I'm wondering if it's a me or them situation. I'll give a few examples of what I mean.
If I'm on the phone speaking to my mum she will constantly have interruptions. For example my dad will keep butting in in the background asking questions, or she'll say "hang on my mobile/house phone is ringing" and leave me waiting while she goes off to answer another call,
She lives in an apartment block and if I go to see her before we get to her flat we will have made several stops for her to chat to neighbours. It's not the neighbours approaching my mum it's the other way round. Sometimes I'm in a hurry and it takes half an hour to get in or out of her home.
My sister does it too. She rings me and then starts conversations with her husband or she stops our conversation to watch something on tv. If we go out anywhere she starts up random conversations with people. If we are out for a meal or coffee she starts telling the waiter her life story. Or starts chatting to the people on the table next to us.
As a result trying to do anything takes absolutely forever.
I now have a colleague who is like this. We will be working on a task together and there are one million distractions so she will answer a non urgent call or text, wander off to find a pen or envelope for someone, say hi and stops for a chat with every single person that goes by. A task that should take an hour ends up taking half a day as a result.
I've been so busy the last few years that I've found I have to be quite on the ball with everything and I wonder if these people are being annoying or if I'm being impatient.