This is exactly what I go through to be prompt. I just do it. If I have tasks of unpredictable lengths, then I don’t do them on days where I have an appointment I can’t be late for. If the unpredictable tasks are unavoidable, then I make plans as to what will happen if I have to interrupt them. If the tasks are unpredictable, uninterruptible, and unavoidable, then I’ll reschedule my appointment. If things are unpredictable, uninterruptible, unavoidable, and un-rescheduable, then I’m screwed.
That is exactly how it was all summer with camp pickups and dropoffs at a variety of places. I may be 30 miles away, and have to arrive for pickup by 4:15. I schedule my whole day so I can leave as early as 3:15 in the event of bad traffic.
If the appointment is “soft”, like the popular mall example, then the key is just communication: “I’d love to pick you up for the mall around 4, but I have some things earlier that I’m not sure when they’ll finish, so I’ll let you know.”
Then at 3pm: “Things are wrapping up, I’ll see you around 4,” “this is taking longer than I hoped, I’ll try to be there by 5, and I’ll let you know,” or the dreaded “I hate to flake out, but this completely blew up and I’m not getting out of here anytime soon.”
Well, my brother has done that a couple of times, and i did feed him. But no, i don’t think anyone here has said they think that’s just fine.
As i said above, if I’m hosting a family dinner involving that brother, i build in a lot of extra time. Because i know he’ll be substantially later than he plans to be.
In his case, i think it’s actually a disability, and related to other psychiatric issues he has.
Yeah, in a case like that, with someone you know is going to be very late no matter what (or is likely to), I’d just say “get here when you get here, I’ll make sure to save a plate.” And not in any passive-aggressive sort way, but in a sincere “don’t stress about it, we’ll take care of you” sort of way. It’s just overall easier that way, provided everyone in the group can manage it.
Tasks are often a mix of simplicity/complexity and ease/difficulty.
For example, losing weight is simple but hard. Simple because ‘eat less exercise more’ is a four word plan that would actually work, but it’s actually not at all easy to make happen in real life, at least not for the length of time needed to work.
Taking a gorgeous nature picture is complex but physically easy. Easy because anyone can turn knobs, point the camera and press the button, complex because of all the interplay between subject, timing, lighting, camera settings, framing and depth of field etc, is what takes a humdrum picture and makes it art.
Being on time for a meeting, for us on time people, is both simple and easy. There is no step that is too complex for any literate adult to understand, and there is no individual action that is harder to accomplish than putting on shoes. You don’t have to change your lifestyle for 6 months, or understand the complex interplay between lighting and camera setting, you just have to… I dunno… try. At least, that’s how it feels, it feels like late people are not really trying.
I’m sure there have been people who think it’s a big deal when people are always 15 minutes late for something that doesn’t matter, but I don’t think anyone has said they consider it a big deal deal when someone is occasionally 15 minutes late for something that doesn’t matter.
I understand that other people’s minds don’t work the same way mine does and also that other people don’t have the same preferences I do. Even though I have to do the same sorts of things that you do to be prompt , including accounting for things days ahead of time , I can understand that someone may not want to plan to do the laundry on Sunday so they can pack on Monday to leave on a trip Tuesday at 7 am. They might prefer not to plan like that, but rather let each day unfold on its own and do the laundry whenever they can fit it in between Sunday and Tuesday morning and do the packing whenever they fit it in - even if that means leaving for the trip on noon on Tuesday. And that’s just fine - and if they told me when we were planning the trip that we might be leaving anywhere between 7 am and noon on Tuesday, my response would be something along the lines of “see you when you get there”. It’s not a big deal for me to be ready to leave at 7am on Tuesday and it’s not a big deal for me to be ready to leave at noon. What’s a big deal is having to waste more than the occasional 15 minutes of my time waiting for someone and what I don’t understand is why people who cannot be on time or don’t want to plan their day to the extent necessary to be on time ever agree to plans more detailed than " A bunch of us will be (at a certain place) Saturday night". It almost seems like they don’t want to choose between not planning or not going to the event/riding with someone etc. I also don’t understand why so many of them get upset when they are given a fake time or when someone realizes they are always 15 minutes late and gets there 15 minutes late themself.
And for other people, it isn’t. That’s the part you’re refusing to accept.
Some people can’t put most shoes on without a lot of trouble, either.
Multiple people have explained, multiple times in this thread, why some of those individual actions are difficult for them to accomplish. You can, I suppose, just conclude that we’re all lying. Or you might conclude that different things are easy for different people. Up to you.
It’s a long thread. There were multiple posts, scattered through it. Maybe I’ll go back and hunt some of them up.
Has anybody in this thread gotten upset about that?
The people I know who are often fifteen minutes late don’t get upset when others are late.
[quote=“puzzlegal, post:581, topic:942631”]
I’m a Geographical Information System Programmer (GIS).
I’ve a very spatially orientated brain. Not temporal though. I use a count down timer when I need to.(generally for cooking) And a re-occurring alarm weekly as well. It’s simple to do.
Earlier today my weekly calendar reminded me that I should start my plow truck to keep the battery charged. Oh, yeah, I forgot about that. Easy peasy.
But I digress.
There have been a number of threads about folks being consistently late to agreed upon meeting times. Nothing has ever been understood or resolved from either side.
It comes down to the breaking of an agreement that was voluntarily entered into. I hope that folks can understand why the majority of us that are kept waiting understand that this is aggravating.
Yeah, I’m delighted if i get to the meeting place before the other person. And there was a standing social event i was routinely 10-15 minutes late for, and the organizer said one day, “okay, so we’ll meet in two weeks at 8, except for PuzzleGal, who should arrive at 7:45”. They meant it as a joke, but i replied, “that’s a great idea”, and put it in my phone as 7:45. And that was the last time i was late. (I was sometimes early, but they told me that would be okay, and they didn’t mind if i came in and hung around until the thing started.) It hadn’t been a huge deal that i was late, as they started with pizza and i ate before i got there, and we all watched a movie together after they finished supper. But after that, i got to tease the next latest person about being late.
No one has advocated “breaking agreements”. Really, no one. Some of us have tried to explain why we try to avoid hard deadlines when we can, and that we believe we find being on time harder than some of you.
I’m sure there are people who are late because they don’t care about anyone but themselves. I’m sure there are people who are intentionally late as some kind of statement, or dominance game, or whatever. But a lot of us just struggle with time. I’m not great with calendars, either.
I liked the losing weight analogy. I’ve actually never thought about my weight. I usually stop eating when I’m full. I’m a bit overweight, but my weight has been stable for decades with basically no effort on my part. Yeah, that food looks tasty. Alas, I’m not hungry and can’t eat it. Why can’t everyone just do that? I dunno, but it’s apparent many people need to work harder than that.
I recall someone relating a story where someone was upset because he was given an earlier time than the other people and arrived at the same time they did. In any event , I’ve known many people in my life who get upset if they are told to arrive at 2pm, arrive at the predictable 2:30 and find the rest of the group arriving at the same time. Certainly not all, but many
No one has, or is advocated “breaking agreements”. But it happens time, and time again. Just look at this thread.
I will say that I’m a lucky one. Most of my friends are very prompt.
But I do have a story. A funny one.
A nephew we care for dearly was coming to our house in the Colorado Mountains to visit. We gave very explicit instructions and it’s really, really easy to find our place. West out of Denver one right turn and two left turns will put you at the bottom of our driveway.
Nephew ended up in Wyoming. Might have something to do with legal MJ in Colorado
Nephew was of course totally forgiven. Well nothing to forgive. He was going to be here that day. No skin off my butt, I’m just hanging out. But it sucks to be in WY when you want to be here.
Nephew also went West instead of East to get home. Ended up in a town 50 miles in the wrong direction. I guess we all have our challenges.
There’s somebody who’s going to be furious if anyone’s five or ten minutes late to something for which the time doesn’t matter.
There’s somebody else with a less than ten minute limit.
Admittedly, I’m not sure what exactly “any failure to keep to that time” means. Maybe it only means “any failure of greater than x minutes”. But that’s not what it says.
Maybe that one wasn’t supposed to mean “10 AM is exactly 10AM” butit sure reads that way to me.
Ditto. Anyone talking about 10 as if it were always the sense of 10 that’s used in math class isn’t talking about ‘I really meant 10 to 10:15’. Or if they do mean to allow a 15 minute leeway, they’re not expressing themselves very clearly.
Yes, it’s easy for me to get my ass in gear in a half hour. I can concentrate on that. That is simple.
I’m really what I call chronologically challenged. I tell people that. My Wife and I had the biggest trip in our lives to Germany. We spent three weeks there. That was… I donno… about 4-5 years ago I suppose. I donno.
Everything in the future is on a timer or calendar. Being on time is simple because I use tools to make it so. No stress, no rush, don’t even have to think about it and I don’t inconvenience others. I recognize that I have a bit of a problem with time and dates.
Recently, now since COVID and I’m working from home, I have to think to figure out what day of the week it is. But I never, ever leave anyone waiting.
In none of those statements does it say they get upset if someone is 10 or 15 minutes late once in a while. One person perceives you to think “that it’s perfectly fine to make someone wait” , which does not imply that he is talking about occasional lateness. (which is what I was talking about).Someone else talks about “10 minutes or more late” - and I very much doubt that 9 minutes late is fine with him but 10 minutes has gone too far. But OK, that’s one.
Because it suits you to read it to mean he will be upset if you are occasionally 15 minutes late- which it doesn’t actually say. Of course 10 am means exactly 10 am- but it doesn’t follow that he or I are going to be mad if you are occasionally 10-15 minutes late. I won’t get mad if you are occasionally 15 minutes late because even the most punctual person can unexpectedly get stuck behind a double-parked truck with no way to avoid it - but that doesn’t mean I really meant 10-10:15. It just means I understand life happens. But there are a whole lot of people I have known who if I said 10-10:15 would make it their business to show up no earlier than 10:30.
What I really can’t figure out is if you are occasionally 10-15 minutes late when time doesn’t really matter, if you are routinely 15 minutes late when time doesn’t matter, if you are routinely 15 minutes late whether time matters or not or if you are routinely more than 15 minutes late.
If it’s the first one, then I don’t understand why you are in this thread talking about how hard it is to be on time. The title of the thread is " Why are you always late?" not " Why are you occasionally late when the time doesn’t really matter?" And if it’s not the first one , if you are routinely late, (even if it’s only 10 or 15 minutes each time) or often more than 15 minutes late , then what does it matter whether people get mad if others are occasionally 10-15 minutes late - they are going to be mad at you regardless of whether they would get mad at some other person who is occasionally 15 minutes late to something where time doesn’t matter.
Why is it that the people who say they’re habitually late due to having a bad sense of timing are almost never early? Somehow their bad sense of timing virtually always works in their favor. (Notice I used the words “almost never” and “virtually always” because someone surely will recall one time when they were accidentally early and use that to neutralize being late every other time.)
Like others here, my sense of timing isn’t the best, so I use clocks, calendar apps, and phone alarms religiously. I’d rather be 10 or 15 minutes early and read a book chapter than keep people waiting.
The time of the event may not matter, but generally speaking I have better stuff to do than cool my heels waiting on someone who’s not on time. Five minutes, I generally am not bothered by as that’s within normal tolerances for people trying to be on time, but ten minutes, without some extenuating circumstance like unusually heavy traffic, bad weather, etc… is irritating, because it shows that the person wasn’t even trying to be on time. Again, it’s a chronic thing, not an every-now-and-again sort of thing that is irritating.
That’s the fundamental problem- lateness is tantamount to selfishness; if you’re not concerned about being ten minutes late, because of whatever YOUR reasons are, it shows that you don’t give a shit about the time of the people who were there on time. And I find that infuriating.
But you’re on record as saying that if someone asks you to pick them up at 10 that you take that as a general suggestion and presume they mean 10:20 is OK because being on-time to the task is not important to you. Actually it was more of victim blaming that when they said 10 they did not make it clear they meant 10 and your default is being late because of it. That implies that there is an element of choice and you are choosing to not put forth the effort to be on time. That is not at all the same as saying, “It is difficult for me to be on time.”
Oh and going back a few dozen post, when I talked about shower times I never said literally, “Cut the time in half.” Puzzlegal said she takes a 5 minute shower IIRC and it was unreasonable to expect her to do it in 2.5 minutes. I agree. My point was if you have to leave in 25 minutes, it is not the time to take a 20 minute shower of which 15 minutes is simply standing under the hot water. Realize you don’t have time and quicken the pace.
Thank you. Yeah the premise is the people that are always: late for appointments, late for work, late to leave for the airport, late to the movies, late to a dinner, etc.
I’ve made this exact observation to friends while waiting for THE always-late friend. If he/she is so bad at scheduling and keeping track of time, why doesn’t this cause the person to be early half the time and late half the time? My friends and I have also speculated whether a habitually late person should keep getting progressively later as time passes. You know…if that person is 15 minutes late for everything today, wouldn’t that make him/her 15 minutes later (a total of 30 minutes late) for everything tomorrow? It would be comparable to a clock that loses a minute every day.
