For privacy I’ll call my friend L. Me and L have been friends since around 2nd grade, and we are now in our early 20s. We are super close and I love him to death, but for the past year a behavior he does has been pissing me off, but I don’t know if the anger is justified.
Around 2 years ago, L started card collecting as a hobby. As he got more into it, it basically unfolded into a part time job. He is constantly scrolling on apps like ebay, and others looking for cards to buy, and resell. He does very well, at least for someone in their early twenties. He’s able to spend thousands on cards and make his money back when reselling. I am really happy for him and proud that hes been so successful with it.
However, as time has gone on, he started putting more time into the card collecting. If he did this on his time, alone or with other people collecting I wouldn’t care. But, when we hang out, he spends a lot of time just looking for cards, or he ends up doom scrolling. This irritates me to no end, I ask him to hang out to do stuff with him or talk, not watch him scroll on the phone and make deals. He has a instagram where he post cards and I understand that people make offers on cards he posted and he can’t really wait to respond, but most of our hang out time is spent with him on his phone. Even when he asks me to hang out he does the same thing.
Sometimes it doesn’t even have to be work related. I got a pc recently and asked for some help building it. He felt the need to have our local football teams championship game pulled up on his phone the entire time and often ignored me or got distracted by it which made the process really slow and we didn’t finish it that night. I would rather just not have him come over at that point. I have brought this up to him, and his response is usually something like "bro, I’m just trying to make money" or "I can’t ignore people offering me deals".
I can understand not ignoring buyers but the whole being on his phone the whole time we hang out annoys me. Again if he said he was too busy to hang out because of card collecting, I wouldn’t care, its the agreeing to hanging out and then spending heaps of time on the phone that makes me angry. In our friend group of 5, I seem to be the only one that is annoyed by this. I don’t plan on ending our friendship or anything. I just want to know AITA.
NTA. If he’s too busy flipping cards to actually hang out, he shouldn’t agree to hang out in the first place. Sitting next to someone while they scroll through eBay for two hours isn’t quality time, and the fact he does it even when he’s the one who invited you over makes it worse.
Was with you until:
> I got a pc recently and asked for some help building it. He felt the need to have our local football teams championship game pulled up on his phone the entire time and often ignored me or got distracted by it which made the process really slow and we didn’t finish it that night. I would rather just not have him come over at that point.
You ask him for free labor, and your mad it wasn’t speedy or conversational enough? Ever think he rater watch the game but was willing to give up focusing on that to help you?
I was gonna say this was just issue of people growing a part and your find to let him know you don’t like how y’all hang but you can’t dictate that he not, but naw, you used the PC assist as a hang out YET your watching the clock???
Naw you’ve cross your wires on expectations and customs YTA.
I don’t see how the OOP is the A. The friend ignores OOP constantly and it seems that the friend doesn’t try to keep the friendship going. PC building is in fact a time consuming process but he could have communicated with OOP but since he didn’t I feel like the friendship is on break point.
PC Building for someone else is a service. OP asked for someone to provide a service, for free, and is upset it took too long and/or that the provdier wasn’t friendly enough.
If OP just wanted a PC Building hang sesh, fine, then why are you watching the clock? Who cares if we even complete it? We just hanging.
Its because OP doesn’t see that, I don’t wholesale accept their view of being ignored. Sounds like they are friends who have a history of just communing while sharing space, so while OP is free to vocalize how this makes them feel, they can’t then go around demanding free friendly fast services from them and say they are a bad friend for it.
You want him to working when your with him or not? Cause the PC build shows me OP mixes these things.
I guess I didn’t word this correctly but I can tell you I didn’t invite him over for “free labor”. We both had never built a pc before, I invited him so we could chill and attempt to try and build. If it didn’t get finished oh well, and if he didn’t help because he thought I was “using him” I also wouldn’t have cared. My issues comes from the fact he decided to watch a football game instead of talking or least trying to help. He also didn’t see it as ”free labor” and I would have definitely paid him if he wanted it. It’s pretty normal for us to help each other with things while hanging out. The hangout was around 4 hours and I recall most of it being him on his phone, and I would occasionally tell him to knock it off or try to make conversation with, he would put the phone down for a few minutes and then hop right back on. I think you took my words as I only invited him over to build, but I intended it as hanging out with my friend and building it together as something to do, and he liked the idea and came over.
I also wanna add, he’s invited me over to help with things. I’ve pretty good with emulation and console modding. I’ve helped him many times with these things never once viewed it as “he’s inviting me over just for a service”. We have been friends for over a decade and we help each other out.
NTA he asks to hang out and he doesn’t give you attention at all. This seems like a one-sided friendship. Are you the only one communicating, or does he also try to keep this friendship intact? If it is just you, then leave. If he also tries (which doesn’t seem like he does) then try communicating once again, tell him that this pisses you off and if once again he doesn’t compromise, leave asap.
NTA but stop getting mad – just stop hanging out with him.
NTA. It means he’s busy and shouldn’t be agreeing to hangout with you just to later justify it as him ‘trying to make money’ if he’d rather flip cards than hangout then he should just say so. It’s unfair for the person who genuinely wanted to spend time with him.
NAH, this reads like you just kinda grew apart. You have different interests now; you’re not both in second grade. If you don’t like hanging out with someone, you don’t have to. You can still be friends and hang out less.
I do get the being on the phone thing being annoying, but tbf if you were also really into Pokémon cards or football, it’d probably be less annoying
Yea, a lot has changed in our life’s and kinda figured it was growing a part situation. The advice I seem to be receiving is to tell him straight up I don’t wanna hang out with him anymore. It’s tough to say that but I think it’s the path I’m gonna take.
That’s fair. At the end of the day, you need to take care of yourself first. Best of luck with this whole situation!
I don’t think anyone’s the AH here, I just think if your interests and how you want to spend time together don’t align, then stop hanging out. It doesn’t have to be a big thing, you can still be friends, just stop hanging out one on one if it bothers you. It not a short coming on him or you, no one has done anything wrong, it’s just not for you at this point in your lives. Simple as that.