46135--Boring Wedding Talk

[Darth Fedora]

I disliked Dragon Lady's response. It's a little wacko to say that if someone is bored by something someone else finds interesting, they must be bitter, heartbroken, and maladjusted. Maybe they're just bored. I mean, we all know getting married is a big deal, but that doesn't mean that it's an interesting conversation topic 24/7. Being bored by talking about the same thing over and over again for every single conversation for months does not mean that there's anything wrong with you, as DL suggested.

[Nanti-SARRMM]

I disliked Dragon Lady's response. It's a little wacko to say that if someone is bored by something someone else finds interesting, they must be bitter, heartbroken, and maladjusted. Maybe they're just bored. I mean, we all know getting married is a big deal, but that doesn't mean that it's an interesting conversation topic 24/7. Being bored by talking about the same thing over and over again for every single conversation for months does not mean that there's anything wrong with you, as DL suggested.

I think she was just giving examples of what Shar could say. I don't think she was implying that any of that applied to Shar.

[Darth Fedora]

Whatever. It doesn't really matter if that was just an example or not. It's still bizarre for someone who had seemed so normal before to say that if you find constant wedding talk boring, then there is something wrong with YOU.

[TheAnswerIs42]

I'm with Darth on this one, actually. From what the question said, it seemed to me that this person is taking unrelated conversations and turning them back to her wedding, and that isn't fun to be around. If that were me, I would want to know that people were annoyed so I could work on it. I mean, my kids are my life- there are days when my "grand excursion" is to the mailbox and back as a stay-at-home mom- but I make a big effort to find other things to talk about with other people. I am fully aware that not everyone wants to hear about every little thing my kids did today that I think is really cute. Like Dragon Lady said, my true friends will be interested in a good portion of that stuff. But no one should have to listen to it being dropped in every single conversation.

It is always annoying when people turn every conversation back to themselves.

And besides, part of the list was that she turns conversations back to her wedding gifts? Tacky!

[Imogen]

i mean, i got sick of talking about my two bet friends' weddings because of the reasons dragon lady had in her example, but as a good friend i let them talk about it to their heart's content and just put my feelings aside for the time being. now the weddings are over, and we talk about normal things again.

i can see it both ways though. talking about it 24/7 can totally suck. but the good thing about a wedding is that once it's over you don't ahve to talk about it again except to reminisce about the good memories.

[Nanti-SARRMM]

Whatever. It doesn't really matter if that was just an example or not. It's still bizarre for someone who had seemed so normal before to say that if you find constant wedding talk boring, then there is something wrong with YOU.

I agree. Constant talk about anything is sure to get boring for most people at one point or another.

[Portia]

I think since Dragon Lady got married very recently, maybe she had also suffered from "can't-stop-talking-about-wedding" syndrome, and was giving her point of view. That's what I got out of it.

But yeah, I'm with the readers on this one. As fascinating as your boyfriend/aqua-not-blue napkins/baby whatever are to you, they aren't necessarily to me.

[A Mom, but not yours]

I suspect, but I may be wrong here, that the issue is one of perception more than anything else. We all have our pet subjects that we like to talk about. We may be certain that we speak about them often, but certainly not constantly. Someone listening to us who cares about the subject but not as deeply as we do may feel that that's all we ever talk about. I have a coworker that I dearly love who is obsessed with a TV show. She watches it, analyzes it, discusses it, follows news of the actors involved, writes fan fiction, writes occasional emails to one of the show's writers, etc. As a rule, she talks about it quite often. Now, I watch said show, but care substantially less than she does. At times it seems to me that it's all she talks about. But if I sit down and analyze it, she really doesn't. It seems like every conversation ends up being about that television show. But it really doesn't. But days when I'm feeling fed up and I don't care how the writer's strike is going to affect this season or next season's story arc, I'm inclined to complain, at least to myself, that that's all she ever talks about. I felt like DL did assign a reason the wedding talk got old to the questioner, but what she said was still valid. If that's the way Shar feels about, she needs to tell the bride to be. Maybe she can ask if they can have a period of time (an hour? an evening? whatever) where the topic of the wedding is off limits. Then she can talk about it again all she wants. When you are obsessed with anything, you often don't see yourself as the outside world sees you. It's actually a decent compromise.

[Nanti-SARRMM]

I suspect, but I may be wrong here, that the issue is one of perception more than anything else. We all have our pet subjects that we like to talk about. We may be certain that we speak about them often, but certainly not constantly. Someone listening to us who cares about the subject but not as deeply as we do may feel that that's all we ever talk about. I have a coworker that I dearly love who is obsessed with a TV show. She watches it, analyzes it, discusses it, follows news of the actors involved, writes fan fiction, writes occasional emails to one of the show's writers, etc.

Wow. That sounds like me when I was in Junior High and liked Pokemon. I was crazy about it and annoyed all my friends about it, and even tried writing terrible fanfics. Definitely not good. But yeah, I agree, sometimes we just don't see how inane/annoying we are being.

[Tao]

It is a difficult line to draw; "You are being very self centered, always talking about what fills your every thought, I want to talk about me for a change."

While challenging, I wonder if it would not be better to feign interest until you can find something that catches your fancy that you can build off of. I enjoy photography, cooking, and debating so although I remain extremely single, I can usually turn a conversation to something that we both can invest interest in. If I run out of ideas for engagement/wedding photos and dinners/cakes for the big event, I can usually find something to debate.

If someone is passionate about a subject, they will be able to turn any subject to their passion. (Fit appropriate mission story here). And since the vast majority of mankind is stuck within their own skulls, it is easy to forget that others think differently than we do. We deal with it in every walk of life, and if you can survive the ex-sports star's conversations about sports and the never-sports star's conversations about star wars, but we struggle to cope with a close friend's engagement exuberance, perhaps we could stand some introspection. As Dragon Lady mentioned, perhaps your friendship isn't as close as you had thought and some time apart is warranted. If you would like your friendship to be strong enough to make sacrifices for each other but are still struggling with it, perhaps there is something else that is out of place. Can you think of any better reason to be unable to bare the twitterpated prattling than that which Dragon Lady used in her example? If a lack of being entertained is earth-shattering for you, many if not most of your interpersonal relations are doomed to be on rocky ground.

In short, being bored does not imply anything out of order, but being unable to cope with it might be.

[chillygator]

Tao,

I agree that a lot of a relationship is talking about things that aren't necessarily fascinating to you, but never in the question did Shar say "it's so boring!" she said "It's uncomfortable." Which may mean the example Dragon Lady decided to use is closer to the actual situation than just bored. And if your friend really did just break off an engagement, don't you think you could find someone better to share your exciting life changes with? Even caught up in post-wedding bliss, some part of your brain HAS to say "Julie's not planning a wedding any more, I bet hearing about mine over and over would be a little painful for her"

Of course, I also agree that if it's just boring to her, perhaps that friendship may have gone separate ways.

[Katya]

This is reminding me of the time a friend in my ward was sooo concerned about boring people with her engagement talk that she wouldn't talk to me about it at all. I finally had to say something like "So, I hear my cousin proposed to you. How's all that going?"

[Nanti-SARRMM]

This is reminding me of the time a friend in my ward was sooo concerned about boring people with her engagement talk that she wouldn't talk to me about it at all. I finally had to say something like "So, I hear my cousin proposed to you. How's all that going?"

Or My Mission President saying that no one would really want to hear about the mission when you get off the mission. And he was right.

[xkcd ***]

This is reminding me of the time a friend in my ward was sooo concerned about boring people with her engagement talk that she wouldn't talk to me about it at all. I finally had to say something like "So, I hear my cousin proposed to you. How's all that going?"

Or My Mission President saying that no one would really want to hear about the mission when you get off the mission. And he was right.

So Nanti, how was your mission?

[Nanti-SARRMM]

So Nanti, how was your mission?

I should have foreseen the irony of stating that...

But my mission was great. I even had a trunkie for the mission moment earlier today chatting with Chilly earlier if that counts for anything.

[chillygator]

So Nanti, how was your mission?

I should have foreseen the irony of stating that...

But my mission was great. I even had a trunkie for the mission moment earlier today chatting with Chilly earlier if that counts for anything.

I'm trunky for mine now, too. Let's now start a thread telling boring mission stories to weed out our true friends. It will probably end fast, though, because I'm sure my mission was way better than any other mission! (Kidding. Totally kidding.)

[Nanti-SARRMM]

I'm trunky for mine now, too. Let's now start a thread telling boring mission stories to weed out our true friends. It will probably end fast, though, because I'm sure my mission was way better than any other mission! (Kidding. Totally kidding.)

Well of course, you got to preach to the Kangaroos, see the toilet water spin in the opposite direction; so yeah, yours was probably totally awesome.

[Portia]

Chilly, I'm pretty sure you're not kidding. You have among the best mission stories I have heard.