"So are we not hanging out??"

Hey look, a post not about food!

This, rather, is about a trend I'm noticing in my friends and people around me. I don't know if it's an age-group thing or not.

Let's start with last Monday. A friend of mine, L, gets a phone call from an out of state friend letting her know they'll be in town for a week, and would she want to make plans to go to the movies on Sunday? She casually agrees Sunday will work out fine, and makes a mental note to not plan anything for that day.

Sunday: after lunch L hasn't heard anything from her friend, so she texts them. They respond that they're painting their parents' house. She decides to take a nap in the meantime, assuming that they'll go out later in the afternoon. She's losing her patience at 4 o'clock when her friend finally calls. They catch up for a few minutes, and when the appropriate lull in the conversation comes up, her friend asks for a number of a mutual friend. NOTHING is said about their plans for that evening. L hangs up thoroughly confused and annoyed. Which is when she calls me, and asks if she's crazy. Yes, I say, but not about this. She was too flustered to ask about their plans for that evening, and she had kept the day clear to hang out.

As I mentioned, things of this nature seem to be happening more and more frequently. I have been known to have plans with a friend or two for about 7 or 8 pm, only to have them show up at 9 or 10. My close friend K is always thanking me for my reliability in her life; her other two close friends are infamous for setting a day to spend time together and then forgetting and/or planning other things.

Is this just me? Is reliability going out of style? Is it a 20something malady? If you say, Hey let's get together on Thursday night, then I'm going to go ahead and block that time off for you. Please don't cancel on me the day of, because I still consider that plain rude.

It occurs to me that this has always been my pet peeve: people who bail or are ineffective at keeping plans. But lately it just seems like it has gotten worse, and after L's experience on Sunday, I'm as baffled as she is. Did her friend forget? Did they just flat out ignore them? Has L started hallucinating?

All questions I'm going to ponder as I go off to dinner.

(And I was so close to not including food in this at all...)