'AITA for being mad at my friend for constantly working while we hang out?'
"AITA for being mad at my friend for constantly working while we hang out?"
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?
Here’s what people had to say to OP:
NTA, 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, to be fair, if you were also really into Pokémon cards or football, it'd probably be less annoying.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.