Colleague is a bit thoughtless?

[toomanycoffeess]

We’re both new but she started around a month before me. We’re the only ones in the team apart from our manager.

Sometimes I’ve felt like the office is a bit unfriendly and I casually mentioned this to colleague (said hello to two people and then looked at me and ignored it) when we went to get coffee together at lunch. And she said well I’ve arranged a dinner with x, y and z from the office and they are really looking forward to it.

Now 100% she didn’t have to invite me to it, it’s really not that. It just seemed a bit harsh to just say it? … If my colleague said I find it a bit unfriendly and I’m struggling to make friends I wouldn’t say well I don’t and I’m having a dinner with colleagues (and basically you’re not invited)

Then today in a team meeting she mentioned the dinner to me again. Saying “oh because you know I’m going out for dinner tonight with x,y and z”

I don’t really get it? My reaction had been to smile and say “that’s nice” and “have a good time”

'Do they not get out much?' just because they're excited and looking forward to it is very nasty OP.

Come on, you know that it's a dig.

The way it was delivered and said came across as mean and it’s hard to portray it correctly without giving the tone of the conversation.

Sounds like she simply said it to show you were wrong about them being unfriendly in her opinion.

I don't know why you've taken it to heart.

I get it. Most genuine people would use the opportunity to invite you along to, especially when you said that you were struggling to get to know colleagues.

I wouldn't particularly like her behaviour either.

That comment was so bitchy I can see why people are not friendly to you. Some people look out for nice things and there is nothing weird and not everyone is so sophisticated like you, big city girl, having dinners out every night (sarcasm). You sound petty and condescending, looking dien in people who have different life experiences.

@toomanycoffeess

It did make me laugh when she said they were really excited. Because I felt like saying - do they not get out much?

I'll sit on the naughty bench with you! That's exactly what I thought when I read it, followed by 'you don't half rate yourself'

shes socially incontinent incompetent at best, someone to keep at arms length because I think she's actually a nasty bit of work.

start asking other people you think could be friendly out for a coffee/lunch.

what do you think of the actual job so far? If you're not that fussed on it, you could start looking for another job.

places that have a horrible atmosphere are no good for your health!!

It’s possible they’re just not that into you.

Well seeing as two out of the three people she named I’d never heard of and asked what department they work in (they don’t even work on the same floor) I’m pretty sure they have no clue who I am either seeing as we’ve had no interactions. So unfortunately your comment is redundant because they haven’t even had chance to “not that be into me”.

It’s not bitchy at all. The impression I got from it was she was trying to big up the event - because I don’t think they’d be “really excited”. Sure they are likely looking forward to it but not excited.

So the “don’t get out much” was in reference to that. Not about people I don’t know, who might go out every single night for all I know.

Majority of my friends I’ve made through work, I’m still friends with people I met at 15 and 18 through work. I know I’m a nice person so it doesn’t impact me your comment which you made in the sole effort of trying to make me feel worse.

The issue is times have changed, I’m not in an office 5 days a week where you build up relationships fast and I’ve never worked in such a small team (I’ve generally worked in teams of 20+) and my commute is long, it’s a 4 hour round trip so I don’t tend to hang around after work. If I want to make friends I’ve got to really put myself out there and it is deflating to smile and say hello and just get a blank stare back.

I go through highs and lows, some weeks I like it and others I’m ready to quit. I think in my head I’ve kind of been like I just need to get out of it what I can and move on after a year … so maybe that sometimes prevents me from really pushing myself to make friends.

My colleague has made other comments that makes me think you really don’t think before you speak do you. I have kept her at arms length but then she kept insisting we get coffee together 🤷‍♀️ … and then it’s like why do you want to spend time with me on lunch when you clearly didn’t want me to come to the dinner she’d arranged.

I dont know if you are a nice person or not, I know how this and your follow up post came across- that people are silly to be excited by a mere meal, while you, big city girl, gets to go out often so it's nothing special; it was patronising and condescending towards your colleagues. Maybe it's your choice of words, but it didnt sound nice. Maybe you do not come across as nice as you think, maybe people are indeed dicks, or anythign in between.
People use different words, you would say you are looking forward to something, someone may say they are excited about something, and may mean the same thing, it's splitting hair really.

It doesn't prove it, because a workplace can be friendly to some people and unfriendly to others.

OP, it's always taken me a good 6 months to really settle into a workplace so perhaps it just needs a bit more time?

Tactless - she shouldn't have mentioned in response to that particular comment it unless she was planning to invite you. It's never good manners to talk about social events with mutual acquaintances to people who aren't invited to them.

I think you're right, just a bit thoughtless. I wouldn't read too much into it. She might have just thought she was being reassuring in letting you know it isn't an unfriendly team and not to read too much into things.

Yes, this. Perhaps they just don't like you, which, if your condescending attitude comes through at work like it does here, would be understandable to me.

Yes it was insensitive to mention their dinner at that point. A bit like saying ‘I’m alright Jack’ .

Some posters are being very holier-than-thou about your v slightly catty comment on an anonymous forum 🤷‍♀️

Threads about a spoken conversation are trickier than text ones. We can't see nor hear what actually happened next. A normal conversation might be "I'm going for dinner with x, y and z", "Oh x is lovely, I chatted to her on my first day about a", "would you like to come?". Given we know OP was sat there sneery-faced about the invite list, extending the invite might have felt like a bad idea. I can't really envisage the conversation at all, it seems to unnatural for OP to have said nothing about the 3 people. It's the done thing to say at a minimum "x is great, i haven't met the others yet, but that'll be fab, have fun".

It does prove that she doesn't find it unfriendly?

Back in the early dinosaur days we had a social room at work & a bunch of us were good friends. We were young & thought they didn't treat us very well 🙄

Friday nights while playing pool & having a few drinks (we had bought & stocked the fridge ourselves) we used to have this playing

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3mgapAcVdU

@toomanycoffeess

i hope this week is a good one for you.

maybe you don't need to think past

some people are weird

I think I'd just invite the others to go for coffee & turn down her invites.

She might have told them she invited you and you'd said no??

... but the fact that the only person OP has talked to in depth, and who she started with, has arranged dinner with 3 other co-workers and hasn't invited OP despite telling her about it rather proves OP's perception that the office is unfriendly to her?

She sounds like a real cow.

Yes, they're undoubtedly unfriendly towards the OP.

However, you replied to my post where I said.... "You said you found the office a bit unfriendly and she said she didn't. And her going to dinner with at least 3 of them kind of proves it"

It proves that the colleague doesn't find them unfriendly.

Perhaps they just have a problem with the OP, or perhaps there's another reason but that doesn't mean the office is unfriendly in general.

I thought you meant that it proved that the office wasn't objectively unfriendly so it looks as if I misunderstood. But I think OP's AIBU is whether the colleague should have mentioned the dinner given that she wasn't going to invite OP to come too. I think the colleague was a bit mean to mention it as she could have just said "oh, I find it friendly enough" and left it there.

You saying you thought colleagues were unfriendly could be interpreted in a number of ways 1) that you are having trouble bonding 2) or you bitching and gossiping about other colleagues. Is it possible that she hasn’t invited you because she thinks you don’t like or were bitching about them? He telling you about the dinner could have been her warning you that she sees them socially so doesn’t want to hear it?

If the other colleague is new, then she might well not feel in a position to invite op along as it's not "her"event as it were. The op also says later that she doesn't really know the others too, so it's not like she would have expectations to go.

The first mention was clearly just to say that she wasn't finding the people unfriendly.
The second could be her forgetting she'd mentioned it before, ordinary conversation "doing anything tonight", or even she didn't want it to be something secretive, because I've certainly sent threads on here where similar has happened and the poster on that thread felt that they were trying to hide it because they didn't mention it on the day, even though they had, as here, mentioned it earlier.

Generally people are slightly self-centred, but not mean to upset others, not particularly inclined to remember every conversation they had, and have good intentions towards others most of the time.