And it was, overall, a good one.
(Though I was somewhat narked that both kinds of edibles at the closing reception had cheese in - honestly, who puts cheese in a chicken pasty thing? I don't even - so I couldn't fill up on those. Was obliged instead to have a v indifferent meal at a place I had noticed in the next block to the B&B, having nixed the ( Read more... )

I am really not sure that interesting people cut through small talk by asking questions that sound a) formulaic and rote and b) pretty much the sort of thing you might get asked in an interview:
9 Questions Interesting People Ask to Cut Through the Small Talk.
Just possibly, if people have 'genuine interest in the other person, they don't need to ( Read more... )

It's bad enough being got into conversation with by extroverts who think someone minding their own business must be gagging for somebody to talk to them -
- but really, preserve me even more from an introvert who is trying to cure their basic dislike of talking to strangers by, well, talking to strangers.
(Is this not rather involving people ( Read more... )

Spotted in the street this evening: somebody walking their ferret. Awwww, cute ferret. Aaaargh, ferret-walking hipsters taking over the neighbourhood.
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I don't think I have ever managed to be fashionably late to any event unless there was a transport crisis.
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Book launch held in turn of the century hall of institution for educating the lower ( Read more... )

Hence the cliche of the millennial who can’t bear talking on the phone, and thinks it unconscionably rude when someone calls, except in an emergency, without emailing first.
I am not inclined to think that this is a sudden new phobia about unanticipated phone conversations, because I know plenty of people, including myself, who am very far from ( Read more... )

Tabs I've had open that just don't seem to make the full post all on their own:
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18 Things Every Book Lover Can Relate To, dissenting strongly from no 3 - just because you don't judge a book by its cover doesn't mean that there is no judgement on other criteria, wtf; and on no 8, my jury is out until I find what a person loves to read; also, no ( Read more... )

Two Chicago behavioral scientists, Nicholas Epley and Juliana Schroeder, have found that people who talk with strangers are actually happier than those who keep to themselves.
Yes, but were the people they spoke to happier as a result?
This - How to Make Small Talk with Strangers: My 21-Day Happiness Experiment - was something that got thrown up on ( Read more... )

Seeing an article in the Guardian Saturday Review that you would like to post about and being unable to find a link.
Anyway, the piece was about detective duos, either married or otherwise significant others, but I was irked a) by the omissions (Nigel Strangeways + Georgia, Alleyn + Troy, e.g.) and b) by not really thinking through the different ( Read more... )

Spotted this today via FaceBook

( Read more... )

Great con, great conversations, lovely people, etc, but v intense and by now, am v tired as things draw to a lingering close. This entry was originally posted at http://oursin.dreamwidth.org/2299081.html. Please comment there using OpenID. View
( Read more... )