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The Truth Comes Out

I think I might be slipping on the social hierarchy at work. I've never exactly been at the top, mind you. But I get by, you know? I have a non-trivial number of friends at work, and they, in turn, are socially capable. I kind of figure that if my friends aren't social outcasts, then by the transitive property, I'm not one, either (really, I'm just riding their coattails).

At least that was the working theory until today. Today, the guy I used to work with emailed me back about a birthday lunch. We usually try to celebrate people's birthdays with at least a lunch in their honor. If we know the person better or can get something together, we'll do dinner or hit a club, but that really depends on the circumstances.

Anyhow, I emailed this guy yesterday asking him if he wanted to do a birthday lunch. Well, the question was more like, "when are you free for said lunch?" And he didn't get back to me. Mind you, this is an office environment at a big Fortune 500 company. Keeping Outlook open is one of those unspoken rules that everyone abides by. Sure, people get busy, but email is usually a fairly quick response. In retrospect, this may have been a sign.

Well, whatever. I was fairly busy myself for most of yesterday, so I forgot about the email. One other piece of relevant information I should mention is that I'm going to be out of town for a few days. I mentioned this fact in my email because it's a little harder to coordinate logistics if you're not around (though not impossible). But hey, it's his birthday, so he gets to pick the date & time. I'm not going to make him cater to me for a meal in his honor, that'd be backwards.

I received the response today, "let's do [the day you're not around] or [the other day you're not around]." That was pretty much it. No explanation or any sort of mitigating factors, he just flat out decided he could do without my presence. Well, crap. Hell, even a joke at my expense would've been preferable to that.

The kicker to all this, of course, was that I was still on the hook for setting the thing up. In this case, that didn't take much effort, but I essentially had to plan the party I was being excluded from. Great. On the other hand, if that's how it's going to be, I think I'm justified in calling this my good deed for the week.

Like I said back at the beginning, I think this means I'm slipping. I've become socially expendable. I'm not entirely sure what I can do to remedy this: plastic surgery is too expensive, I'm not rich nor will I be anytime soon, and I'm not going to get any smarter. I think my only option is to get funnier (the bit I'm referring to starts right around 5:33, but the whole thing is comedic gold, in my opinion). And I'm not above stealing shamelessly, either. If you've got jokes, send 'em my way. My very social standing and mental well-being could be at risk here.

Or maybe this guy's a jerk. But given the stakes, I'm not sure I can afford to chance it; I'm going to work on the funnier thing, just in case.
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Comments

  1. (<> .. <>)February 20, 2010 at 10:04 PM

    youtube pulled the video, and I'm not sure funny fits your image. Not slapstick/goofy funny, anyway.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sam ChangFebruary 21, 2010 at 10:10 AM

    Hm, that's a shame they pulled it. The guy goes to a strip club with a famous comedian, and the DJ announces the famous guy's presence. All of the girls converge on him. Ergo, the response, "Wow. I need to get funnier"

    ReplyDelete

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