How to meet & make friends after college / Your experiences with Meetup.com and other similar sites

In My Humble Opinion
61

Just updating the thread on the Meetup.com experience. I found two really great girls - funny, sarcastic, ambitious. We seem to be hooked on going to happy hours together, because of the cheap food and booze. They eschew the whole “let’s drink and be crazy!” that seems to permeate a lot of under 27 people, for some reason. The group is split; half seem to do a lot of bar crawls and bowling nights, and another group of us tend to do the happy hours.

Something else I noticed is that lots of people flit in and out of the get togethers. We finally figured it out, but lots of people - guys especially - are trying to date and hookup. Not a problem, just not our cup of tea (the two of them recently got out of relationships and I am in a serious one). We had several guys included in some of the meetups and all of them, in varying degrees of smoothness, asked one or all of us if we were single. They never reappeared. It occurred to me that the scene right after college is heavily focused on meeting someone marriage-tracked. Somebody said to me “Well, right after college you have to look for a job and get your shit together. So at 23, you have two years to meet someone. If you meet someone by 25, you date for two years, get engaged and live together for 2 years, marry at 29. Have a kid at 32.” And this was a guy! It’s like a rat race. I guess I can’t properly sympathize since I’ll be engaged next year at 24, which I feel is veryyoung. I’ll be younger than my mother and my grandmother when they got engaged. I don’t feel like a weight’s been lifted off my back, but it seems that’s how other people perceive it.

And yet, even with several Meetups, it seems like it takes a long time to become close. I went home this weekend to care for the dog and my youngest brother (my parents were out of town) and met up with one of my closest friends from high school. Within minutes we were laughing on the border of tears, sharing our parents’ past martial strains and subsequent tighter bonds, boyfriend updates, and our mutual friend updates. I had a fantastic time seeing her; the four hours we spent together felt like twenty minutes.

And today I realized just how far away my new Meetup friends and I are from that. I really hope that with time we just invite each other to our own apartments. The one I’m closest to, unfortunately, is only here for a yearlong internship. She loves it here, and wants to stay, but there’s a very real possibility she’ll head back to the South after all.

Anyone else have (varying degrees of) success?

62

I’m in Pittsburgh. I’ll be your friend. :slight_smile:

63

Come join some Meetup groups and we’ll hang out!

64

I gave up finding friends in this tiny southern town a long time ago. The biggest obstacle is that religion has these people by the throat, and I am not religious, which makes me scary and suspicious and godless and therefore someone to avoid. I feel absolutely certain that there are other women in this town or county just like me, but, like me, they are not a part of the community and so they are invisible. There are literally no social groups or activities that are not church sponsored for church members. None. I actually tried to start a book club a few years ago but people only came to one meeting, asked me when they walked in the door what church I attended, and I never saw any of them again. When a guy came out here from a local tree service recently to remove a dead tree from our yard, he introduced himself and (I swear) the next words out of his mouth were “What church do you go to?” There is simply no way to find anyone here, if they even exist, to be friends with. A bit of a jolt since we had a huge social group where we lived before this–which was not in the south.

65

This may sound silly, and it just popped into my head, but why not post an ad at the grocery store? Say something like “irreligious lady seeks equally indifferent friends. Meet me at xxx coffee shop at xxx time.” Or at the library, post the ad.

I would do this if I lived in the tiny town I grew up in. Not everyone is rabidly religious, they’re just…well, rabidly indifferent to life in general.

Have you thought of going to church functions and sniffing out the indifferent? Might be a good idea to go on a major holiday, too, help set up for it or somesuch. Cause there are a lot of people who only attend on major holidays…might be up your alley.

If you don’t mind spending a little cash, you could make a Meetup.com group, and put that on the ad (use a URL shortener for the group’s site, and have the website as people would have phone numbers on an apartment flyer. So you can tear 'em off). Flyer the hell out of any public area.

66

I’m at the age now where all my friends too are married with kids. What I found best when I was younger was to house share - if you got the right house and people you instantly made friends and if like you they are single you can make long lasting friends and get a quick social life.

Now that I’m in my 30’s I find some of the social sites such as www.drinkingpartners.com are good for being able to contact people who you think you might get on with, and even meeting up within 24-48hrs. You can also arrange to meet up in groups. It turns out there are a lot of people who have to move to a new city for work, or come out of a long term relationship, or whose friends are all attached so some of these friends sites I’ve found to be quite good.

67

Plans were in place for several days to go see a movie tonight. 6 people RSVP’d yes. It was a chick flick. Now, those two girls I’ve grown to like a lot (we’ve hung out 4 times by now) and I joke that people don’t show up when they say they will. A very high number of flakes, if you will. Then they sort of disappear and reappear as needed. Nobody ever asks why they flaked. One of the six RSVP’s was a guy in his 30’s. Yeah. For a meetup group of 20 somethings. For a movie with Julia Roberts.

So there was a storm warning in the northeast, right? A wind advisory here. Nobody was saying people shouldn’t drive, more like a heads up type thing. Wind was gusty, I wouldn’t have wanted to walk anywhere, but it was tolerable. My wipers weren’t even on the highest setting.

So I show up at the front of the theater, where we agreed to meet.

An extremely creepy dude approaches me suddenly, and said “I have an extremely weird question to ask you…are you from the meetup group?” I almost shit myself during the pause. I answer “yes” and we start to chat. He’s extremely close to me. I keep stepping back from him until we’ve moved to the center of the entrance. He somehow finally seems to get it, if only barely. I’m squicked out, but trying to hold out hope. More time passes. Now, we had all agreed to meet 20 minutes before the movie started and the movie time comes and goes. I have the phone number of a person; I call her twice and leave once voicemail. Traffic was bad coming in; people could reasonably have left on time and been 20 minutes late. I realize the showtime for the movie isn’t listed. I ask if it’s still showing. Nope.

Still none of the other 4 (and 3 of them girls) show up. He elects to go to a bar nearby. Ooooookay. The nearest bar is a Chili’s because this place is a bit off the beaten path. Chili’s has a 20 minute wait. At this point I’m channeling Jack Donaghy and thinking “Never go with a crazy person to a second location”. He suggests another, creepy looking bar across the way. I agree to follow him there. While in my car, I call the SO and relay the story to him. He encourages me to just up and leave, which I won’t do. Nor will I sit down with the guy and then “pretend” there’s an emergency when I get a call.

So we’re in this bar - excuse me, horse racing/track and bar - with fewer than 4 other people and NO ambient noise. I order a small caesar salad and he starts telling me about his DIVORCE. I asked if that’s why he’d recently moved back to Pittsburgh. Ah, no…it’s because he broke up with his live-in girlfriend. Ohhhhh, I see. Okay…

Let’s just say the conversation from him jumps from his divorce (epic!) to West Virginia (where he lived) to his job (which is paying for his master’s!) to his ex girlfriend beating him (did I mention her name was Brandi?) to three-somes (I cut that off quickly) to weight loss pills (he’s taking some that are illegal. Really. Illegal.)

He inhales his burger (the first thing he’s eaten since Sunday, he informs me) and roughly 1/4 cup of mayo and asks if I’m single. I don’t say anything, and he says “well you GOTTA be single” in an increasingly angry voice. So I say I’m single but I’m not looking; that I’m trying to focus on myself right now. This seems to be the best answer all around.

He finishes two Bud lights after telling me how much he loves craft beer. I ask for the check; the bartender nastily tells us we can’t do separate ones. So I hand him all the cash I have, some of it in quarters, and we leave.

As I’m walking to my car he shouts “Are you on Facebook?” and I say “Yeah, but I’m not searchable. We’ll just talk on Meetup”. Whew. At least Meetup doesn’t release last names. Thank Og.

ETA: I checked my email when I got home. 3 people canceled at 601 and 602, citing the weather. Anothe rcancelled 10 minutes in advance of our meeting time. Needless to say, I had left by the time they changed their RSVP.

68

Lindsay I live in Pittsburgh and am looking to make new friends! It’s hard as an adult and I don’t have a work situation where it’s conducive to making friends, feel free to email me. I was thinking of forming a meetup group but felt a little weird a about it! I’m a 30 year old female I live in the North hills.

69

As I get older, I find that I’d much rather have a small handful of close friends than a bunch of people that I don’t know as well. Quality over quantity as they say.

70

People get either weird as they get older or they get less tolerant of drama and bullshit.

I don’t get the whole internet friend / dating thing though. The marketing message they present is that only undesirables are in the bars and your chances of making a real connection are slim. I don’t believe that. Why would people who are unable or unwilling to meet people in real life be someone more desireable than people you meet in a bar or coffee shop? Just because they share some of the same search criteria?

71

I didn’t understand…well, any of that post. I’m not going to go into a bar and make friends. People arrive with gaggles of friends already. The people at my workplace are old and have kids. I have 0 in common with them. Two of the girls I’ve met are my actual friends now; if we’d had a class together or worked together at a job on campus we would have become friends naturally. Sure, the medium is a bit weird, but we don’t just sit and talk on a staid early 90’s internet date; we play boardgames and get coffee and do happy hour. Last week we went to a BYOB arcade. It was hilarious. Maybe 7 peopled showed up; someone ran into friends from work and we all mingled and such. One of my friend’s boyfriends is absolutely hilarious; watching him shut down a Ron who showed up was pretty great.

72

But aren’t you… scared?? How do you know that these people that you’re meeting over the internet aren’t axe murderers?? Aren’t they all weird and creepy?? Oh my god, run! Run for your life!!

:stuck_out_tongue:

73

I just wanted to put in a plug for couchsurfing.com. I’ve never couchsurfed in my life (although I host sometimes), but the group in Toronto has a couple events a week for visitors and locals. I’ve gone to outdoor movies, pub nights, concerts, museums, etc, and made a few friends though it. I’m not sure what the community in your city is like, but you should check it out.

74

In NYC and Hoboken,NJ, because there are so many bars within walking distance, they tend to be the center of social life here. I’ve met a lot of people who didn’t know anyone when they moved here. They would spend a lot of time hanging out in their local neighborhood bar where they would eventually meet other people which would eventually lead to activities outside of just hanging out at the bar.

The only downside is that if you aren’t careful, you might turn into an overweight alchoholic.
What’s a “Ron”?

75

Yeah but then I’d have to live in Jersey. Who wants that? I know what you’re talking about too, there are a few bars in 10 minute walking distance where people do that. Not me, though. I stopped having more than 2 drinks (and I mean two servings, not two 2-shot drinks) a night when I turned 21. It’s not a good habit at all. Plus I don’t want to be friends with people who spend all their free time at a bar. Y’know, varied interests like going out to eat, going to an arcade, board games and the like. People with a little depth, if you will.

snicker I hate giving away things for free, but…

ETA:

Only one guy has been a crazy (see the aforementioned illegal weight loss pills and breaking up with his live-in girlfriend on a Sunday and going speed dating on Thursday.)

But everyone else has been great. By great I mean normal and nice, not everyone’s a keeper :wink:

76

However you eventually wind up meeting people, true friendships are going to take time – years, even. When you’re in school it’s easier because most of the people you’re meeting are in the same situation as you: roughly the same age, no spouses or kids, you have school in common, etc. And if you go to school near where you grew up, you’re likely to meet people who have similar backgrounds. You wind up sharing the kinds of experiences that make people close, but that you only go through while you’re growing up. It’s why we sometimes hang on to friends from school even once it’s apparent that we’ve grown apart or no longer have anything in common. After school all bets are off, and that kind of bonding takes much longer.

This makes me want to slap you (just a little, in a “snap out of it” way). Why would you ever agree to go to a bar with a guy who was already giving you the creeps? The original planned activity was cancelled; end of obligation to hang out with him. The rest of your complaints about him are moot, because it’s entirely your fault that you’re still spending time with him – and you voluntarily went to a SECOND bar with him! Seriously, don’t complain about your night with the crazy guy when it could/should have just been 20 minutes.

77

Okay, in my defense, we weren’t out to get drinks or something. I can’t say “oh I have to leave, I have a thing in 30 minutes” because it was a 2 hour movie - I couldn’t have had anything planned! Or come up with a decent excuse, really. I was kind of shell shocked nobody else showed up. What I should have done was just driven away when we agreed to go elsewhere, but then he could have showed up at another Meetup later and been weird!

Also, I was holding out hope that people would still show. One girl gave me her phone number so I called her a couple times. The theater is in a really weird location so it’s possible that they got lost - I certainly did the first time I went there.

It all turned out fine because he was banned from the group because I off-offhandedly told the moderator what happened. I only told her half and she was horrified. Plus he was way older than our group called for, too. It wasn’t all a loss; I did have the best (and cheapest!) Caesar salad I’d had in ages.

78

Um, what would have been wrong with, “Nah, since the movie was cancelled I think I’ll just go home, but I’ll catch you at the next event”? Why does there have to be an excuse? And agreeing to go elsewhere but then ditching him would have been a high school move and completely ridiculous; pretty much the opposite of anything you “should have done.”

79

Because I’m already there, that’s why. I dunno, I was saying “We should just head home” and dropping hints like that. He didn’t bite, I didn’t force the issue.

80

Why don’t you try Couch Surfing? Its whole purpose is to bring strangers together. I’ve never had a bad experience yet. It’s not like you have to surf or host anyone to participate. Most don’t, in fact.

Pittsburgh’s got a pretty cool group. I think they meet up on the first Monday of the month. I know they do other miscellaneous activities during the month, too. The holidays are a little slow, but by January, everyone is out and about again.

Tell you what…if you want, when I’m in Pittsburgh next, I’ll take you to a meeting or happy hour with them. Or you can come down to DC for a weekend and hang out with the DC CouchSurfers. PM me if you want. That goes for anyone else in DC or Pittsburgh that’s interested in trying it.