No Stupid Questions

I usually like to hear about people's travels to xyz. I find it less interesting to know about who had a baby, who's engaged with whom etc. but baby pictures are kinda cute. Usually though the purpose of hearing people talk about therir trip is to tell another mutual friend/family member that "person abc went to country xyz" or "had a baby with xyz". But sometimes you wonder how it would be like to visit that country yourself, or if you have been then how their trip compared to yours, so hearing stories from people you know are good insights.

It can drag on after a while, so when some anecdote goes on too long I try to fast forward towards the end of the trip, ask more about the trip that I want to hear about, or ask "did you bring anything back?" As the last question before changing the subject.

I like telling anyone who's interested about train stuff, and I'll share my travels in conversation, but I try to limit it to showing one or two pictures/videos off my phone and just the highlights in a few sentences.

Depends a lot on the details and execution.

Some friends can tell a good story about having a beer anywhere. Other folks would make meeting (some well liked celebrity) tedious.

I'm a little too deep into the "I had an onion on my belt" side of things, so I try to be patient with other people's meanderings.

If i have somewhere else to be or am short on time, then yea, i cant wait for them to finish telling me whatever they are telling me. Otherwise i can usually challange them with some questions or Insights, to create a two way conversation. Sure, if the person is someone i dont know well, ill usually not ask questions, and i am indeed not interested.

I care about my friends’ babies, but that’s mostly because I get to interact with them. The rest is mostly just politeness.

Trust me, parents know that not everyone cares about babies. But those who do sometimes care a LOT. My parents live hundreds of miles away from their grandchildren and love to see even small updates about them. Same with many cousins, aunties, and faraway friends. I don’t need you to be interested. I understand if you are not. What I don’t understand is why we can’t just coexist on this. Every so often I need to listen to a post like this declaring how much you don’t care about babies and kids. Does this make you feel better or something? Everyone was a baby once. Everyone had a parent. Can we just allow that this is a normal part of life and not some bizarre niche interest that’s getting shoved in your face out of the blue? Damn. /rant

Im generally happy when good things happen to my friends. What you learn in the long run is to keep those things to your self. When we go on vacation only my close family knows. Any big steps in life are better taken alone and then celebrated after.

It gets easier to ask relevant questions when you have some experience in those things.

Regarding vacations, I like to ask about the nature of sights in the area. I'm not interested in what food was in the buffet or how many pools were at the hotel, but I would like to know if the area has anything of interest.

For people having babies, I like to ask questions about how they're going to handle it, just to check if they are on top of the situation or if they need help with anything.

That culture-wide, near impossible to appeal level of stuff you must care about or be an asshole is just the worst. You really lose something critical when you pretend, and everybody seems to be in a conspiracy to bust your hump if you don't play along.

https://youtu.be/LbTB3ASkdOo

I AM nice, so I generally hope the people around me are having a good time, but that's not really much to think about so I'm generally thinking about anything else.

Babies and children, no. I mainly care if those kids are sick as children being sick affect the well-being of who I'm talking to.

I like to discuss vacations and I'll usually ask more in depth questions about travel since I like to travel.

That said, there is usually something beneficial to social cohesion where you care enough about people that you more than just name and role. I've found that it is generally a lot more miserable to work in an environment where everyone is a cog in a machine.

I generally don't really care but am happy for them. I very much care about them getting new dogs, though. Send me all the dog stuff.