Outgrowing

[feuervogel]

I've been skipping anime club lately, partly because I'm not excited about what's on the schedule, but partly because I don't know any of the people. There's maybe half a dozen people I want to see (one of whom I live with), a couple more that I like talking with, but I don't know any of the undergrads anymore. I'm not really interested in getting to know them, either.

Maybe I'm just getting too old for that shit. What do I have in common with someone half my age? (Aside from liking cartoons, but none of the kids like any of the shows I like. They're too old, too weird, too boring.) The only young-COUPer I can get along with is G, who's 19, but I can never remember she's that damn young, because she acts a lot closer to 25. (And I'll offer her a beer, and she'll say, "I'm not legal yet," and I'll go durr.)

I haven't really enjoyed Animazement in several years, and then I mostly preferred loitering or lurking about with other old farts in the over-30 club. I'm glad that teenaged and college-aged geeky kids can hang out and be exuberant and enthusiastic about Japanese cartoons; I was probably an annoying fan when I first became one. It's a phase, and thankfully most of us grow out of it. I just can't handle that sort of energy and nigh-on obnoxiousness anymore.

This is something I was thinking about on Tuesday, when I decided to skip the meeting again (and just download Giant Killing, which holy shit you guise is totally the German National Team this year, no joke), but when I was invited to a party and was sort of meh on going even though I'm home alone and kind of bored and had the long list of email invitees read to me and recognized like 3-5 of the people as people I consider friends (or at a minimum good acquaintances), another half dozen as people I'd say hey to, and the remaining dozen or more not at all, I decided that was a sign I ought to write a post about it.

Which is another reason I'm less than enthusiastic about the beach trip this year (the other major one being Señora Crankypants and her diabetes.) I'd hang out with LA & D, and I'm not even sure shinshan is going. The rest of the people on the list? I either barely know, couldn't point out in a lineup, am ambivalent toward, or actively dislike.

I need another place to make new friends. Because I seriously don't fit in at COUP anymore.

Comments

agreement

[serriberry]

I can't remember the last time I went to COUp, and I don't really miss it. There are certain COUp-folk I enjoy spending time with, but I never seem to make plans. I should work on that sometime. Hrm.

Re: agreement

[feuervogel]

Yes, make a party happen :) I should also make a party happen, but I'm crazy busy until after Dragon*Con. (Oh, on that note: we still have a spot in our rooms if you want to come. If not, I'll find someone else to offer it to. It's gonna be me & Ben, Andrew, Laurel, Wm, Geneva, and Erin. Yeah, I don't quite know how the sleeping arrangements are gonna work out, or even what size beds we have.)

[picklish]

I absolutely understand that feeling. I think ranyart and I have both made very similar posts to everything you've said here. After going to it for a decade, I thought I would miss COUP a lot more than I did, but it turned out that I only missed seeing a small handful of people more frequently than just at your parties.

I think I might try to start up a monthly/biweekly anime potluck night or something here, once our friends sixolet and melithiel move here in the fall. I don't need to watch three hours of cartoons every week, but a little bit every once in a while in a small group with some food seems much more palatable. Maybe you could organize some alternative yourself and just get together with other like-minded folks who also don't feel like they fit in at COUP anymore?

[feuervogel]

I was contemplating that, actually. I don't know how Ben would feel about it, or when we'd manage to do it.

Ooh, we could watch some older stuff that's cool, like Planetes or Patlabor.

[kurai-seraphim.livejournal.com]

Yeah, after last year's repeated price hikes and the general uncertainty of the COUP trip, we opted to just go to the beach by ourselves last weekend. We only stayed for one night and it cost $70 total for the room, so it was ultimately an effective cost-cutter. We figure we'll get our social trip at Dragon*Con.

As for our lack of COUP attendance this summer, honestly it's a lame schedule and we don't want to build our carbon footprint to catch it. It's about 25-30 miles from our apartment to COUP and we just don't want to make that trip for mediocre shows.

Given Geneva starts at NCSU this Fall, I don't expect us making COUP that often then either. COUP eats pretty much the entirety of Tuesday night and she won't likely be able to handle that while studying and finishing homework. I've been going to COUP regularly for four or five years now, but it was a lot harder when I was a student and I'm certainly not going to push that onto someone who is taking "real math" and hard sciences. We're hoping to still attend events and occasionally make it to first half movie COUPs, but we'll be playing that by ear.

If you're looking for new groups to socialize with, I imagine you could check out some of the local writer organizations. You're going to NASFIC, so I'm sure there will be plenty of adult nerd networking opportunities.

[feuervogel]

See, Ben told Cameron we were definites while I was in Germany. Without asking me first. *angry face* So we're sort of fucking stuck. Though if we can share with Laura & Daniel again, that's cool.

I actually met a local guy up at ReaderCon who told me about a Triangle-area SF club and a queer-oriented SF club. I should drop him an email and ask about the mailing lists. He'll be at NASFIC, too.

[warpig1979.livejournal.com]

Seems to me like Isis is a perfectly good reason to bow out of the beach trip if you want to stay home. Or you could stay home and Ben could go, or what-have-you.

[feuervogel]

True enough, I guess. Ben & I are going to discuss it when he gets home from visiting his family.

Thing is, though, if he went and I didn't, I'd be doing the same thing I am this weekend, which is sit in my house and be bored while simultaneously not having the motivation to leave the house and be less bored.

[warpig1979.livejournal.com]

Thing is, though, if he went and I didn't, I'd be doing the same thing I am this weekend, which is sit in my house and be bored while simultaneously not having the motivation to leave the house and be less bored.

True enough. Personally, if I went on the beach trip, I'd spend about a couple hundred bucks for the privilege of sunburn, bad memories, being fucked off and miserable, and this year enjoying the special bonus prize of watching Phil back at trawling the club for a girl half his age. So I'll take boredom instead. But that's me.

[feuervogel]

That's pretty much what I'd do, actually. I honestly haven't really enjoyed it in recent years. I mean, yay, it's so fucking much fun to set up an NES on the hotel TV and play a one-person side-scroller while everybody else watches! Oh, that's the best fun ever!

Fucking christ.

[anacoluthon.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I got really tired of only liking one or two shows a semester and complaining loudly in my head about 80-90% of the people. I hate feeling complainy so it made sense just to not go. =/ I thought I'd be more sad than I was; I think I'm sad about the idea of not going but it actually felt great to free up a night that I hadn't realized was so stressful.

Finding new social groups is tougher, though.

[feuervogel]

I need to socialize (like, I get withdrawn and depressed if I don't), which is probably why I stuck it out as long as I did. But "socialize" doesn't mean "sit by myself in a room with other people," so it wasn't meeting my needs. Hell, my tai chi class leaves me feeling more social-up than coup, and we don't even get to talk in class (since, duh, it's class.)

[amakarie.livejournal.com]

I can understand your feelings about COUP. Although I haven't been there in a while, there are only a handful of people I really like there (you, Ben, Sean, Kevin, Phil, David, Erin and a few others I'm not sure even go anymore).

I've always liked hanging out with people older than I am/more mature, so I avoided anime clubs for a long time because people would either be my age or younger, and I just couldn't relate. But yeah, that makes me sad, but I can understand. It seems like you have other interests and friends outside of COUP, like your SciFi writer friends, and you go to your weapons class. Maybe you can ask those people if there are clubs or get-togethers they attend?

If I end up going to the beach tho, I'll miss you guys. :( But I understand.

[feuervogel]

Most of my writer friends are in the internet, unfortunately. But like I commented to William, there's a couple SF clubs I heard about from a guy at ReaderCon who lives in Raleigh, so I should poke him.

As far as I know, I'm committed to the beach trip, even if I don't really want to go, though we haven't given Zach any money. But Ben wants to go, so. Bleh.

[thorny-rose.livejournal.com]

If you don't fit, I know I sure wouldn't.

Oh well...

[feuervogel]

Heh. This is just one of those things that's been growing in my head for a while and is finally coming out.

I just can't fucking deal with immature people. I can forgive it in freshmen and sophomores (and ~sometimes~ upperclassmen, but they really ought to know better), but not in people who have a bachelor's degree already. Or are old enough to but never went to college (because there's no law that says college is the only way to Grow Up.)

I mean, shit, I wanted to stab half my pharmacy school class in the eye because they were so goddamn immature. They started at UNCSOP at age 20; I was 25.