leaving a party without saying goodbye

generally stagger off without warning when i've had enough

this is weird. so weird.

but really if it's the kind of party where you'd need to find people to say goodbye then i don't see the point

never heard this called "the irish goodbye".

i'd refer to it as a houdini. i do this sometimes, mainly if the place is shit or i'm wasted or both.

I say goodbye to my friends first, but I kind of wish I didn't feel obliged to. Quite jealous of my mates who have mastered the stealth exit.

Though you get hugs and kisses if you say bye, which is always nice.

depends on the scene, but i used to do this all time

sometimes it's cos people were try and persuade you to stay, but plenty of the time it's like some really busy place with a rammed bar, everyone drunker than you, and you just drift off into the night.

xxxposts

1) usually if i'm dissatisfied with how the night is going: i'm out and i don't need to say goodbye. i'll see them again or i won't. hopefully next time they can work harder at making the night right. 2) too fucked up. usually drop a "i'll be right back," throw up in the elevator and take a taxi home / fall asleep in the backseat of my car.

usually it's a level of drunk where everybody is really in their own heads anyway and i want food/bed/air/oblivion

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snihdG1rE0Y

also i feel like pointedly saying bye-bye to everybody feels a bit attention ho-ey on the whole unless you're not going to see them for months

http://images.plixid.com/imager/w_500/h_/339d49edb8372b2bd7df9237bd09713d.jpg

also getting "yo dude where the fuck did u go?" texts and judging my worth based on how long it took after i left to receive.

Being in the habit of doing this can be a disadvantage - my friend who does it all the time vanished from a small house party on Saturday, and we were all like whatever (including his girlfriend) and didn't bother looking for him. Turned out he'd been locked out the flat without his phone and had to walk from Crouch End to Tufnell Park at 4 AM in the rain with only a t-shirt. Ha.

this is actually the biggest piece of party-anxiety for me. if it's a really big event, meaning like I went to a party with hundreds of people I vaguely knew, I'll slip out undetected into the night.

however, with most parties, which are usually a smaller group of my friends, I feel bad if I leave without saying goodbye (and have had friends give me razzing for it if I don't). I hate it though, I always feel like I have to wait for an appropriate break in the convo.

Sometimes I leave parties by causing a diversion (ie setting a fire in a trash can) and running the other way when everybody goes to look.

It's very rare that I'll leave w/o at least saying goodbye to the hosts

I'm elderly so most of the time, the parties I attend are small dinner parties/game night gatherings/what have you and saying goodbye to people when leaving involves a specific goodbye and thank you to the host, then standing in the door way and saying, "We're taking off! It was great to see you all!" However, this is quite right, I think:

sometimes it's cos people were try and persuade you to stay, but plenty of the time it's like some really busy place with a rammed bar, everyone drunker than you, and you just drift off into the night.

I do always tell somebody that I'm leaving, though, even if I don't make a big production of saying farewell, because if one of my female friends left a party without saying anything to anyone, I would worry immensely and I don't want to do that to anyone else.

this is the opposite of an irish goodbye, which lasts three minutes per person and that's if you're going to see the person again that week, anything more than a month and it's tears and hankies and you might write a letter to their parents thanking them for something, anything.

exiting on an elaborate song and dance number always an option

i usually say goodbye, but i've definitely done this. sometimes you just have to get out of there.

Oh, I've heard this called a "French Exit" as well as an "Irish Goodbye."

the times I tend to disappear without a trace are larger parties, mostly cuz the moment arrives where I'm sitting in a corner by myself, thinking too much and getting emo, and decide I'd rather be by myself so I just walk out.

worst is when you reach the door and someone says "OH YOU'RE LEAVING?" and then you either admit you were about to duck out or say "oh NAH, I was going to look for the rare Banana Splits .45 I had in my car real quick" and then feel obligated to stay longer

Is this the "aspie scram"?

one time i went outta my way to say goodbye to a couple hosting a party (knew the girl, not the guy) the boyfriend made one of those "no idea who you are" faces to his buddy after he thought i turned away. still pissed off about it 10+ years later.

i do the no goodbye at work now and it feels weird but everyone is wearing headphones and staring at their monitors so... /shrugs

"OH YOU'RE LEAVING?"

As you are opening and stepping through the door: "I am. I have to get up early/I'm just exhausted/there's a Saved by the Bell marathon starting in midnight. It was really good to see you, though. Tell everybody I said goodbye!" THEN RUN AWAY.

puking on their shoes, that works too

i don't think i've ever left without saying goodbye to anyone (got to thank your host and hug your friends, innit) -- sometimes when my goodbyes are dragging i worry that i'm doing it out of neediness, wanting to have people make a disappointed face and tell me they'll miss me, or treating it as a way of starting a new last-ditch set of conversations. But i'm not good at leaving in the first place, i'm all inertia.

a friend of mine's a master ghoster, will wander off to "get some air" and reappear a few days later. i'm kind of envious, it seems like a real skill.

i always want to do this but when i've tried it i was hit the next day with a bunch of "where the fuck did you go?"s

remember when you left ilx without telling anybody

had a small halloween bash at my flat on friday, bout 20-25 people there, I nipped out for a fag at about 2am, came back ten minutes later and...EVERYONE had gone. SPOOOOOKY!

are you sure you went back to your own flat?

xxxpost text back "I will answer you when you use language more befitting our Lord Jesus Christ"

oops didn't googleproof J3sus, get ready for googlers with Chick tracks in a day or two

I like saying goodbye, it extends time naturally if you don't REALLY want to leave, plus it's a chance to say a few words to the ppl you planned on talking to but never got around to because someone near you snagged a bottle of wine and started talking insider shit about some local production

i had one friend who'd developed ghosting into an artform, could be a gathering with five people and he'd still manage to slip off unnoticed.

tbh i usually take the third option of being the last person around, which avoids the anxieties involved in the other two. which adds its own anxieties + other problems.

I shut down parties on the reg but that is because I secretly may have a drinking problem

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YrNQaXdOxU

i like when one person sees you ghosting and says nothing. like renton escaping at the end of trainspotting.

that upward head nod is the bro way to do it

i usually say thank you and goodbye to the host but not everyone i know there

http://achewood.com/index.php?date=11202007

why wouldnt you say goodbye you weirdos

and the classic ilx thread is complete

i do what i can

im away now folks cye

good night now

fuck, he was already gone

might go get a drink in the kitchen

fuck it actually

master ghosters are usually early leavers ime, the one girl i know who's made it her MO says it's because she wants to be in bed by midnight which means leaving while pretty much everyone else is still in full swing. i think i might have done it once or twice but tbh it never crosses my mind because 90% of the time i'm one of the last to leave. ghosting the next morning after coming to in a room of passed-out wasters is not quite the same thing.

on the rare occasion i want to leave before the party has actually wound down i would try to seek out the host, at least, and say goodbye to any friends i encounter on my way out, but if i can't find them ghosting is far more dignified than rampaging around looking for them

of course these are for largeish house parties, gatherings of fewer than 10 people tend to come to a natural halt at which point everyone leaves at the same time and obviously goodbyes are said

Walk away. Just walk away.

situations really do vary with this but i guess i do it most of the time

if people seem to be enjoying themselves it's a shame to mark an index of dissatisfaction into the collective night imo, i'd rather just take the hit of looking like a ~personal issues~ weirdo, which i probably usually am being tbf

if people aren't having a great time or there's some you won't see for a while then yeah it is a poor show

i don't think i've ever sought out the host, unless i know/have gotten to know them really well and they happen to be at a loose end at the time

Yeah if it's a small party I'm specifically invited to, with under 20 or so people, I'll say goodbye. But house show/house party-type events or whatever then nah.

20 people being a small party is sure not my world 2013

i said bye to max on his birthday, then i looked around the bar and almost everyone i knew had split.

#1 on my list is the most common reason. you aren't drunk enough or the depressant effects of alcohol have outweighed any sort of party excitement and you start to see the night as another in a long string of nights that have started and ended the same and you're done with that shit and you'd be happier alone and you never want to see any of these people again. but you stick it out most of the time because there's the possibility of reason #3 for leaving a party without saying goodbye, which is going home with someone. if you get the greenlight, you want to get out of there as fast as possible.

i have done this solo but not if i'm with my gf. sometimes i hate having to say goodbye because by the time i've decided it's time to go, it's really TIME TO GO, and i haven't budgeted for the extra half hour of "oh hey by the way..." goodbye conversations.

I want to gather a whole bunch of ILXors in a room and document who leaves without saying goodbye, then start a poll thread on most artful exit

double middle fingers, burning out in the parking lot

i occasionally bellow "gotta go!" and stride toward the door, waving

ilx makes me think that the phenomenon of socialising with one's friends because you actually like them is much rarer than i assumed

Haha otm

I do this and I'm glad when guests at our parties do it. Just leave, no apologies or appreciations or long goodbyes needed. A thanks via email or text or whatever the next day is nice.

I do this at large parties -- it's too difficult to wade through all the people to find the people you need to say goodbye to, who are often busy engaged with other people so that you have to interrupt them just to say you're leaving.

I accidentally drank too much at my own party one time and when I woke up the next day I didn't remember for sure when everyone left. Honestly, I went upstairs to make sure everyone HAD left

As a rule I say goodbye to at least one of the hosts. But, like other people are saying, it's somewhat situational. If it's a big party and people are spread out through a whole house or around the grounds or whatever, I might make a half-effort to find someone to say goodbye to and then just take off. (In which case at least an email the next day seems necessary.) As a party host, I don't mind if people say goodbye or not. For any decent-sized crowd, there's a natural arc where once you get down to the last dozen or so people, everyone's kind of hanging around together anyway, so obviously you say goodbye to all of them.

I always say goodbye and thank you and have a final drink with the hosts, then look around the room and say "bye. bye. bye." in an exaggeratedly perfunctory manner.

i have mild social anxiety and also hate people so i generally do this

I like to unplug the sound system to get everyones attention and then make an announcement that i'm leaving to the whole party

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_tJiyDgiksxk/S_bLlPYSljI/AAAAAAAAAVM/WaoypkuFTZA/s1600/Godard+Weekend.jpg

poll needs more choices. many more.

I try to tell at least one person that I'm leaving, just so at least someone knows I actually left and am not passed out in the backyard or something (ever since that one time I did leave a party extremely drunk without telling anybody and people started searching for me outside).

That's a good plan. I have a friend who fell asleep under the bushes in the front yard of a friend's apartment building, once

I typed out a deleted a similar story that happened to me in my days as a miscreant youth but thought better of it.

usually to avoid the problem I just get the host so upset about something that he/she gets angry and screams "THAT'S IT, EVERYBODY OUT". no goodbye needed.

to avoid the problem, sure

even thinking about this kind of pushes me into the early stages of a mild anxiety attack

ilx makes me think that the phenomenon of socialising with one's friends because you actually like them is much rarer than i assumed

Yeah but not every party you go to is full of friends though, there are the ones when you've been dragged along or the people you expected to be there aren't there - those are the ones when you quietly duck out, but I don't think I've ever left a party without saying goodbye to *anyone* unless so hammered it became a necessity.

There's also the point very late on where everyone else is just discombobulated and leaving quietly is just easier.

If the party is at my own place, I am the queen of the irish goodbye which in my case usually means I'm too tired and/or have had enough and just sneak off into the bedroom and fall asleep without saying anything.

I always say good bye to at least the host. Haven't been to an awesome super huge house party in years where everyone just gets drunk and no one cares...ahhh Austin in the90's.

Was at a wedding last month and the newly married couple ghosted out of there before most of the guests left. I admired their chutzpah.

Oh I think that's pretty reasonable honestly. Especially of the wedding is a big to do.

i used to get in a weird headspace of 'i can do whatever i want & i dont want to be here anymore' and just bounce from places. idk i think it was a p simple mix of anxiety + booze that ive since figured out how to manage better, though i do still feel that impulse sometimes

if I ghost someone else's party it's because no one really cares that I'm there. if I've been having good convos then I'm gonna at least say goodbye to those people

having kids def makes for a good excuse to skip out w/o ghosting. but that's only for parties that I'm attending out of responsibility. guessing when people here are complaining about parties, they're parties they "have" rather than want to attend

Is this the "aspie scram"?

― christmas candy bar (al leong), Tuesday, November 5, 2013 10:27 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

oui, but you can AS in any situation, doesnt have to be a party even

i think i'm less likely to ghost in a party i'm under obligation to attend. paying attention to social etiquette, being on my best behaviour etc. usually if that's the case it's a party where i don't know people too well and don't want them to think i'm rude.

Basically and ideally: acknowledge the host, then ghost.

^

the term "aspie scram" doesn't sit right with me

is it the word aspie or assigning this behavior to ppl with aspergers in general?

its my experience that ppl with aspergers cop to this behavior (and others similar to it) as just like a typical, innocuous personality quirk that most of them share. and i def dont think of "aspie" as offensive, but maybe it is? autism community seems to use it a lot - but maybe its mostly just as self-ID? idk

i guess it's not the term per se that bothers me, it's mostly ilx's history of using "aspie" as a pejorative (of which i'm sure i'm guilty as much as anyone)

oh yeah i feel you on that and have been as guilty of that as anyone and most likely guiltier in fact

idgi anyway surely aspies would stay too long

don't really feel it relates to my feelings about my friends, though the smaller the gathering the more logical it is you'd say goodbye to everyone.

occasionally if i'm wasted i might feel i need to be at home. sometimes drugs make people feel low rather than high, or just sick or whatever, i mean those who are unlucky enough to self-reflect.

I just jump out a window.

this is the opposite of an irish goodbye, which lasts three minutes per person and that's if you're going to see the person again that week, anything more than a month and it's tears and hankies and you might write a letter to their parents thanking them for something, anything.

wait – I thought only Cuban parties did this

idgi anyway surely aspies would stay too long

― r|t|c, Wednesday, November 6, 2013 11:32 AM (52 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This. Trying to disengage from my relative with Asperger's is a pretty delicate art. I think sometimes I might actually lie to myself about whether she is still trying to talk to me on the phone after the fourth or fifth time I say goodbye.

it affects ppl both ways tho i think - sometimes engaging too long for other people's comfort, and sometimes not engaging enough

I do this

Bad form if you're edging toward shit-faced as then people have to try to figure out if you're okay.

haha a dude did that^ at my house recently and i spent a large part of the night searching for his body in the tall summer grass with a flashlight

he had just had his GF come pick him up

LOL I did this just the other week and I dont ever do it normally but as others have said, sometimes you hit that bad "omg way too drunk gotta get back to my safe place" wall and have to go. I txted the host on my way home and apologised for bailing tho. Apparently just after I left, my housemate who I didnt think was turning up did in fact turn up, asked where I was, and everyone looked around and went "huh.. I ... dontknow!".

NICE TO KNOW YALL NOTICED.

otoh I'm notorious for semi ASing at my own parties. I mumble about feeling shit and hove off to bed. WOuld not do this if I lived on my own (paranoid I'd wake up to find my laptop/stereo stolen).

when i was a sophomore in college i embarrassed myself at a group counseling session by admitting to this sort of behavior. nb: never agree to do "group counseling"

Well if this threads anything to go by, it seems fairly common to get the "shit I'm anxious and gotta go!!!" freakout. Which tbh reassures me.

crut otm

it's completely normal - everyone does it, that's why it has so many colloquialisms to describe it. most people i know would be more likely to make a joke of it, like it was an achievement, the next day.

otoh I'm notorious for semi ASing at my own parties. I mumble about feeling shit and hove off to bed. WOuld not do this if I lived on my own (paranoid I'd wake up to find my laptop/stereo stolen).

― taxi tomato or bag tomato (Trayce), Thursday, November 7, 2013 2:18 AM (7 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

omg i had a roommate who would do this all the time. invite a whole lot of friends over and suddenly say in a super loud voice 'I'm going to bed!' Leaving me to watch all these fools, that I mostly didn't know, until they would decide to leave hours later. I mean it was funny but it also drove me up the wall.

remember when you left ilx without telling anybody

wonder how many posters have ghosted ilx for good

lol @ my own parties i often totally just go to bed and the party rages til all hours, its p routine for me at this point

its a family affair tho, cause several times one of my sisters has left her own birthday party to go party somewhere else and appointed someone else in charge

i love saying goodbye, it's fun if you kind of make a big spectacle out of it; highfiving, fingerpoint & wink at people. p hilarious imo. not "attention-hoey" imo, it's nice to have someone say bye to you, it's like "oh, they thought of me, aw" especially if they're like "dude... breakfast tomorrow?!!!" even if u both know you're not going to actually eat breakfast together

especially if they're like "dude... breakfast tomorrow?!!!" even if u both know you're not going to actually eat breakfast together

Why would you say this if you knew it wasn't going to be true

My god people are monsters

:(

¯\_(O?O)_/¯

cause youre both wasted and both deep down know that youre gonna be too hungover in the morning, but its nice to think about anyway

this happens all the time, and neither person really believes it will happen, sometimes that mutual doubt is expressed sometimes it isnt. extremely drunk goodbye-plans are not real plans

yeah exctly

Uh oh there's no good way out of this

Obviously it's a thing that happens, I said my comment in jest

But now that you both thought I was being serious I can't be like 'haha you guys are stupid' because you guys are not

But if I say it was all a joke it looks like I didn't know that this was a thing that actaully happens and I'm just covering for myself after the fact

In conclusion life is hard

what is you guys' position on hello, can you manage that one

Act of extreme aggression

Do not attempt unless a matter of last resort

fuck that colonialist bullshit, "announcing" the space you're taking up and making it everyone else's responsibility to respond in kind

if anyone says "hello" to me i feel 100% ok about kicking them in the nuts, because they are my oppressors

hey

Fuck you

sup

what's shakin

MODS

OK well I'm gonna get going now

Catch you later

rox otm

^^ally

this happens all the time, and neither person really believes it will happen, sometimes that mutual doubt is expressed sometimes it isnt. extremely drunk goodbye-plans are not real plans

― 1 P.3. Eternal (roxymuzak), Thursday, November 7, 2013 12:59 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Roxy, I am in desperate need of a book filled with these american non-spoken rules because idgi.

idk if thats an unspoken rule so much as a "wont even remember u said this by the next morning", surely?

there's a truth to drunkenness that we can't always live up to in sober life. if you were both somehow in the same condition the next morning i'm sure the breakfast would happen and it would be wonderful.

'somehow'

lol gtfo noob

well the other scenario is when you notice that it's already 8am and go for breakfast there and then.

lol 'notice it's 8am' gtfo noob

:''(

THE PARTY CHART

#|1-------500+|
*|¯¯¯¯----____|

LEGEND:

# = Number of humans at a party
* = Probability of saying goodbye to host and friends

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

i dont even

ILX self selects for party leavers.

just left a party, said goodbye, still feel kinda guilty

it was just getting started but I'm tired

ILX self selects for party leavers.

― Jeff, Saturday, November 9, 2013 11:08 PM (7 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol

The classic Irish goodbye. Total classic

the only thing noticeable about ireland is that people there spend a long time saying goodbye to each other

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifm00JEjSeo

I think the nü-Irish Goodbye is closing a gchat tab without saying goodbye

Do they? Most of my family is Irish and while I've never heard this expression, I'm laughing!! If they're Irish and they walk out, they're either telling you they're upset or ill. But I'm laughing because it seems like the Irish in my family are practical about leaving. Like, "we're leaving at nine and that 's that." I'll tell you the Irish don't like to fuss it's better to leave at a certain time than keep the host up talking. I mean we laugh at those people that stand at the door for an hour.

i left a party saturday without saying goodbye, it felt awesome

last time I said goodbye to someone at a party I stayed and kept them talking as their life passed and the years fell on them like crinkles on carpet they died halfway through the fifty fourth thousandth decade of the rosary I had proposed out of sheer awkwardness over the departure arrangements and twas a great way to go, at peace and surrounded by the cobwebbed remainders of the other guests (I had been standing in the doorway for night sixty years by then but obviously they couldn't leave by window nor back door without taking proper leave of the host themselves. I believe this trait of elongated exit is perhaps a carryover from our dear colonial guests, who invited themselves over 800 years ago and are upstairs footering about even yet

called 'polish exit' in germany fwiw.

pretty sure there was an infographic recently attributing technique to even more nationalities, depending on country the party in question is taking place in.

Italian party- never leave