"What's up? How are you? How's your day going? What's new? How was your weekend? How's the weather?"
Each week, the inbox of our venerable advice columnist, Miss Information, is flooded with queries. And although she makes a valiant effort, she can't answer them all. To deal with the surplus, we've decided to turn to you. So, don your spectacles and help this woman out — give her advice in the comments below.
Dear Hooksexup,
I have a friend who lives in L.A. where I live, but works in Germany. Lately, he's spent more time there than here. I see him occasionally when he is in town.
It's a very casual "relationship," but in his mind, it's probably more and I know he wants it to be more. I feel like I'm always working on keeping my distance with him, because I know if I give him too much, he'll have expectations and want more.
The issue right now is that he's started the habit of emailing and texting me almost daily when he's in Germany. Besides the fact that we're in different time zones (he's going to bed when I am having a late lunch, etc.), we really don't have that much to say to each other. So it ends up being tedious and boring (to me, anyway): "What's up? How are you? How's your day going? What's new? How was your weekend? How's the weather?" etc., etc., etc. If I do allow myself to engage with him, he will go so far as to say "Good night!" via text before he goes to bed. Of course, it's 3:00 in the afternoon in L.A. This is not the kind of ongoing chit-chat I want to have with him.
How do I tell him in a gentle way that I don't want to continue this type of communication? When he is in town and we've gone out, I enjoy a little back-and-forth banter re: our evening and how much fun it was, telling him thank you and so on. But I don't want to email and text with him about nothing on a daily basis.
He's also a very sensitive man and I don't want to be mean or hurt his feelings. He's kind, generous, and thoughtful, and I enjoy the time we spend together. I just don't wish to be in touch with him constantly discussing various boring minutia. Any suggestions?
— Annoyed with TMI
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