To wonder what runs through some people's heads sometimes?

[FattyAirways]

I was at a cafe enjoying breakfast. The cafe is big, got around 25 tables in. I was the only one in the cafe. A couple, came in, placed their order at the till and came and sat at the table right beside me! They had 20-odd other tables to choose from. My table wasn't in an enviable position in the cafe, no views out of the window, nothing special about this area in the cafe, yet they chose to do this. Why?

Good to know you would do it if there was no CCTv…

Happy to help!

Just remember not to park next to a car in a empty car park and you’ll be just fine 👍🏾

No I don't mind other women doing it either if they're on their own.

This is a running joke in my family. DH is disabled and uses 2 sticks. For this reason, if I want go in a shop that he's not interested in, he'll wait outside. Can guarantee that when I come out of the shop, he'll have moved because someone has decided to stand right next to him. On holiday once, he stood looking over the sea wall- no one else there, it was October so pretty quiet. An elderly couple decided to stand so close to him that the woman's bag kept hitting DHs arm every time she moved! There was about another 2 miles of wall to choose from!
Another time, I went into a fish and chip shop. DH waited outside, in a quiet area. When I came out, he was literally penned in by a whole family of people- I could barely see him!
Went to a sea life exhibition and was showing the kids some fish. DH moved out of the way so the kids could see better. When I looked around he'd been surrounded by people and was stuck in a corner!
I can understand if it's busy but why people do it when there is so much room is beyond me!

😁

The people of Finland were furious during Covid because the two metre rule meant they had to stand closer to people. They are a people who like to have a lot of personal space! 😁

I hate this too!
The worst I have ever had was when I was on an almost empty bus, and this man got on and sat right next to me. Not on the seat across from me on the other side, but literally right next to me so our legs were touching. I was visibly pregnant as well and I felt extremely vulnerable and unsafe, so I didn’t even have the courage to tell him to move or to even move myself. He stunk as well. I was so so relieved when he got off.

I am really nice (I promise), but I have always been the kind of person to believe in taking charge of the situation, tt makes DW cringe sometimes. The flip side though, is that we do usually get what we want. As a result of the same kind of herding mentality that people seem to have, when you assert yourself most people will comply out of surprise, a sense of not wanting a scene or whatever.

I had a similar situation as the couple at the cafe in a pub a while back, we were out for DW's birthday (middle of the day on a Tuesday in a deserted country pub with the DC's were at school). A couple came in and literally sat at the table next to us, to the point where the womans chair would actually impede our way to the bar / toilets when we wanted to get up.
I didn't even let them get comfy, I just said 'excuse me folks, I'm not trying to be a pain but is there any reason you've sat right on top of us in a deserted pub?'
They just looked totally shocked, then looked around the place, seemed to clock that is was completely empty (and I mean COMPLETELY empty), they muttered something between them and moved to an equally nice seat the other side of the bar. They probably said loads of mean stuff about the horrid anti social man at the pub but I don't give a stuff. We had a nice time.

Are you a flocker? Because plenty of us on this thread do understand and like some space around us.

I always park next to a car because it’s much easier to line up straighter. I’m always skew whiff else.

It’s the same at restaurants on holiday. You’ll get somebody sitting in one and then that restaurant gets really busy and the empty ones stay empty. The next day, the first people arrive and choose a different one, so that one ends up busier than the rest. Then I suppose it is because people believe it’s “better” if it’s more popular. Sometimes that is the case and it actually is better, other times it’s just the flock mentality.

Do not get me started on this topic! I've had it in empty car parks, empty cinemas, empty airport lounge, empty campsites... It totally annoys me!!!

What I hate also is if you're driving to an event and parking is on a field and there are carpark marshals who tell you where to park and you're all next to each other trying to get out the same time and banging doors. So awkward.

👍 love it! 😁

it is highly annoying. People do that to me in supermarkets as well. I will be quietly browsing a section and sometimes people will start to gather around me. Even strike up conversations with each other, when it appears every other aisle is empty and they could do it elsewhere without being in my space.

Nope. I am a friendly person and love talking to people but the folk who do this don't seem interested in interaction; they're just interested in securing a seat beside me in an empty space. I do not know why.

You are my hero! You win the thread lol.

I’m getting crankier with age and will always move away now and/or say something to these fish-brained cheeky flockers.

Also I have been ten-pin bowling all lanes empty and then staff put a huge group on sharing lane with us and they sit on our seats and take our balls!

Towards the end of the COVID restrictions, I would go to the cinema (weekday afternoon, so quiet), seats were prebooked. I would double check before I went in that nobody had booked next to me, as I could change my seat if I needed to.

Twice, in between me actually sitting down in the cinema and the film starting, a couple booked the seats right next to me. (Not the same couple both times).

I mean wtaf?

I think I’m probably a bit extreme. Even where I live is 99% enclosed (ie no one can even see me opening or coming in/out of my front door, it’s not overlooked by anyone even though I don’t live rurally) and I like that. I’ve always had a big personal space but don’t really know why as I’m not particularly socially awkward (I can certainly chatter) when I used to go on holiday abroad we’d have a private pool because I didn’t like sharing with strangers. I had to really get my mind in the right place to share a dinner table with strangers for two weeks when I went on a cruise (which turned out ok as they were nice). I need to walk around with a big hoop around me to show my space boundaries 🥴

💐 This is why it’s so important to remember that you don’t know what someone else has on their mind or what they’re going through.

I wonder, is it really that important that people claim, not just the territory of their selected chairs and table, but the territory of all the surrounding adjacent tables and chairs too and that everyone else must respect this claim?

@NeedCoffeeNowPlease us non-flockers are introverts according to Lucy Mangan so of course are highly evolved 😬

No way😲 It's just so bizarre. I park as far away as possible. The mind truly boggles.

I think some people who flock might be lonely - some but not all! Whenever it happens and I am really unhappy about it I just move. As a pp said - I don’t care what they think. They clearly didn’t consider my feelings when they migrated into my space! I would make an exception in certain places, like hospitals, especially if it was another woman on her own - people are generally not in hospitals for the best of reasons and, as the lady above looking after her daughter was, people aren’t thinking straight. Those people in the hospital canteen sound foul 💐

Ooh, this reminds of one of my 'visits to Glastonbury town' stories.
DW and I had made the journey from Wales to a brilliant campsite in Glastonbury by public transport, lugging all requirements with us.

We set up camp in a nearly empty field and as we had been up early and planned to meet friends in the evening decided to have a afternoon nap. We heard some bustling outside but slept through it.

When I opened the tent door I was shocked to see a tent set up about 12ins away. 😳 I sidled out to find a party of 5 tents set out in a circle nearly on top of us!

We came back about 11pm to the dulcet tones of a bored teenager moaning to her friends back home about being dragged to this rubbish place! She talked to them ALL NIGHT LONG!!

Friends came to see us the following morning and we pulled up the tent pegs and carried the tent across the field!

That was not the end of our adventures but I am still open-mouthed at the sheer lack of consideration that led the whole lot of them to think that nearly trapping is in our tent was reasonable 😳😳😂😂😂

I'm noticing this more and more. Before Covid, I didn't see it as much. Weird

Omg just talk to them. Shock, horror.