Someone asked a question about how frequently young people have time to socialize and it made me think about what people do with their evenings. I recently asked my son to go to a concert (free ticket to see a band i know he likes) and he declined because it was an hour away on a weeknight. If we invite our kids or niece/nephew to dinner they always want to go at 6/630 which feels so early. Edit: Kids are 30ish.
Early 30s. Outside is a scam. Everything there involves spending money and dealing with people. I’ll talk and play games with my friends online but don’t see people unless I am at work or forced to go out.
Everything there involves spending money
Almost all the good socialization has become commercialized. There’s no town square anymore, it’s turned into a Walmart.
And not even a 24 hour Walmart.
I think that’s a big point, hardly anything is open late anymore. Seems like the world stops at 10PM these days and everything has to shut down then.
Yeah, many places that shortened hours during covid have not resumed their BC hours.
Which i get, finding and keeping workers to work those odd hours can be hard and it is nice to get out of work at decent times if you do work at one of those places… besides bars if ur over 21or movies, i cant think of annother place to go when it gets late
Libraries still exist! They have activities every single day!
not even a walmart. where i live it’s a neiman marcus. if you don’t have $2000 to drop on a single coat, GTFO.
My town actually has a square. It’s nice to have.
Nice, I love town squares. The place to be
Games are a scam too.
If you buy the ones with paid dlc/season passes/microtransactions, yes. You have to use your powers of observation and critical thinking and buy the complete games instead.
Some are, and some aren’t. 100 dollars with bg3 gets you 100 plus hours of enjoyment. That is 1 dollar / hour. That is value. I am still playing Skyrim after 10+ years and it was 60 bucks. I have 1000+ hours in it. Worth.
I don’t go out because post covid everything costs 100% more and is 100% worse.
I spend $60 on two beers and a mcdonalds quality hamburger + fries last week. F that. in 2019 that would have been 20 bucks. in a place that was crowded and it took me like 30m to get my food. and almost every place is like that now. double the price for half the service or quality of product.
if going out was fun and affordable I’d do it more. I went out regularly before covid. I just don’t want to have to drop 30-40 bucks for a single beer and junk food meal anytime i want to socialize.
all my old spots that were affordable, chill and fun, are gone. i used to hang out in coffee shops after work because they were quiet and i don’t drink… now they all closed at 2pm. bars are noisy and crowded and want $15+ for a cocktail and $10 for a budweiser. that used to be $10 and $5.
I get that. On top of increased cost we got into this overtipping to help people who were working and it’s all gotten out of hand.
yeah i’m not even counting tipping. that shit is insane. lots of places in my city now want a 20% tip, and a 5-10% fee. on top of a 9% tax. So basically your meal is now 35-40% more than the prices in the menu. and it’s expect at literally every joint now, take out and coffee joints too.
it’s just not worth it. for that kind of pricing I’m better off just getting delivery. which is what i do now. ubereats is a 20% tip and like a $5 delivery fee. it’s cheaper and i don’t have to deal with slow/rude service and other customers being loud and obnoxious.
I still tip 15% most of the time. Tip flation is a scam when tips are already a percentage of the total. Don’t feel forced to tip more.
speak for yourself. in my city people shame you for not tipping 30%.
That’s surprising. But I live in a pretty medium city
😳 US pricing in restaurants felt always crazy to me, but this just sounds crazy!
We doordash or order from the restaurant more than going out because of the tip and restaurant alcohol costs.
Don’t forget to tip your dasher!
Nah, fuck that. I stopped ordering from apps. If I want takeout, I call the restaurant or use the restaurant’s website directly. GrubHub and Door dash add fees to the items’ cost and then delivery costs and then want you to tip the driver. I can drive myself, or walk in some cases, and pickup my own food. My orders went from like $95 down to like $65 instantly (family of 4)!
I do usually check the restaurant website first to see if they have their own system or just link to dd, etc. Need to start doing the call in/pick up.
We did not get into over tipping to help people who are working. Tipping popped up everywhere because it’s profitable for POS terminal operators and business owners. It wasn’t something society decided on, most people complain about it. It was brought about suddenly when the POS terminals changed, mainly from Square Cash, but everyone else followed suit.
I’m not saying that’s why we started tipping. During COVID we started really overdoing it.
Yeah, I was fine overtipping during COViD, and did my part to raise that bar, but that should NOT be the new norm
Dude even stuff like bowling is too much now. An hour for two people can approach $70 at certain places. Not the bougie places either, those places are even more. I was browsing Google reviews for one place nearby like that and the owner responded saying that they should look for a Groupon.
Around here, all the affordable bowling places shut down. All we have left are the boogie places.
My mom sent me $60 to take my kids, and it was not even close
If we invite our kids or niece/nephew to dinner they always want to go at 6/630 which feels so early.
I hate to break this to you… but it’s likely because they want to do their own things as well.
Like to do something else afterwards? Maybe that’s it.
Like have time with each other or simply sleep before work next day.
Yep. I don’t mind doing it for birthdays or other special events, I’ll just need to take the day after off.
At least for me, its a threshold problem. The internet means that staying at home is always going to be at least somewhat interesting, which makes it a lot harder to take a gamble on a random late night outing. It’s not just staying out late, either—Gen Z shows declines in a whole host of risky behaviors. Smoking, alcohol, drug use, teen pregnancy, are all way down in our generation. In some sense, we’ve found a drug that we prefer to actual drugs.
I have two 15 years old sons. One of them is never home. He is always going out with his friends, either to the gym, or just walking around town. The other one rarely leaves the house. He’ll invite his friends over to hang out, and sometimes he visits them, but they usually talk at school or online.
One difference I noticed is that back in the 1900s, we had to get a ride from our parents in order to play video games with our friends, but thanks to the Internet, it’s very easy to play and socialize with your friends from home, and being in the same room now PREVENTS people from playing together.
The kids are actually socializing MORE because they don’t need to meet at the same location, and I don’t have to drive their asses all over town, so I’m ok with that.
1900’s… 🤣🤣🤣 Thanks for the age gut punch.
One of my kids said it a few months ago, and I decided that MUST be how I refer to it from then on! 😂
I like to say “before the turn of the century”, but someone always gives me shit for it.
I don’t think they had video games in the 1900s, since Tennis for Two was invented in the 1950s.
Hate to break it to you, but 1950 is only halfway into the 1900s.
No, 1905 is halfway into the 1900s.
Bold move doubling down on that one. I’m excited to see if your attempt to change the internationally accepted name for an entire century to now only include one decade pays off! Keep me updated!
Hmmm… So if i say that both World Wars occurred in the 1900’s, you would disagree?
They didn’t both occur in the first decade of the twentieth century, if that’s what you’re confused about.
You do know that words can have more than one meaning, right?
You know the meaning depends on context, right?
Cost of living and going out is insane. We don’t have the expendable income to do so.
I’m in my 40s, I’m not gonna go out to a concert an hour away on a weeknight because that means I’m not getting home 'til after 1 and I have to be up in the morning with a functioning brain because I have a damn job.
I’m 46. I took a half-day off last time I went to an event an hour away so I could sleep in the next day. It’s the only way I can do it and I do it rarely because I don’t have much PTO.
speak for yourself. same here. i still go to concerts and come home at 1am. at least concerts are still affordable and like 20 bucks.
Maybe near you… A hundred or more in some places.
They can be expensive for big shows, but there’s also alot of great local music; bands that are just happy to have an audience.
How old are you, what time do you wake up for work, how much sleep do you normally require, and what’s your job?
Me? 50ish. Usually sleep around 11 to 630. I work with kids so i have to be alive, awake, alert, and enthusiastic.
Again, I have to actually use my brain for a living.
I don’t know about your location specifically or the specific age range you’re refering to, but at least where I am, school/college tends to start at like 8:00 am, and most students want to or need to work fairly busy jobs given the ongoing cost of living crisis. Considering that, it means they can’t stay up late, and don’t have much energy to socialize compared to older generations. Although again, this varys by area and individual.
I should have mentioned that the kids are 30ish. In the US, Texas. We all work generally 8-5 jobs and my husband is the only one who drives more than 20 minutes to work. He’s almost an hour each way- maybe that’s why we tend to go out later - come home, love on the animals, have a drink, go to dinner.
I’m nearly 30. When it comes to family dinners, I want to eat earlier because I need time to unwind after the dinner. I want to get home by 9 so I have time to wind down before bed. I’m very introverted, and even though I get along well with both my family and my in-laws it’s still tiring to be around them. The only person who doesn’t wear me out is my husband, so I feel the same about hanging out with friends.
I think that has always been the case. Working that is.
I’m in my 30s and with constant stress of life, I have no interest in really doing much of anything besides sitting on my couch playing video games and forgeting everything in my down time.
I used to go out and party every weekend and during the week, but that was my early 20s.
Your kids aren’t kids and probably understand the value of a good night’s sleep in order to work the next day?
I generally don’t go out on week nights especially not late because I want to get at least 7-8 hours of sleep or I’m a grumpy unproductive mess. My evenings I’m making dinner, getting ready for the next day, and trying to find an hour or two to relax before doing it all over again
I don’t know I hate going out any more. I quit drinking, me and my girlfriend like so smoke a bong eat dinner cuddle with he cats and go to bed early (9pm) to wake up for work (5:30a), but if a band I like is playing the next city over on a week night the music lover in me makes me go. I’m 36 and it’s the only thing that I get excited to go out and do any more, not that’s it’s a super frequent thing.
Super reasonable! I’m not out until 2 every night, but I was excited to go see some great live music and we were home by 1230. My kids rarely drink - they learned lessons in their 20s that i didn’t learn until my 40s. I’ve shifted more towards cannabis, especially during the week - better sleep and no hangover.
I just don’t feel like it anymore, I’m a different person than I was in my 20s. COVID has nothing to do with it.
Covid isn’t a factor for me anymore, I keep up with my shots. It’s financial reasons and time restraints mostly. I got too much shit to do to have any sort of fun. My off days is catching up on sleep debt and errands. Speaking of which I need to do right now.
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Covid definitely changed the way people think, behave, and live. I think my husband and i feel like we dodged a bullet, came through it ok, and enjoy being out (cautiously with the recent uptick). During lockdown we did dog walks to wave at neighbors, and moved our dart board outside to have people over for game nights.
Both kids are musicians (hobby and small gigs, not for survival) - one returned to bars to watch and play when they re-opened (he went to the concert with me) while the other now mostly watches videos, plays, and records at home.
We do have a couple of friends with long symptoms, especially fatigue, who crash after work on Wednesdays so we tend to see them on weekends.
Being in Texas we are super familiar with oppressive government. When i read the news or watch tv i get pretty sad, frustrated, angry about it. When i talk to friends, neighbors, coworkers I’m relieved and hopeful for change. About 75 percent of the people i see in a day share my values. The few who don’t are at least reasonable enough that we can find some issues to agree on. I’m sure those numbers would be very different if i moved to a smaller city so i feel pretty thankful to be where i am.
Opinion: unless you or a loved on has some kind of immune system issue, COVID is pretty much over.
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That seems like a separate issue. I acknowledge your dread. It is important and should be addressed appropriately. I just don’t think the actual threat that COVID currently poses warrants such dread. You should be more afraid of heart disease, or car accidents, or something like that. Those things kill more people than COVID. Especially in 2023. It’s barely worse than the flu now. I was afraid of 2020 COVID. It’s not the same disease as it was then though.
I work in schools. It’s like a wildfire right now.
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4 people I know right now are home sick with the new strain of Covid.
How are their symptoms though? Not bad right? By saying COVID is over I mean the more dangerous forms of it from 2020 and 2021 are gone. It’s barely worse than the flu at this point. I’m not saying people aren’t still getting it. It’s just mostly inconsequential.
Do you know how many people the flu killed in 1918?
As we both know, the 1918 Spanish flu was unusually virulent, and back then we had no vaccines. Comparing to that flu would not give us useful data. It would be misleading. As you know, I meant today’s flu.
Today’s flu can mutate and become as deadly as the 1918 flu without a vaccine prepared to deal with it.
So could COVID.
Both must be taken seriously.
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I recently asked my son to go to a concert (free ticket to see a band i know he likes) and he declined because it was an hour away on a weeknight
Either your son is more responsible than you or he already had plans to sneak out with his friends or gf 😂
Also are your kids and nieces/nephews more like young adults, teenagers or middle schoolers?
My kids are 30ish. If he’s sneaking out, his punishment comes from his wife, which i suspect is more effective than any grounding he got from us. 😁 Niece’s and nephews are late 30s-mid 40s. The older ones seem more likely to go out later and stay someplace longer drinking and chatting than the younger ones.
Oh, they are full grown adults. During the week, they are grinding at work. Sometimes they just want to come home and reset with their own family (wife, kids, games, catch up on shows, whatever). Not sure what their commute or work is like, but I can definitely see dipping out on random family events early or just not going out completely. Especially during working days.
I think you just need to plan it better. Maybe schedule family dinner and events on the weekends.
Kids seem depressingly lethargic these days. They will probably doomscroll tiktok instead of going out with friends.
The world is a depressing place what do you expect?
I don’t have any expectations. I’m not making a judgement. Just an observation.
Kids seem depress
ingly lethargiced these daysFTFY
I don’t think you deserve the negative reaction you’re getting. I think it just hit a nerve with some people. There does seem to be more depression in younger people and lethargy is a symptom of that.
I don’t like it any more than anyone else. I believe social media has a negative impact on children and likely all people who use it.
