what do outoging peopel actually do?

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i have a question for any outoging aspies, or even ones wh only go out once in a while. what do you actually do in your spare time?, do you have a routine?, how frequentley do you do these things? i knwo that i would really enjoy beign outgoing , but from waht ive seen nts have really clsoe relationships with their freinds, and frequntley go round theri houses and go otu with them, and im not really sure if i am fit for this amount of chaos.. anyways im just wondering thanks

i go to the movies with my old friends once or twice a year. on schooldays i occasionally go out with a schoolmate for lunch
(she is an intelligent, serious person). Most of them enjoy anime, I don't. Otherwise I don't hang out with people.

they go out

I don't know. It does seem that when they talk, they aren't really talking about anything. I imagine that when they do, they aren't really doing anything.

Well put.

It seems as if you might not get the point of casual conversation for NTs, there. To have a successful convo, you don't really need to talk 'about' anything... it's social grooming. This is a HUGE part of maintaining successful relations in the NT world. AS people are often extremely topic-focused in their discussion, which often seems to be a large part of 'typical' social awkwardness... coming up against the casual conversation pragmatics of NTs, who tend to drift more.

cheers,

-Luke

i goto the local bar, drink and pretend to be in a conversation, but i pretty much just stand there and smile and nod my head

AND DO WHAT?? lol

I knew a guy who couldn't understand what people would do in a house beyond sleep and shower.

I couldn't exactly figure out what he spent all his time doing, though. There's bars and restaurants, but that's unhealthy, not to mention expensive, on any kind of regular basis, and I guess billiards halls and gyms, then there's good old fashioned wandering around. Most entertainment events cost a lot to go to.

I can see I'm going to have to give up writing semi-facetious comments. I apologise.

i guess the first thing they do is lock their doors.

apparently george bush was outgoing. i heard it on the new. he was referred to as "the outgoing president".

Brilliant!!

I've taken plenty of time listening to NT conversations, there's a lot talking about someone else. Nothing rude, but just simply talking about someone else. But it's not as bad as you think, there's plenty of topic oriented conversations to be had, you just don't stick to one topic. Usually it flows, I will even use my main interest (music, a popular hobby) as a conversation starter.

Condensed conversation example:
A--me, B--friend
A: "The Vines are working on a 5th album"
B: "That the band who's singer freaks out on stage?"
A: "Yeah."
B: "It's like he's possessed"
A: "At least we don't need priests throwing themselves out the window like in The Exorcist.
B: "Scary movie. Don't watch it when you're high. Hey, have you seen that "Shutter Island?! That was pretty crazy too"
A: "Nah, can't get to a theater, no car, remember?"
B: "Oh yeah..."
A: "Can't get to U-Fest either, cool lineups, even Throwdown's gonna play this year.
B: "I'll probably be going, I'll give you a ride so let's just hope that I don't lose it in the moshpit and we gotta leave early again like last year."
A: "Oh yeah, that skinhead who's jaw you broke?!"
B: "That a**holehad it coming. But those f*****g cops, man"
A: "Yeah, that's bullcrap. It's a moshpit, was the p**** expecting everyone to play nice and then call the cops when he gets hurt?!"

That right there is a fake conversation between myself and an NT friend I just threw together, but it is a perfect example. It's still topic oriented (in fact it's a mixup of previous conversations we've had), but it's a good example of the "drifting" as previously mentioned. Don't worry, there's single-topic exchanges that go on much longer if they need to be discussed (hopefully you'll recognize them). It flows, bro!!

One of my keys to success: Watch/listen and learn don't just try and guess the cues of the person you are speaking with, listen to yourself as well as your friend/acquaintance/stranger. Imagine you were spectating from a 3rd person perspective.

This isn't just aspie related - it's common to all manner of socially awkward people - but there are two kinds of conversation. One is a flow of information - like being asked directions, say - and involves learning. The other is basically gossip - there's little or no factual content and little or none of it is retained afterwards. This is "small talk" and is the type that antisocial people really struggle with.

People who struggle with information-bearing conversations are airheads. They are the target market for gossip magazines and are destined to live their lives as checkout assistants.

My social skills improved enormously when I figured out the "rules" for gossip. It isn't pointless at all - it's emotional contact. The words don't matter - it's the tone and (more importantly) the affirmation that you're chatting with this person that counts. You are spending your time with them, which means they feel important to you. A good flow works both ways - aspies can struggle to "receive" these emotional transmissions, and metaphor/pragmatics can cause problems. Just nod and smile. We aspies have a big advantage - we don't talk as much tosh, so we listen more. People generally like to talk about themselves, so let them waffle, sift the gibberish for any useful facts and demonstrate that you are actually listening by commenting on the odd snippet. Don't worry about remembering it all. They won't!

In the opposite direction, beware of boring them! I know an aspie at work who's several years younger than me, and at about the social level I was then, and he bores people. And he can't see it! There's no need to expunge whole plotlines to the television programmes you watched last night, or go into the details of every activity. That's factual transmission, and it's unasked for. Instead, talk about them, always their favourite topic, and look for common ground where you can talk about yourself at the same time - common interests, for instance.

My biggest difficulty is recognising people. Unless they're particularly close to me or I see them a lot, I'll seldom remember them unless they have a particularly unusual quality (missing limbs, third eye, silly voice, you get the idea!)

i guess the first thing they do is lock their doors.



so thats why my stuff keeps dissapearing, of course it all adds up!

bingo! that's a really summary of how i think it works. you know... this thread's really making me think i need to go and get some sociolinguistics and language pragmatics books out of the library.

-Luke

umm, whoops. (shrugs)

-L