This, unfortunately, has happened to me TWICE in the past week. I only pray AND ASSUME that it has happened to everyone else. It is:
THE MISTAKEN GREETING
I was walking down the hall at my temp assignment. A woman walking my way smiled, so I smiled and then she said, “How you doin’ girl?”
I smiled more and said, “Oh…fi—”
AND THE WOMAN BEHIND ME, TO WHOM THE ORIGINAL WOMAN WAS SPEAKING ALSO GAVE HER ANSWER. dork! dork! dork!. There’s me, left in the hall, talking to myself, smiling.
But isn’t it worse when someone waves to you and you wave back only to watch them walk right by and wave at the obviously more engaging person behind you? OH god, deliver me from THE MISTAKEN GREETING
Another Social Mishap:
THE WRONG STOCK ANSWER
“Hi”
“Hi”
“What’s up?”
“GOOD!”
oh god…too many times.
So what are some other small, devastating social mishaps? I need a laugh
How about THE TRIPPING ON AN INVISIBLE OBJECT - you know, you’re just cruising down the sidewalk, or even down the hall at work, and somehow you forget how the hell to walk. You don’t pick up your foot enough or something, and you start to rocket forward, ready to fall on your face. Yes, you recover, but not without making a really stupid looking face ( :eek: ). You look around to see if anyone saw, and sure enough… :o
YOU THINK THEY’RE GOING TO KEEP TALKING, BUT THEY’RE FINISHED
I was talking to a teacher at my school and the way he spoke it sounded as if he was going to go on. But he was finished talking, so there was a long pause on my part before I said, “Oh…heh yeah,” like a moron. It sounded as if I wasn’t paying attention, but I was.
I hate running into someone that I have met before and cannot remember their name. It happened to me twice yesterday. We had a vendor conference and there were several vendors in the office. Years ago I worked in procurement as a subcontracts manager and met and worked with a lot vendors. Two that I worked with for years stopped by my office to say hello. I recognized them, knew the name of the company(s) they work for, but damn it, I could not remember their names.
You see someone you at fist recognize as an acquaintence and you say hello to him, only to discover he’s not the person you thought he was :smack: I did this at work a few weeks ago. I saw a guy who looked a lot like someone I know, but after I asked him, “how’s it going?” he just looked at me weird, probably wondering, “who the hell’s that guy?”
What I also hate is when the other guy is blathering on endlessly about God-knows-what, so you’ve tuned him out. Finally, he stops to ask you a question related to his big rambling story. If you don’t want to offend the other person and want to make him think you were paying attention it’s hard to come up with an intelligent-sounding answer to his question.
Back in my late 20s or early 30s I went with a couple of friends to this very chic, tony party in Dallas at the home of an old acquaintence that obviously had done very well for himself. We walked in the front door of his beautiful home in this exclusive suburb and everyone inside looks like a model… all the rich and beautiful people, and we felt sooooo out of place.
I looked acroos the room to the stairwell where several women were talking and there’s the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen… small, petite and the perfect mix of Joey Heatherton and Connie Stevens. I actually heard the breath leave my body.
She looked back at me and our eyes met, she smiled and slowly with a mischevious grin on her face mouthed out some little sweet nothing to me. My face went flush, my heart pitter patter, I scrunched up my forehead and managed to mouth back a most witty “What?”
I saw her laugh, smile back at me and again mouth out something that undoubtably would have allowed me to die happy. Determined to make up for my previous boring gaff, I again scrunched up my forehead and slew her with yet another “What?”
Right then a Ken doll four inches taller than me and with a perfectly chisled face brushed past me and walked toward her, her eyes glued to him the whole way. They greeted as old friends and walked out the back to refresh their drinks together. I turned to my friends, said “This place sucks” and we collectively went off in search of the coldest keg.
She and I did talk later, laughed about the incident and dated for the next month or so but for awhile there I felt about four feet tall, and rightfully so. Nothing like humiliating yourself a full 8 seconds after arriving at a nice party.
You’re walking in one direction and come up to someone walking the other way.
They move to the left (you move to your right!). They then move to the right (as you move left!).
This continues until someone finally stands still and lets the other person go by.
No, this is fun! When people onthe other side of the room wave in my direction and smile, I wave back! They get kind of confused, and then when I stand up and start walking over to them, they’ll get this real funny panicked look on their face.
For me, the big problem is
SEPARATION ANXIETY
when you finish your conversation, say goodbye, then both of you try to leave… IN THE SAME DIRECTION! “Oh, I’m parked over there.” “Hey, me, too.” “Hah hah.” “Hah.” “so…”
Once I was attending a very nice formal dinner event, black tie and everything, the works. When we were all seated I saw that there was a different fork for each course, and at the time I had no idea which fork I was supposed to use. I had to guess completely at random. By coincidence I guessed exactly right, but later on I crapped in my pants.
My favorite version of this is when I am in a meeting, and the boss/meeting leader is going on and on and on about something that doesn’t concern me, and my mind glazes over and I start thinking about something else - like what else needs to be done that day, who I need to call before close of business, etc. And then, suddenly boss/meeting leader is asking me a question, and every turns to look at me expectantly, awaiting an answer. And I have no idea what the hell they’ve been blathering about for the last 15 minutes. GAH.
I’ve managed to completely avoid this by developing the habit of always giving a non sequitur answer.
Avoid embarassment by looking at the other person square in the eye, and saying in an exaggerated falsetto, “Shall we dahnce?” Instant tension eliminator, and it changes an awkward moment into a shared laugh.
