Right now, my online social life is a lot of tabletop RPG groups and my MMORPG pals.
My FFXIV crew is mostly current or former forum folks. I know there are a ton of other forum folks in other free companies, but I haven't interacted much outside my own, so if you ever see Siege Zabac on Sargatanas server, that's me!
My weekly Monday D&D 5e crew is also mostly current or former forum folks, overlapping heavily with my FFXIV crew.
My bi-weekly Tuesday D&D 5e crew is run my by brother, and full of old friends of ours from college that he tracked down on social media.
My weekly Thursday D&D 5e crew is all people I met at PAX from the Acquisitions Incorporated: the C- Team community.
My monthly whenever-the-schedule-permits GURPS crew is all local, and previously we were meeting in person, but moving online has been so much more convenient for most players that we're thinking of adding a second monthly session.
And then I play a lot of games online with my nieces and nephews, which seems to be appreciated by my siblings since they know that if their kids are playing stuff with me, they're only learning curse words they would have eventually picked up at home anyway. We've been negotiating the details of a family minecraft server for a couple months, but the timeline for that keeps getting pushed back because we don't want to do a grand opening while any of them are grounded, and there are enough damn kids now in my very Mormon extended family that there's always at least one of them in trouble.
Realizing lately that I don't really trust or respect basically any of the moderators here. So, good luck with life, friends! Hit me up on Twitter @DesertLeviathan
Of course, she is delightful. She'd invite you over and bake for the occasion, then ask if you wanted to watch lord of the rings or a naff disaster movie
I am down as hell for this.
Could we bake together or is she territorial about the kitchen?
Videogames can help introduce people to each other
Or any shared hobby
I would not plan on befriending co workers, despite the fact a former co worker and I have been in a romantic partnership/relationship for a year and a half
Or that one of my former co workers is one of my closest friends
I mean, I'm 36, I've worked with hundreds of people and I consider four of them, from three different workplaces, to be friends
Can't do drugs with people you work with, after all
The two people that sabotaged me and listened to my not manager f ing up the whole store with how they run Cap 2 would go in the parking lot at lunch and hot box it
If you're reluctant to make the first move or naturally reclusive, one way to meet people online is to do something creative and post it up somewhere. Drawing/writing something that someone out there likes gives them an excuse to strike up a conversation with you. Granted, looking at it cynically, some large fraction of these introductions will have getting you to draw/write something for them as an ulterior motive. On the other hand, I'd say that a large majority of the people I directly talk to these days are people I met through art communities of some stripe, either as the artist or the "hey that thing you made was neat" guy.
My favorite musical instrument is the air-raid siren.
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Donovan PuppyfuckerA dagger in the dark isworth a thousand swords in the morningRegistered Userregular
I would not plan on befriending co workers, despite the fact a former co worker and I have been in a romantic partnership/relationship for a year and a half
Or that one of my former co workers is one of my closest friends
I mean, I'm 36, I've worked with hundreds of people and I consider four of them, from three different workplaces, to be friends
I just could not figure out how to socialize with the vast majority of my co-workers at my last job. It seems like all they talked about was sports, their kids, gossip about people they knew, and giving each other a hard time. It was miserable.
Goose!That's me, honeyShow me the way home, honeyRegistered Userregular
Spoilering this because while it feels good to get it out, I also feel...embarrassed isn't the right word exactly, nor is ashamed. I don't really have a right word for it. I don't like making a thing out of my life or my problems? Alright I'm rambling now, spoiler time
I have a hard time with feeling connected a lot of the time, actually. I don't actually have strong ties, like someone I feel like I could open up to or discuss things with, and haven't for quite a bit. Don't get me wrong, you're all very lovely people and if we hang out at PAX or Camp Counseling or Discord or Twitter, I appreciate you and value you as a friend. However, it's been difficult for me pretty much since I dropped out of college to develop and maintain any kind of meaningful bond with anyone for very long. There's a lot of baggage and abandonment issues, some explored some repressed, along with other reasons.
But for the most part I haven't had like a best friend since high school (and they were a shit best friend as it turned out) and I haven't had a close online friend that I talked to consistently in some fashion (in a private message etc.) for at least a year. For all the positive steps I've taken in getting my license and moving out of my family home thinking it would spur a sort of new social life, this fucking virus sorta kneecapped any ability to have a ocial life, which was already severely hampered by my own brain and past experience.
Found a great article with plenty of suggestions for keeping connected online. I'll post some excerpts, too.
Discord is similar to Slack and many other chat clients, but Discord has a prominent voice chat feature that can be active all the time. Discord’s voice channels allow users to talk to each other in real time while they multitask. It also comes with a screen-sharing feature that allows groups of people to watch a movie if one of them is streaming it.
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Birthday parties are moving to Google Hangouts, board game nights are moving to Zoom, and popular group party games like Jackbox are encouraging people to try playing them remotely.
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On Eventbrite, an event discovery platform that’s typically used for offline events, a recent surge in livestreamed classes and webinars prompted the company to create a new landing page just to feature upcoming virtual events. It’s a slightly surreal tour through the landscape of classes and events that are usually chances for offline community-building — everything from yoga to bread-baking to a virtual ballet class is listed.
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One of the most fundamental tools for group gatherings has proven to be the remote conferencing platform Zoom, now expanding far past its professional purpose, as families, schools, and groups of friends assemble for a wide range of unexpected encounters. The New York Times reported that more than 600,000 people downloaded Zoom in a single day last week. A Facebook group for Zoom memes has ballooned, while Instagram is full of people screencapping their Zoom conferences with accompanying hashtags like #unity, #isolation, and #coronavirussucks.
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As Putnam told Vox, the online apps and platforms are helping people “combat loneliness and stay connected and engaged during this very strange time.”
I think I'm going to try my hand at hosting a Netflix Party myself soon. I just need to figure out how to bring in people.
Before the current pandemic I would occasionally go to a bar in Athens, GA that would have free screenings of oddball movies. It would be nice to try and replicate that experience.
I'm also pretty bad at making friends online, but one thing that would probably help is knowing the layout of the Washington State Convention Center ahead of time.
I think I'm going to try my hand at hosting a Netflix Party myself soon. I just need to figure out how to bring in people.
Before the current pandemic I would occasionally go to a bar in Athens, GA that would have free screenings of oddball movies. It would be nice to try and replicate that experience.
If I am free I'll watch a movie with you mate
In the UK so timing might be difficult but you know, potentially can work something out!
Posts
:bigfrown:
My FFXIV crew is mostly current or former forum folks. I know there are a ton of other forum folks in other free companies, but I haven't interacted much outside my own, so if you ever see Siege Zabac on Sargatanas server, that's me!
My weekly Monday D&D 5e crew is also mostly current or former forum folks, overlapping heavily with my FFXIV crew.
My bi-weekly Tuesday D&D 5e crew is run my by brother, and full of old friends of ours from college that he tracked down on social media.
My weekly Thursday D&D 5e crew is all people I met at PAX from the Acquisitions Incorporated: the C- Team community.
My monthly whenever-the-schedule-permits GURPS crew is all local, and previously we were meeting in person, but moving online has been so much more convenient for most players that we're thinking of adding a second monthly session.
And then I play a lot of games online with my nieces and nephews, which seems to be appreciated by my siblings since they know that if their kids are playing stuff with me, they're only learning curse words they would have eventually picked up at home anyway. We've been negotiating the details of a family minecraft server for a couple months, but the timeline for that keeps getting pushed back because we don't want to do a grand opening while any of them are grounded, and there are enough damn kids now in my very Mormon extended family that there's always at least one of them in trouble.
I am down as hell for this.
Could we bake together or is she territorial about the kitchen?
Or any shared hobby
I would not plan on befriending co workers, despite the fact a former co worker and I have been in a romantic partnership/relationship for a year and a half
Or that one of my former co workers is one of my closest friends
I mean, I'm 36, I've worked with hundreds of people and I consider four of them, from three different workplaces, to be friends
The two people that sabotaged me and listened to my not manager f ing up the whole store with how they run Cap 2 would go in the parking lot at lunch and hot box it
It takes practice, but yes.
Oh, go on.
That cow gave me $150, I HAD to do it to 'em!
I just could not figure out how to socialize with the vast majority of my co-workers at my last job. It seems like all they talked about was sports, their kids, gossip about people they knew, and giving each other a hard time. It was miserable.
But for the most part I haven't had like a best friend since high school (and they were a shit best friend as it turned out) and I haven't had a close online friend that I talked to consistently in some fashion (in a private message etc.) for at least a year. For all the positive steps I've taken in getting my license and moving out of my family home thinking it would spur a sort of new social life, this fucking virus sorta kneecapped any ability to have a ocial life, which was already severely hampered by my own brain and past experience.
once things get more back to normal I'm sure you'll start finding social connections forming again
It's fun! We've done it a few times.
For some reason I thought Netflix Party had voice chat. This is still neat, though.
Source
The UI is shit. It's fucking shit.
but I wanna riff
Before the current pandemic I would occasionally go to a bar in Athens, GA that would have free screenings of oddball movies. It would be nice to try and replicate that experience.
If I am free I'll watch a movie with you mate
In the UK so timing might be difficult but you know, potentially can work something out!
If anyone wants like, a chat for a bit
I am totally up for that, hit me up, we'll have a call!