I'm a simple girl with a li'l dream, of seeing her humble works in exquisite print, to share with all who feels for words, written with
an unsupressable urge. So indugle in my fantasies, and plow your way through my memories, greatly appreciated you will be,
if you can leave your comments here for me.


Friday, January 25, 2008

Time Filler

Artwork by =andaria

A girlfriend of mine asked me today: "What do you make of a guy who messages you every day, calls you up to chat every night, but never ask you out?"

"He's bored at that point in time, and is probably taking a break from whatever has been taking up his time before he called/messaged. In other words, I think you are his time filler." I rationalised.

So how do you tell when you someone is taking you as his time filler? Here are some tell tale signs...


1/ He calls you at his convenience - even it that means in the middle of the night.

2/ He is more caught up with updating you about his life than asking about yours.

3/ He hardly asks you out, but when he finally does, it's out of the blue when he's got nothing else on to distract him.

4/ When he's with you, he's only got one thing on his mind and it starts with S and ends with X.

5/ He wants you to understand when he is busy, but he kicks up a big fuss when you have no time for him.

6/ He wants to know who else you are seeing; but he keeps his dates a secret

7/ He says he misses you whenever he calls - but his calls are so infrequent you wonder if that was true.

8/ He calls you to chat when he is drunk.

The list goes on - but these are the ones I always hear about.


So ladies - if you don't wish to be taken as a time filler, recognise these signs and purge these men out of your life. They are toxic and detrimental to your emotional well-being.


You definitely deserve better.

7 comments:

Richard said...

Women do the same. I have a friend who was generally busy whenever I called, or what I found most annoying was being bumped off because of call waiting ("Uhm, Rich, can you hold on a sec. I've got another call coming in." A few minutes later, "Hi. Rich?" "I'm still here" "This is an important call, so I am going to have to let you go.")

Now, she is a great kid, but I was always annoyed by some of her behaviours. Even to this day she complains I don't call or write enough.

On the other hand, despite always being of secondary consideration to her, she would often turn to me for support. I would get those 1 or 2AM phone calls from her - even after I was married. She seemed oblivious to time. She has stopped those now. I think two kids are probably keeping her plenty busy.

As for asking women out ... some guys are shy (like me), so it takes a lot of effort to ask someone out. Also, I had (have?) a bad habit of not asking in advance. I always tended to ask people out on relatively short notice. Planning a week in advance is too far in the future for me.

123 said...

i agree with you. some of the guys just wanna pass time. or they dunno what they want. they just try to get some attention and feel good about themselves. baiting. once you're hooked, they shrug it off. a training phase for the wannabe alpha male? a curious habit of the male species... i think its probably part curiousity, part ego and part idle behaviour.

Ellen Soh said...

I haven't met such a guy yet, but I do have some question marks of my own, elv, since you've gotten on this topic (:

What would you make of a guy who is showing a lot of concern for you, sends you home weekly after night classes(though it's generally safe, and it's not customary because he's just a friend, and it's a weekly night class for god's sake), admits playfully that he is flirting with you at times; teases, wrestles with, listens to relationship problems, and asks you out?


Any ideas?
I'm really confused.

Elvina aka LaoNiang said...

Merryfeet:

He likes you enough to wanna hang out with you, spend time with you, and even send you all the way home.

He thinks you are fun enough for him to have some harmless flirting with, and not be judged for it.

At this point in time, since he has even asked you out, I think he wants to be more than just a friend...so the one-to-one date will allow him to know you better and vice versa, and he can have 100% of your time and attention.

Without more information on his behaviour, I can only say that at this point - he is interested, but approaching his feelings for you carefully.

Ellen Soh said...

i see... thanks for letting me know your perspective as an uninvolved party. i can't see clearly from my own point of view (:

What kind of behaviour are you referring to, though?

Elvina aka LaoNiang said...

Behaviour - meaning how he behaves towards you...what he said. what he did etc.. you take all these cues and put them together you will get a good idea of what the man wants.

I can't exactly tell you how to decipher those cues - comes with experience i guess. :)

you can drop me a personal email for more advice if you want.

Unknown said...

Elvina, I think you just listed out my last relationship. Seriously, half the time I felt like the dirty mistress that he has to keep in the dark. It really wrecked my emotional well-being! And now, come to think of it, I think I am still stuck in the same vicious cycle. Hmm...i need serious counseling!

Btw, I really love your insights to life, very real and I don't know exactly how to describe it but in chinese (direct translation) it is called one poke see blood.

Wish you could write more often..