The Awkward Silence

Extroverted Main Man

04:28

0

Q: When is it rude to change the subject?

Suppose you and I were walking together, and you said, "Would you like to get something to eat? An appropriate response might be, "oh, here is a diner, or "there is a bar and grill," or "let's look at this ice cream kiosk." But suppose I said, "look at these daffodils." Assuming that I meant th...

etiquette

Extroverted Main Man

04:48

0

Q: How to deal with condescending comments when in a Bar/Club?

A few weeks earlier, I was with 3 of my guy friends to a Bar. Where me and my friends played a drinking game, the loser had to drink. Since, Im not really good at that game, I was losing a lot.I got drunk pretty quickly, couldn't even walk straight. And one of my friends, lets call him K. K sta...

friends conflict-aversion

Extroverted Main Man

05:07

0

Q: Man asking for food on the street would only talk to my girlfriend

While in Nashville TN my girlfriend and I were approached by a man asking for money or food. We were walking down the street and he approached us from my side and asked if we could help him. I thought he was addressing both of us but as I responded he completely ignored looking expectantly at my ...

conversations awkward-situations

Tinkeringbell

07:48

Morning! :)

Ælis

08:05

@Tinkeringbell Morning and thank you for the comments on the new questions :) (I was on my phone earlier and I don't like commenting with it)

Tinkeringbell

@Ælis You're welcome! :)

@ExtrovertedMainMan I'm not sure about this one. It might be related to 'behaviours people use to interact with others', but it's also just 1 observation, so I'm not sure if we'd be explaining a phenomenon or an incident :/

Ælis

@Tinkeringbell IMO, if it's only about one incident, it's mind-reading and thus, off-topic. If OP can edit to show that it's a behavior they have observe several time, then it's a phenomenon

Tinkeringbell

@Ælis I'm writing a comment now :)

Ælis

@Tinkeringbell I figured (since you "double crossed" me in the edit race :p )

Tinkeringbell

@Ælis Hahaha ;) How does that look? I do hope someone can find some evidence online that this a more common behaviour, and that we can keep the question :)

but don't google 'begging from women', it turns up some NSFW stuff :P

Ælis

08:16

@Tinkeringbell Ouch, I probably don't want to see that indeed ^^'

@Tinkeringbell And yeah, it looks good :)

Tinkeringbell

@Ælis That's why I left the comment XD Can't do much more googling at work here now :P

Ælis

@Tinkeringbell You might have more luke trying with "targeted begging" (if you still want to google stuff while at work)

A J

Afternoon!

Tinkeringbell

@Ælis Hah. I'll focus on work a bit more now, and do the Googling tonight at home :)

Tinkeringbell

08:33

twitter.com/WesterDude171/status/1123096428044271616 Today is always such a sad day :P There's still tourists showing up to celebrate 'Koninginnedag' on April 30th, even though we celebrate Koningsdag on April 27th for years now!

Ælis

@Tinkeringbell Oh no, poor tourists :(x (This is a double smiley were I'm sad for the tourists but still find it kind of funny :p). This is something my mom while definitively be able to do. She always plans a lot of stuff, but she often mixed up the date. We even have a name for that: "Mummy's good plans" :p

Tinkeringbell

Hahaha :P

My mom can do the same, plan to go watch the tulips just a few days after they mowed them :P

'But I didn't realize' ... XD

Ælis

Haha x)

Tinkeringbell

Well mom, it's quite easy. If auntie says they were flowering so nicely last weekend, this weekend most of them will be mowed!

(They mow off the flowers, so the energy will go towards the flower bulb)

I actually helped picking the flowers of the tulips that didn't grow high enough for the mower once, to earn money to celebrate Koninginnedag! We've come full circle now :P

Ælis

@Tinkeringbell I didn't even know this was a job ^^

Also "it will be sunny" is one of my mom favorite. She always says that "it will be sunny" even when the weather is clearly not going to be sunny. I remember some activity she made us do when the weather was really terrible ^^'

Tinkeringbell

08:45

@Ælis Not that much a 'job'... more of a chore that pays reallly well XD

Ælis

@Tinkeringbell Isn't that the definition of job? "A chore that pays really well"? :p

avazula

Morning everyone!

Tinkeringbell

It's called 'tulpen koppen'. If you google that, you'll get images.

@avazula Morning!

@Ælis Yes and no, a job takes longer than a chore ;)

avazula

how are you guys doing? :)

A J

@avazula afternoon!

Tinkeringbell

08:48

@avazula So far, so good ;)

A J

@avazula tired

Ælis

@avazula @Tinkeringbell is frustrating me because she is right about the chore vs job thing >< I want to be right :'(

Also, internet is very slow today at my workplace and it's frustrating too ^^

avazula

@Ælis I need to catch up on this it seems haha

Ælis

@avazula It's not a very long conversation, but it starts here if you are interested ^^

avazula

Haha now I see

King's day was really fun

Everyone was wearing orange and was smiling :)

A J

08:57

Orange? ;)

I know a moderator whose favorite color is orange. ;)

Ælis

@avazula I'm glad you had fun, I'm not sure I would have been at ease in a big crowed

Also, if you all have time to take a look at this answer, I think it's nicely backed up now :)

Tinkeringbell

@Ælis Yes, that does look good!

I even see you already beat me to the bountying part! :D

Ælis

@Tinkeringbell Ahah, I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks that deserve a bounty :D

Tinkeringbell

@Ælis The other answer they wrote is awesome too :)

Ælis

@Tinkeringbell Really? I need to go check that out then! (That is, as soon as the internet connection stop being so horribly slow! grrrr)

A J

09:14

Seems like I scared Ava. ;P

Ælis

@AJ That's probably because people who like the color orange are real monsters. Everyone knows that green and blue are the best colors! :p

A J

@Ælis high five for blue! ;) Green meh! ;P

avazula

Green's hope, blue's happiness

Ælis

@AJ I think your friendship should end here. I can't be friend with someone who doesn't like green :p

A J

lol

Tinkeringbell

09:20

@Ælis Green is the worst!

Red is best :D

A J

I have a complete attire in blue color. Blue shirt, blue jeans, blue shoes, and not to mention blue moderator cap. ;)

Ælis

@avazula I have a hard time seeing blue as happiness ^^' Green is life and blue is calm (but also sadness sometimes)

@Tinkeringbell Aaaaaaaaah Nooooooooo! So many hidden monster in here!!!

@Tinkeringbell What does red mean for you?

A J

@Tinkeringbell My fiancée likes this color.

avazula

@AJ I was in a meeting :p

Tinkeringbell

@Ælis It's the perfect colour for a parrot :D

Unlike green

Ælis

09:27

@Tinkeringbell Right, because green parrot definitively don't exist :p

Tinkeringbell

@Ælis Look how ugly the green one is! :P Red is definitely much better :D

Ælis

@Tinkeringbell Ahah, especially with some glasses on, isn't it? :p

A J

@avazula haha

Tinkeringbell

@Ælis Yes! :D

I'm not sure when this all started, but it started on meta.se chat... we made it a running joke that I really, really dislike any parrots that aren't red ;)

In other news, my mind just figured out that elt is being used to spell 'element' in this piece of code, and now I can suddenly understand what it's about :P

Ælis

@Tinkeringbell Being able to understand the code is always nice ^^ Did you rename "elt" into "element" than or do you thing it will be too dangerous?

Tinkeringbell

09:39

@Ælis I'm thinking about it. If I do make changes to that file, I will. But I'm not sure it's the right place for me to make those changes yet :)

Ælis

I understand, changing someone else code is always tricky

A J

@Tinkeringbell Well, imagine handling a project with variables and functions written in Spanish. ;)

Tinkeringbell

@AJ That would actually probably be understandable, for me ;)

A J

@Tinkeringbell Not for me. :P Although, it helped me learn some Spanish. ;)

Extroverted Main Man

10:56

0

Q: How to deal with the mother of my child stealing from me?

I am the proud father of an amazing 3yo and his mother and I have decided to part ways. I do not know how to deal with her anymore and need some external opinions. The last few months have been quite the ordeal and my world started falling apart the day I realised my wife was regularly stealing ...

children life-partner toxic-people

avazula

@ExtrovertedMainMan POB

TheTinyMan

13:15

Morning, awkwardly silent peoples!

Tinkeringbell

Heya! :)

Rainbacon

Morning tiny human

TheTinyMan

@Rainbacon You're making some assumptions about my species there! :o

Rainbacon

I mean, you called yourself a man, so I'm not making that much of an assumption

TheTinyMan

@Rainbacon Oh, yeah, dwarves and stuff don't usually go by that do they?

Rainbacon

13:17

Not that I'm aware of

Em C

morning o/

Rainbacon

Although, my current D&D character is a gnome, and we have a dragonkin in our party who refers to me as "tiny human"

TheTinyMan

Well, morning then, moist breakfast food! ;-)

haha I love it

Hiya @EmC and @Tinkeringbell! ^.^

Rainbacon

Our party is hilarious. 2 gnomes, a dragonkin and a half-orc

Tinkeringbell

walk into a bar?

2

Or should that be 'tavern' in D&D?

TheTinyMan

13:18

hahaha

Rainbacon

We did meet in a bar

Tinkeringbell

@Rainbacon Best place to start an adventure, that's why I never go there :P

TheTinyMan

@Tinkeringbell So the bar will have to come to you!

Tinkeringbell

> We are plain quiet folk and have no use for adventures. Nasty disturbing uncomfortable things! Make you late for dinner!”

TheTinyMan

Now I can't unsee you as a hobbit xD

Em C

13:20

@Ælis thanks for commenting on it earlier, now it's exactly the sort of answer I was hoping to find :D

TheTinyMan

It fits very well, haha

Tinkeringbell

@TheTinyMan Exept my hole isn't underground, but under a blanket! :P

TheTinyMan

@Tinkeringbell We could dig you a hole with a blanket in it! :o

Rainbacon

Curious, would any of you find it unprofessional if an interviewer told you why the company fired the person you'd be replacing?

Tinkeringbell

@Rainbacon Dunno, but it tells me they're fond of gossip and might well tell other people stuff about me I don't want them to tell other people about me.

I'm... not fond of gossip XD

@TheTinyMan Why though? I can already create a nice little hole while comfortably on a mattress!

Rainbacon

13:24

I had an interview yesterday that felt pretty unprofessional. "This team used to have a senior engineer, but we had to fire her because she dropped the integration database, plus a few other things."

Em C

@Rainbacon 0.o yeah, a bit. I would probably feel pretty uncomfortable hearing that, at least.. I wouldn't expect that sort of information to be public, especially not to someone who isn't even at the company

Rainbacon

He also dropped the f word once or twice

Tinkeringbell

I'd run, and fast.

Em C

@Rainbacon ookay yeah, that also kind of sounds like a veiled threat

"don't screw up like she did or you'll get fired too"

Tinkeringbell

Seems like they hold grudges too... 'you did this once, and it never happened again after but together with this, this and this, we now fire you'

Rainbacon

13:26

It sounded more like it was the straw that broke the camel's back, but yeah

Now I have to figure out how to tell the recruiter I'm working with.

Em C

"not a good culture fit"? :P

Tinkeringbell

^ +1 from me.

Rainbacon

Boo, I can't respond to my own messages

Tinkeringbell

@Rainbacon You can

Rainbacon

I was going to say that my phrasing request is off topic

Tinkeringbell

13:30

@Tinkeringbell Like this :) (but with the : in front of the number XD)

Rainbacon

Oh, I have to do it manually. That's annoying

Tinkeringbell

Get the permalink for your message, get the number on the end of it, and put a : in front of that :)

Rainbacon

Also, thank you all for reassuring me that I'm not crazy to want to run from the job

JAD

@Rainbacon they didn't have backups?

Mithrandir

SOX adds a reply button to your own messages also

Tinkeringbell

13:31

@Rainbacon And in a few years, you'll be mad at us because we made you miss an awesome opportunity ;)

Just take care with our opinions, we weren't there for the whole thing XD

Rainbacon

@JAD They did. He told me that they restored from the backup

@Tinkeringbell I was looking for an excuse not to take the next interview (I don't want the job but it's getting harder and harder to turn the recruiters down)

JAD

@Rainbacon then why would that be a reason to fire someone

Tinkeringbell

@Rainbacon Oh good ;) So we didn't influence the decision making process :D

JAD

hmm, remember that interviews are as much about you interviewing the company as vice versa

you didn't like the company, that's that, it's not gonna happen.

Rainbacon

@JAD It wasn't the only reason they fired her, it was just the only one he explicitly stated

Tinkeringbell

13:36

And I guess that turning recruiters down comes with a 'max attempts' or something, doesn't a recruiters job also take into account how soon/often they find a job for someone? If you keep turning things down, they might very well get annoyed...

Rainbacon

@Tinkeringbell That is the thing I worry about

I don't entirely want to burn my relationship with him because he's gotten me a few good leads. But he's also had some major misses

JAD

@Tinkeringbell and is that Rainbacon's problem, or the recruiter's?

Tinkeringbell

@JAD Bit of both, I guess... It's the recruiter's problem in one way, but it might become a problem for Rainbacon too if the recruiter isn't professional enough to keep that annoyance compartmentalized.

Ælis

@EmC I'm glad the answer turned out that well too :)

Rainbacon

Ok, I emailed the recruiter. Now to sit and wait for him to call me and tell me that I'm wrong (that's happened a few times so far)

TheTinyMan

13:42

Geez! With this particular recruiter?

Rainbacon

Yeah, though he actually just emailed me back and said he totally understands

Em C

@Rainbacon phew :)

Extroverted Main Man

14:30

0

Q: Become a Public Speaker

I am good at speaking and I do not have fear to speak. Addition to that i have skill as well. I would like to be a public speaker. But problem is I have no chance to my first speak. How do i get my first chance to address public community. My specialty in Information Technology. I hope good Advic...

public-speaking

Rainbacon

@ExtrovertedMainMan Off-topic

avazula

Hello yellow square

scohe001

14:48

Hello German pub girl

avazula

15:00

How are you today?

(My beer may be German but my heart is in Hungary)

Well, rn it's in the Netherlands actually

Great country!

scohe001

Ooh you're over by @Tink!

Today's been pretty good. We've had 3 criticals come in already (we usually get maybe one a week), so things have been a little...hectic...around the office

TheTinyMan

Tink sells it well enough that I kind of want to move there myself :-P

Until I stop to think about her commute... :o

Rainbacon

15:16

You don't have to live as far away from work as Tink does

scohe001

If I was going to make that kind of move I think I'd choose a little fishing village in Iceland

Rainbacon

Also, long commutes aren't that bad if you are on a train and can read

scohe001

Just gotta find a company that'll let me work remote out there...

Rainbacon

Stack Overflow allows remote employees...

Tinkeringbell

@TheTinyMan Remember I'm doing most stuff by public transport as I'm too much of a coward to drive (not for long anymore though, things have definitely improved a lot already)

TheTinyMan

15:18

@Rainbacon That's true. Or game on my laptop probably. :-P

@Tinkeringbell That's fairrrrrr, haha. I'm glad to see that things are improving!

Tinkeringbell

If I took a car, my commute would probably be down to 30-40 minutes one way, with no traffic. The train, train, bus method takes 2 hours

scohe001

@Rainbacon tempting, but webdev is the bane of my existence :(

TheTinyMan

@Tinkeringbell Oh wow from the map that seemed so much further. I always forget how big the US is!

Rainbacon

@scohe001 Wait, how did you find a dev job that isn't web?

TheTinyMan

@Rainbacon Haha, I've worked way more WinForms jobs than I wanna admit

scohe001

15:25

@Rainbacon lol I applied to 95 jobs 6 months before I graduated college ;) when in doubt, #bruteforce

TheTinyMan

@scohe001 Those jobs really are getting harder and harder to find, and I'm learning that as I'm going forward I'm regretting not having more Web experience in the years I've been developing. Just my two cents. ;-)

Rainbacon

I can't even find job postings for non web positions

scohe001

@TheTinyMan yea I like to keep an eye on openings both in my company and at other companies that have interested me before and there's definitely more and more web stuff. But it also seems like you can go the opposite direction and do super low-level stuff. That's where I'm heading

Or worst case I could always just go into management

TheTinyMan

@scohe001 That's fair :-)

There are probably fewer low-level jobs where I am than where you are then

Rainbacon

@scohe001 low level stuff sounds fun

scohe001

15:50

@TheTinyMan I think there are less just in general, but once you find one you're set lol

TheTinyMan

@scohe001 As long as you like it and they pay you enough, that's ultimately why I stopped doing WinForms! :-p

scohe001

@TheTinyMan haha those sound like good reasons to not do WinForms

TheTinyMan

@scohe001 I mean I liked it okay but that particular job didn't pay well enough :-P

And the lack of Web experience led to a lack of transferrability, you know?

Rainbacon

16:39

Aha, the recruiter passed my feedback on to the cto of the company and now he wants to set up time to try and convince me that there is no problem

Job searching is awful

Tinkeringbell

17:26

@Rainbacon :( Just very politely decline that one too?

Rainbacon

I'd like to, the trick is figuring out how to do it politely

Tinkeringbell

Ehhmm

Dear CTO,

I'm not interested K thanks bye

Signed, Rainbacon

Rainbacon

Is that polite?

Tinkeringbell

@Rainbacon It's as polite as I usually am when people keep pushing :P

But perhaps not polite enough, consider it a rough draft :P

Thank you for your concern, but I've made my decision?

Does that work better?

And then something like 'I wish you all the best in finding a great candidate'

Is this the same person that interviewed you, by the way?

Rainbacon

Different person

Tinkeringbell

17:37

That's a bit more difficult, as they might not even know about that thing that manager interviewing you said and so they can't guess why you'd say it's a bad culture fit...

Rainbacon

I'm working on a draft. I'll drop it here when I'm done

Rainbacon

17:49

Hey CTO,

Thanks for reaching out. Yeah, after chatting with Interviewer, I have some concerns about the culture at Company. An interview should put the best foot of the company forward. The level of unprofessionalism of telling a candidate reasons why a former employee was fired tells me that either the company doesn't put much effort into selling itself to the candidate, or it has a culture that tolerates unprofessional behavior. I appreciate that you are reaching out to listen to my concerns, but half of the interview process is the company selling itself to the candidate, and I've seen …

How does that sound @Tinkeringbell?

Tinkeringbell

@Rainbacon Sounds... maybe a bit much? I'm not sure what was in the mail you got, but it sounded like just an invite to decline. I personally would've done just that and left the explanation out :/ Note that I'm also not an expert on these things, I've applied for three jobs in my entire life XD

Okay, I've applied for more but never made the talks and then decline part ;)

I would get rid of 'unprofessionalism'. It sounds a bit accusatory.

Rainbacon

Content of the message I got - Recruiter mentioned that you had some concerns after your chat with Interviewer and I would love to set up a time to chat where we can talk through them! Company is a truly awesome place to work and based on our conversation I think would provide you with everything you are looking for in a new role.

Tinkeringbell

Yeah, I would probably find a way to just decline the invite and not mention those concerns, because if you're going to do that you could just as well have accepted the invite? ;)

Unless you expect them to never talk back after getting your e-mail ;)

Any second opinions here? I'm a bit out of my depth here too :)

Anadactothe

i'd ditto that as well, if you're declining an offer there's not any obligation to put why really

its not their job to worry about that

Rainbacon

Ok, this is what I'm going with "Thanks for reaching out. I appreciate that you are interested in my concerns, but I've made up my mind. Thank you for taking the time to consider me, and I wish you luck finding the right candidate for the position."

Tinkeringbell

18:03

That sounds about right to me :)

El'endia Starman

Agreed; non-confrontational but firm.

Tinkeringbell

And professional! :)

You're not dropping down to the level of that interviewer, you're not snitching on your interviewer like they snitched about the previous employee...

Rainbacon

Thanks for helping me workshop that :)

Searching for a job is a true test of one's interpersonal skills

Tinkeringbell

18:18

It really is :)

And doing those on paper is much harder than in real life (at least for me) so I've noticed my chances are actually a lot better once I got to speak to someone! :)

Rainbacon

Same

I have about a 3% success rate at getting an interview based on sending my resume. I have a nearly 100% success rate of getting a second interview after talking in person with someone

Tinkeringbell

Something like that :) My first two jobs I got by just walking to stores that had signs, and expressing interest, and personally handing over a CV (and in one case, immediately having an interview on the spot).

The third one I got by passing some tests and getting invited as part of the 100 best scoring people to talk to recruiters in person at an event ;)

As for internships, I always did ask/talk in person too, even if it was just after class by pretending to have some sort of question about the internship...

I never heard anything back from all the paper applications I sent out to different musea after graduating, but I got volunteer jobs by just going places and expressing an interest in helping out ...

scohe001

@Tinkeringbell personally I prefer "kthxbye" but I agree with your general sentiment :p

Rainbacon

18:33

Oh hey, while y'all are here. This question only needs one more close vote

Tinkeringbell

@Rainbacon Ah... last ones I can cast :)

Rainbacon

@Tinkeringbell That's exactly why I mentioned it :)

Rainbacon

20:00

Today I learned that there is a term for using a repeated word (for example saying "Do you like Susie, or do you like-like Susie?")

scohe001

Damn that's pretty cool

El'endia Starman

Agreed! That's pretty neat!

Em C

21:15

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