I used to be #8:** The Person Who Insists On Cleaning Up Your Party While It’s Still Going On**
I really have tried to get a grip on this behavior.
My friends totally crack on me because I’m like this. I know it’s rude, but I have this obssession with making order from chaos. This OCD party-cleaning thing even annoys the hell out of my parents when I’m home and they have a party. They’re all like, sit down! Enjoy yourself! Stop embarrassing us!
Anyhow, I’m getting better. At this point I can wait til after the party to go to work. I always assume I’m going to be drinking at any party (except a work party). If I drove myself to the party I always crash at the house of whoever threw the party (it’s always a good friend’s place, of course, not a stranger’s house— that would be *really * rude), so I can stay up late to get stuff done or get to work asap the next day.
And yes, I try not to make noise cleaning up at 4am or 9am!
Pete: "Well the closest Margaret ever came to cooking as a religious experience was making ‘burnt offerings’ yuk yuk yuk…
Marge: “Yeah, hah hah hah… shame I can’t cook like your mother… course at least unlike your mother I haven’t driven a husband to cutting his throat in the basement like your father did! Of course it saved him having to hang out in men’s rooms I guess… like I would have if I’d been married to the old bitch… though you obviously prefer her to me…”
Other guests: heh heh heh yeah… basement… Barb here has a basement story… the time the cat did that thing that awkwardly changes the subject why don’t you tell it!
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Hee. While, clearly, Marge is being a little too biting there, Pete’s comment is not very funny either. I think the realistic alternative (that Marge would stay quiet while wanting to murder Pete while crying, because saying someone’s cooking is bad is really mean and rude) is not a whole lot better.
[QUOTE=OpalCat]
I have a friend who is #9: Mr. Oh Look, You Have A Guitar. I like the guy a lot, mind you, and he’s pretty good at playing guitar, but when we have a bunch of people over I generally want to be social and talking to people, and when you have one guy sitting in the middle of the living room playing the guitar, nobody feels comfortable talking over him and the whole evening turns into Bored People Listen To Guitar Guy. Or at best, a couple of people having isolated conversations on the periphery.
(edited: I think next time we have people over, I’ll put the guitar in the bedroom ahead of time “so it doesn’t get damaged” and see if that does the trick.)
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I thought I was the only one who felt this way. It seems like I had a period in my teens/early twenties where every fookin’ guy I knew was going through this phase, and expected all the girls to just sit around and tell him how great he was while he screwed around at his guitar at parties.
Guess what instrument Mr. Athena has decided to pick up this past year? Yup. I’ve put the fear of God in him about expecting me to sit around and listen to him, though. It sorta worked. I still have to help him “evaluate” guitars. Apparently, my opinion counts, even though it’s 5 minutes of pure hell for me to have to sit and listen to whatever two guitars he’s comparing. Poor guy, it’s not his fault, I just have dealt with “Mr. Oh Look, You Have A Guitar” too many times in my life.
My MIL is #8, my FIL is #1. I love 'em, but it’s the truth.
I’ve mostly been #6, but years of experience as #6 has taught me not to be #6. (Yes, that makes sense.) It’s better than being #5. I once dated #7. He was a jackass.
[QUOTE=thirdwarning]
Now I’m going to spend several days trying to remember where I know #3 guy from. He looks disturbingly familiar.
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You’re not going to remember. You were too hammered the night you met. :smack:
[QUOTE=Sampiro]
imagine you invite a couple called Pete and Marge. Marge may or may not have had a bit too much to drink in the evening, or it may or may not be obvious that she and Pete are having “problems”.
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(Off-topic, but we’d be like the unlisted cast member of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? - the other faculty members who sadistically don’t warn Nick and Honey not to go over to George and Martha’s for a nightcap, but instead sneak over to watch from the bushes)
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic]
I admit to having been a 1, a 6 and a guitar guy. The guitar thing is a tightrope. Most guys overdo it. It can get you tail (or at least a shot it) if you do it right, but you have to be very sparing. Somebody has to ask you to play. You have to be reluctant about it. Then play one or two songs and STOP. If you execute the maneuver correctly, you can seem like you have mystique and talent. One song too many (and one song too many can be as little as two), and you become a douchebag with a guitar. It’s a tightrope.
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It’s fine to be the guitar guy at a party, as long as there’s a Bluto to keep things under control.
Heh, my wife and I are unintentionally #11 occasionally, because we have a running gag that doesn’t always translate well involving threats of grievous and silly bodily harm at insignificant provocation:
Z: “Yeah, we’re holding off on having kids for a few years until…”
Mrs. Z: “interrupts comically But I want a baby nooooow!”
Z: “We’re never having a baby because I’m going to superglue your crotch shut.”
Mrs. Z: “Yeah, you do and I’ll stick a knitting needle in your peehole!”
Z: “Yipe!”
About 75% of our friends get this, but sometimes when there are new people around (like our big new years bash) it gets entertaining. (Ironically, I always get tagged as probably abusive but somehow she gets a pass.)
Oops. I tend to be #8 when I drink, but I really do try to keep a grip on it, just clearing out empties and leaving the rest. I’ve gotten better about it as I’ve gotten older.
I’ve been #6, too, but I’ve gotten better about talking to people I don’t know (and I go to fewer parties where I only know one person).
I used to be #8:** The Person Who Insists On Cleaning Up Your Party While It’s Still Going On**
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You can come to my house for a party any time! I’m certainly not going to complain about the person who cleans up for me! (Especially if you’ve transitioned into someone who cleans up after the party. That’s the best person to have around.)
[QUOTE=jackdavinci]
Unfortunately, more often than not, I tend to be #6. I tend to have a diverse group of friends who don’t know each other and therefore I tend not to know all of each of their peeps.
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This is pretty much my situation. I have two good friends who have parties and for awhile I only knew them and none of their friends but over the years i’ve gotten to know the core group of their friends so now I am comfortable talking to the other friends instead of just my friend.
One of those friends has become a WoW addict the last couple of years and now most of the time when there is a party at his house he’ll hang out at first but then disappears to go play WoW. So I just end up hanging out with his friends and roommates. Just in the last six months or so his roommates have been having poker parties on Friday nights which is a major raiding night for my friend and his guild so by 7PM just as people are starting to arrive he goes off to play WoW. Because of that I show up between 5-6Pm just so I can hang out with my buddy for a bit.
I used to be a #7 the first few years after I turned 21 until my friends started complaining so I made a rule where I do not start drinking until 90 minutes in to the party and that fixed me. Now I can start drinking right away but I time myself on how much I drink over time so as not to get wasted and so I have time to sober up so I can drive home later that night.
Can anyone list the party people types for those of us who are blocked? 8 and 9 have been explained, and I think I can infer that 6’s are the folks who stand around and don’t talk to anyone. Filling in the rest would be cool.
As someone who hates housework, I have to admit that I have two friends who are #8s and I ALWAYS invite them. The only time it annoys me, strangely, is when I’m at a party at their homes- you’re handed a drink and a napkin, pick up the drink and take a sip, start to put it back on the napkin and find the napkin is gone.
