People who are ALWAYS a BIT late

[AliceRR]

Somewhat lighthearted but interested in others’ views.

Not thinking of the friends who regularly make plans and cancel or make it clear they double book or drop you if something better comes along... the ones who rarely cancel but are always late (10-15 mins or more).

I’m waiting for a friend in a restaurant. I arrived about 15 mins early as I timed trains to be early rather than late. We were due to meet 15 mins ago and she isn’t here yet. She texted me to ask me to text her the drinks menu (I texted 20 mins ago offering to order her a drink). I said she may as well look at the menu when she gets here as waiting staff have been over three times.

It won’t ruin our evening but I find it mildly annoying.

I could have an extra 20 mins at home and got a train that would get me in bang on 6pm but didn’t in case I was late.

I just can’t think of a time when she’s arrived somewhere first (and I’m not an overly early person)

Does this kind of thing annoy you?

It's the first type of friends that irritate me more so much so I've dropped one of them. Just rude! I don't mind lateness really. Though anything more than 20 mins drives me loopy must admit.

I have a very close friend who is always late - so much so that we actually refer to "her name-time" instead of the actual time. Drives me insane.

My anxiety about time comes from my childhood - lateness was not tolerated in my house. If you were told to be home for 5pm, it meant 5pm, not 5.01pm. Each minute we were late home meant being grounded for a week - and withdrawal of all privileges too - and I'm not even joking. I remember the summer I was grounded for 7 weeks

As a consequence I learned it was better to be early than late, and even though those childhood groundings are in the dim and distant past for me I still get palpitations at the thought of being late.

I hate lateness and am always early for everything.

It's normally I will see you at 10am, 1pm comes and they arrive, How hard is it to say i'm running late.

I often joke I will be early for my own funeral

I agree with others and have done it before.

Adjust your own timings to the friends you're meeting. Either arrange an earlier time, or arrive when they usually do too.

Or contact them at an appropriate time, preferably before leaving home, to adjust time of meeting accordingly.

It is annoying, though, because such people usually arrive smiling as if it was nothing. If they are clearly rushing or apologetic, I'm much more forgiving.

To not be late is to plan well and action that plan. I get three children up fed, dressed and out on the way to school in 45 minutes on a daily basis.

Set alarms on your phone. 6am get up, 6:30am breakfast etc, keys/phones/wallet/bag all live in a certain place ready to grab so your not wasting time hunting for them yet again. Get clothes ready the night before, if it’s a 20 minute drive allow 30 minutes actual driving time. No you haven’t got time to suddenly wash up those three plates two cups before going you will make yourself late. Build in a 15 minute extra contingency every time. If you need to leave at 8am to get somewhere be ready for 7:45am.

It’s selfish to be regularly late and do nothing to fix that.

Especially if you are only late with your family and friends, but manage for work or doctors appointments and other one off ‘important’ things.

It’s about priorities and if someone regularly treats a friend as less important than the doctor or hairdresser then it’s obviously going to have an impact.

Everyone can be late every now and again. Traffic is bad because of an accident, the baby has a poonami as you leave the house, but if someone is always late that’s a choice

I had a friend like this as a teen, and would only meet her in places I had stuff to do if she was late, or would just leave after 10 or 15 mins waiting. We stayed friends as she realised her lateness was shit and didn’t get arsey if I leftz

DH was like this too, and on a couple of early dates I just left.