly the only one at the table who knew no one. Painful. I am utterly inept at small talk.
"How different would life be if you could divide by zero?"
"How many 5-year-olds could you take in a fight?"
At a different bar association event, I arrived with a colleagues non-lawyer neighbors and had a really great conversation. They thanked me several times for "babysitting" them when surely I could have been chatting it up with my professional peers. I don't think they believed me that I was immensely grateful to have interesting people to talk to instead.
One alternative with self-conscious dweebs is abstract topics. Idiosyncrasies of the immediate physical environment, food, airports, something about history can open up those people who do not like to talk about themselves.
Di, what did New Trier do for bike security? Your rival school had a bike cage, but it was unlocked and the guard who watched it also had to keep track of the locker rooms.
Did you just suggest that I was a *Trevian*? I am aghast!
...The worst I've seen is math people. ...
Way to pander to stereotypes.
Even the most awesome math story ever is still just geeks huddled around a chalkboard or some shit. How the hell Numbers was on for five years or whatever is beyond me. Even the astronomers get to go outside. "Look at that black speck on the sun. LOOK AT IT. Breathtaking."
But guess who was driving around in a carjacked car on Monday? THIS GUY. He passes me going the opposite direction on a small street and I knew I knew him but didn't recognize him right off. I'm running the plate and holy shit that car was stolen at knifepoint a couple weeks ago. I flip around and he's nowhere in sight. SHIT. I'm rolling around the neighborhood for a few and as I'm pulling up to a four way stop he passes right in front of me. I pull in behind him and he starts to go around the block, faster with each turn. By the time we make the loop he's flying through stop signs. He makes a hard left and now we're ripping down this dirt alley full blown Dukes of Hazzard style and I can barely see where the hell I'm going with all the dust his car is kicking up. That neighborhood is almost entirely residential with some small businesses and as we come tearing out of the alley I see there's kids and pedestrians everywhere as usual on a summer evening. No stolen car is worth a dead kid so I pull over and terminate the chase.
It's common for these guys to ditch the car and leave on foot so I start slowly driving around again and within three minutes I'm turning a corner and see you know who walking towards me with the stolen car parked maybe 30 yards away. Now I recognize who it is. Bwahahahaha. Sit on the ground with your hands on your head and take a good look down the barrel of a gun while we wait for backup.
11: It's funny. IME, math people aren't the most socially awkward people. I actually think they cluster in engineering. But math people are often very shy and introverted. To make grand over-generalizations.
Oh right that was someone else. It's not necessarily an insult...
Even the most awesome math story ever is still just geeks huddled around a chalkboard or some shit.
Unless it's Borges telling the story.
And then last night we had a poor guy whose attempt at quick thinking only yielded the alias "Michael Vick".
I'd taken a call the prior day on a felony theft where they had a plate and a description and it so happens I know who they are. Both the female wanted for the theft and her boyfriend are frequent flyers. Boyfriend has a felony warrant out for him. Her mom lives in my beat and I'm cruising by every so often looking for that car. As I'm heading that way again they pass me going the opposite direction on a five lane road. As I'm flipping around and turning on the red and blues they go speeding into a convenience store parking lot. Before their car is even done rolling boyfriend with his warrant is bounding out of the front passenger seat and running off into the neighborhood. His bad luck is A. I know him and can rattle off his name and physical stats immediately into the radio and B. Even though we're on the non white side of town it's mostly Hispanic and Tongans so you're SOL trying to casually disappear as a 6'1 black dude. A couple other units see him on a corner trying to be nonchalant but obviously breathing heavily like a 35 year old out of shape crack user who's just done some panicked sprinting. They jump out of their cars and ask him his name. "Michael". "Michael what?" "Ugh...Vick". And then he takes off running again. He didn't make it very far.
Hah. I'm 1 for 1 at outrunning cops on foot.
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NMM to Ray Bradbury. Sad news.
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Re: the OP, I definitely feel more comfortable asking the questions but I'm trying to learn that talking about myself or answering questions at some length not only isn't necessarily obnoxious but can have significant social utility. (Heck, it's even possible that the other person is genuinely interested in what I have to say.)
The City of the Saints always seems rather placid when I visit, gswift, but you're alwaysgracing to deal with what seem fairly serious dangers. I assume my obvious Batman-esque martial arts expertise keeps your carjackers and Michael Vicks in check.
No stolen car is worth a dead kid so I pull over and terminate the chase.
What?? It's like you have no compassion for the viewers of local TV stations. Nothing beats watching a good police chase in real time shot from the local news choppers. You need like 20 black and whites bearing down on a hapless, increasingly desperate driver as they close off the freeways.
Does that happen anywhere but California?
Gswift, that's hilarious. You dont have to work in WVC at all, do you?
Combining the topics -- I was wondering if it ever get awkward on long drives back to the police station after you've arrested a perp. Is it hard to make small talk in that situation?
After you read the Miranda rights to someone, I'd assume small talk stops for at least a while.
22: Not to mention the increasingly panicked commuters with highly pressurized bladders and nearly empty gas tanks flipping through the radio stations for news.
Actually I think it's only LA. Never saw that in northern California.
I'm much more used to conference dinners with a loudmouth who won't let anyone else get a word in edgewise.
You dont have to work in WVC at all, do you?
No. They're right off our south border (2100 S) but they have their own dept.
Probably the word "banquet" is indicating the problem here. You mean something with white tablecloths and catering staff and rubber chicken, right? That invites stiltedness. Go to a real restaurant and order enough alcohol with the meal.
The City of the Saints always seems rather placid when I visit, gswift, but you're alwaysgracing to deal with what seem fairly serious dangers.
Pretty much every city is like this. There's always loads of stuff going on that never hits the news.
"There's a million stories in the naked city."
32: Not sure how the boundaries between cities work here yet. Everything is a city!
The L.A. County news outlets can count on about one homicide a day for the "if it bleeds it leads" maxim. The car chase is a regular feature.
http://projects.latimes.com/homicide/blog/page/1/
I think I'm naturally worse than average at socializing* than most people, but a couple years as a reporter forced me to learn about it through experience, and now I can socialize normally or even better** when I want to - tell anecdotes, elicit anecdotes, gently pull other quiet people into a conversation, be witty, keep my foot out of my mouth.
When I want to, that is. If the people I already know well are busy, if I don't feel obligated to make conversation, or if I'm just too tired, I'm happy to hover near the hors d'oeuvres or listen to other people without actually engaging.
If this thread is supposed to be for advice, then here's some: ask questions to which you already know the answers. (Or as I sometimes put it, "ask stupid questions," but that's a bit too oversimplified.) That's something I never would have thought of if I hadn't been a reporter, when (a) I was supposed to be really, really sure about details, and (b) in addition to information I was also supposed to get direct quotes from different people to add spice and color to articles. And isn't spice and color what you want in social situations? Then, if you have a personal connection to what they said or it reminds you of an anecdote, throw it in.
It's basically just keeping the other people talking, but if you do it right, it's much less obvious and inane than rapid-fire question-and-answer.
* "Naturally worse than average at socializing" is a complicated concept, but I don't think it's completely useless. First of all, by "naturally" I have no opinion on whether this is genetic or learned by the age of 3 or 13 or what, just something that's inherent to me now. By "worse than average," I realize I'm still better at it than many people, and blogs like this are self-selected for introverted shut-ins, I'm just comparing myself to what I imagine is "normal," and who knows how accurate I am. And finally, "socializing" is a mix of making myself appear witty and keeping gatherings interesting for everyone and actually getting to know people, and probably other stuff.
** Or so I think. Self-assessment is unreliable. It's entirely possible that I'm still a wallflower sober and a huge asshole once I have a few drinks in me.
I find that politics and religion always make for good small-talk topics.
"Hi! I'm Heebie. Fuck, marry, kill, ready? Okay: abortion!"
Ugh. Overheard from office next door: "We don't have enough work and I've got one too many people. We need to fire someone." Also overheard: brief discussion of the short list, my name included....
Look busy, polish your resume, and the best of luck.
Quick, do something surreptitious to make one of the others on that short list look bad.
I personally recommend smearing some liquid LSD on their keyboard to discredit them. However there may not be enough time for it to take effect.
Where do you get LSD in delayed-release forumulation?
I meant 41, though Ebay sucks in its own way.
41: That sucks. Maybe you should bring your dog Checkers to work.
41: I'm kinda in the same boat here. I don't even want to go into it, it has been very traumatic. But suffice it to say that I have to find something else a.s.a.p.
Not to mention the increasingly panicked commuters with highly pressurized bladders and nearly empty gas tanks
This situation is screaming out for one of those Sesame Street videos about cooperation.
I am also looking for something else, because my current job MAKES ME WANT TO SHOOT MYSELF IN THE FACE.
Women are so likely to direct their rage inward. That's why they suck at spree killing, especially the ones at work.
My job makes me want to shoot other people in the face, because I'm a feminist.
Everyone else in my division is also female, though. I'm going to have to head over to the other side of the floor to find some mixed crowds to shoot into.
You don't need to be picky beyond "not you."
23: Does that happen anywhere but California?
I've seen it in Florida as well. Sort of goes without saying.
I hate talking about myself, and when people ask me questions about myself I usually answer them as quickly as possible then stop talking. In many social situations where people are just making small talk, of course, this just leads them to keep asking more and more questions, which to me come to seem more and more personal and invasive, so I keep answering curtly and get increasingly irritated. It took me a long time to realize that what people want me to do in these situations is either keep talking or ask them questions in return, and I still have to remind myself of that frequently. Part of the problem here is that I genuinely don't mind just sitting in silence, but that seems to make most people uncomfortable so they keep trying to make conversation.
Part of the problem here is that I genuinely don't mind just sitting in silence, but that seems to make most people uncomfortable so they keep trying to make conversation.
I'm the same way. I've learned that you can actually use this trait to your advantage. For example, in negotiations, if you simply say nothing in response to a proposal, it can make the counterparty uncomfortable to the point where they start undercutting their own argument or making unsolicited concessions just to fill the silence.
OTOH, I've also found that stony silence is a distinctly unhelpful response in marital disagreements.
I'm the same way. I've learned that you can actually use this trait to your advantage. For example, in negotiations, if you simply say nothing in response to a proposal, it can make the counterparty uncomfortable to the point where they start undercutting their own argument or making unsolicited concessions just to fill the silence.
Good to know.
Yeah, the number one rule of negotiations is: shut up.
Also the number one rule for sitting in the back seat of a police car.
I'm the same way. I've learned that you can actually use this trait to your advantage. For example, in negotiations, if you simply say nothing in response to a proposal, it can make the counterparty uncomfortable to the point where they start undercutting their own argument or making unsolicited concessions just to fill the silence.
This also works in journalism. You can often eke out more information by not asking another question when they expect you to.
experience teaches that silence terrifies people
the most
Silence is great. Nobody knows where the smell came from and you just hop off the bus.
My grad school memories were that math folks (phd-level) were mutants...great people and good once you got them rolling but the Asperger's was always strong. There's perhaps some relationship between brain modules involved, reinforced by self-selection of sociable-but-good-at-math types into different fields.
13 and 17 from gswift are hilarious. Cops must be at the absolute opposite end of the spectrum from math profs in storytelling. It was almost unfair of him to uncork some long stories in this thread...rub it in, why don't you.
Speaking of gswift, I just saw that Pittsburgh and Salt Lake were adjacent on a list of places to retire. Pittsburgh's con was the weather. Salt Lake's was the crime.
You dont have to work in WVC at all, do you?
Does WVC refer to Morgantown or Wheeling?
I have a very hard time thinking of SLC as dangerous.
Philosophers, in my experience, tend to be fairly social. Mildly asshole-y, especially when the mist descends, but socially normal rather than particularly awkward.
re: 65
Yeah, I've seen that done really well in academic tutorials and seminars, too.
'So, what would you say about $foo?'
Person gives long, discursive and slightly evasive answer and then looks expectantly at questioner.
[silence]
'Erm, ' - and then shovel comes out as they dig themselves a deeper hole.
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Last Monday I had to show a group of Swedish editors round the office, and to prepare for this looked up all the FT stories on my business for the last few years. The figures made me feel so bad that my entire spine tensed up in a really hideous way. When the same sensation overwhelmed me after bicycling in a hurry to a hospital appointment in Cambridge the next day it turned out to be a small, but proper, heart attack. So now I am at home, all stented up, and thinking that there are worse things than bankruptcy.
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I have no idea if it's actually a successful tactic, but I borrowed from Douglas Adams the idea of trying to say something non-typical in response to a person's bio - e.g., not to ask about earthquakes if they're from CA, or not to talk about sports if they're from Big Sport U, or not to talk about what an asshole Rahm is if they worked at the WH.*
The idea, anyway, is that people will both be flattered that you've given any thought to their situation other than the most obvious, and be happy to talk about something different.
When people ask us about the review gig, AB's response is almost always the same, word for word. But presumably someone could ask a question that would actually draw us out on the topic.
Actually, along those lines, even if you can't think of something clever or non-obvious to ask about, you can try to skip a layer or two. In my example, instead of "that must be so fun!" or "do you ever get tired of going to so many restaurants?", you can ask about the actual process - which isn't super-interesting, but is less likely to elicit the stock response, and more likely to lead to an interesting/recent/specific anecdote.
* on the flip side, my standard joke for anyone who works with a mildly well-known person (e.g. civic leader or faintly popularly known academic) is to ask "So what's X really like?" in that tone you use for people who know celebrities. I don't know that it amuses anyone but me, though.
74: Whoa. You didn't fall off your bike?
I have a very hard time thinking of SLC as dangerous.
Especially for retirees, unless your retirement plan involves joining a gang and/or the illegal drug trade.
Nworb's fuller account was linked recently in another thread. Glad to hear he seems to be doing okay.
I feel like I am fine at making small talk in any conversation in which I'm involved, but terrible at involving myself in conversations. When I sit down at a banquet table or whatever, I feel like 9 times out of 10 after some initial introductory words I will end up with the people on either side of me having their backs turned to me, talking to the groups sitting next to them. Jumping into one of the conversations at that point feels like interrupting, and just sitting there sort of staring attentively at people waiting for the conversation to open up so I can rejoin feels almost like evesdropping. So, I usually basically just sit there and eat.
(The same thing happens when standing around with groups of people I don't know well, actually, although in that case there isn't even the initial introductory stuff.)
re: 74
Hope you feel better soon, Andrew.
werdnA! The post at your blog was chillingly vivid. And I also hope you feel better and there are no long-term repercussions.
(After the fact, when you could talk to the doctors about it, did you at least get a little satisfaction from having been actually exercising when the attack hit? Clearly, lifestyle wasn't the problem.)
79: This is one of the most terrifying things I've ever said, but in this regard, I am urple.
I'm terrible at the sort of lurking around the periphery of conversations in events where I know no-one at all. Something that used to happen at academic functions now and again. However, if I have any kind of 'in' with one or more people in the group then I'm fine.
I'm definitely more on the 'alpha' side socially at work, even though most of my colleagues aren't particularly nerdy for programmers. I think that comes more from being slightly older than some, as much as any social skill.
79,83: I too am urple. But I am not afraid.
Alcohol. The best thing to do if you're at a party or some other such event where you don't know anyone is to quickly down two drinks so as to be able to blab away without any anxiety. It doesn't prevent you from making an idiot out of yourself, but does allow you to avoid the preemptive worries about doing so.
A table can be awkward because people do physically turn away. A room full of strangers though, I can do that. Mostly as suggested above, by asking questions. In this thread I identified most with Cyrus I think - I can scintillate if necessary but am also perfectly happy these days to sit back and observe.
Drugs used to help such situations - I remember going to one party of friends of my boyfriend - some people I knew, but not many and not well, and I arrived before him. I plonked myself down in the middle of a sofa and started skinning up, and soon had several people around me all chatting away as if it really were just me that had brought them over!
That actually doesn't help for me. I talk more freely when I've had a few, but I'm fine making conversation dead sober. It's the breaking into other people's conversations that's a problem, and a drink or two doesn't seem to solve that.
I'm very good at socializing/making small talk when I focus on it but I sort of hate it and it makes me exhausted.
Oh, and Andrew, glad you were in the right place for the best treatment and hope you stay well now.
skinning up
Never heard this -- I don't know if it's US/UK or just a vocabulary gap. Rolling a joint, or something else?
92: no no, skinning somebody, then shooting up.
87 is right. I believe myself to be so charming after a glass of wine.
After a few glasses of wine at a party, I'm either at my maximum charm or in the corner crying. It's a crapshoot.
It's also helpful if there are some things centering the group - e.g. 'so how about that penis stretching thing?'... or 'so what did you think of that paper on late nineteenth century Hungarian modernization'. But even without them I find alcohol is great. I recently found myself at a neighbour's barbecue where I knew nobody except as people to say hi to in the stairwell. Started off with blind-date style chitchat 'where are you from' 'what do you do' 'lovely weather' [aargh get me out of here!] and that's where it would have ended without lots of wine. As it was, things went fine.
But even without them a group anywhere nearby I find alcohol is great
We had a bourbon tasting at our house a while back, and it actually made for a fascinating controlled experiment; everybody was very friendly but basically pretty quiet and a bit shy until the second tasting was through and then instant friends!
It's summer. I should start making margaritas.
I also identify with 90. Some nights I just spend the evening making loops from the food to the drinks to AB and/or the kids and/or the 1 or 2 people I know best, avoiding the need to chat even with people I might like, but with whom I'd have to try.
...ask a question, one person would answer, and then it would die again. Again and again.
I had a girlfriend once whose conversational style was often like this. Actually getting a conversation going was a major production.
101: Crap. I had no idea any of my exes commented here...
Never heard this -- I don't know if it's US/UK or just a vocabulary gap. Rolling a joint, or something else?
UK/US, I think. "Skins" are Rizlas. Um, let me try that again. "Skins" are "Rizlas", which are cigarette papers.
Werdna, I'm glad you're on the mend.
98: Half the party didn't participate in the tasting?
Benquo has a point. You should hold a second bourbon tasting but with no bourbon.
What blog are you talking about, LB?
I thought gswift was untoppable, but Werdna has quite the excitement/word ratio. Also, personal threat. I am jumping off a cliff. ("The fleets meet.")
Actually, I am among (the?) sociable mathematicians, all hanging over each other's shoulders at screen or whiteboard. But people keep asking me for software installation help. (And generally I can, which may be my error.)
... I hope I was more coherent explaining the software installations, at least.
I've never heard "skinning up" but "skins" is lowlife US for papers. Or used to be.
109.last: Reading the EULA out loud once keeps anybody from asking again.
74: Holy shit. Glad to hear you're okay!
74: Oh, man. Glad to hear you're on the way to recovery.
Thanks for the bulletin Werdna. Glad you're getting better. Keep us posted.
Wow, yes, best of luck with the recuperation.
What blog are you talking about, LB?
I too am urple in the respect discussed upthread. On the other hand I feel perfectly comfortable sitting quietly while other people rabbit on, especially in formal settings; if this unnerves them, it's not my problem.
Today I go out of the house for the first time since the excitement. Will walk slowly down a flat road for a bit, and then back. I am greatly looking forward to this. But -- don't tell anyone -- having both children around, when my son is usually in Macau, pretty much makes up for everything.
And to think, Gareth was making fun of the idea of Helminthic therapy!
Seriously, I hope everything goes as well as things can go following major medical drama.
It has been snowing and is very pretty here -- there is a pretty photo here so possibly that is a calming and soothing thing to look at, if you are in the market for such things.
(God knows I was following tonight's discovery in the law reports: the "limbs in the loch" killer, who is bizarrely fascinating.)