Does it bother you when co-workers ask "how was your weekend?"?

No—it doesn’t bother me at all. I pay my bills online, usually during the week, don’t have kids, and often spend my weekends doing homework with fun breaks in between. Before I was back in school, I spent my weekends with my boyfriend and that in and of itself was simply great. It’s a bit invasive at times to ask if you aren’t at all friendly with each other, but generally I think they are just trying to be nice and start a conversation with me.

If someone is trying to be friendly, I’m more than happy to tell them about my weekend—good or bad, I think they are just trying to connect.

Wow. Are you, like, the least happy person in your office? “How’s your weekend” bothers you? Really? That’s just absurd.

@EmpressPixie yeah, i know what you’re saying, but the question is so general, like, hey, i’m just trying to have a conversation with you “and i know this.” i dunno, maybe we can start off the conversation with stuff other than the weather or the weekend. be creative, you know?

Kids activities sounds kinda fun,.. life is what you make it.

It bothers me when they are just asking so they can brag about their weekend, but other than that, I don’t care at all.

Yes, it’s a pretty generic question, I’ll give you that, but think of it this way – if you were to do anything out of the ordinary (be is good, like go to a concert, or bad, like repaint your living room) you’d likely do it on the weekend, so it makes sense to ask if they want to know what’s new in your life. If you respond “Average” enough times they’ll probably get the drift… Or hell, you could consider actually continuing the conversation, and tell them what you did. I don’t think “Timmy’s soccer game” is a bad answer!

@MrItty i see what you mean, but i’m trying to get at the root of the actual question. as fireinthepriory said, it is so generic.

here’s the angle: uh, stuff like “have a good day.” do you really mean it or are you just saying it because that’s what everybody else is trained to say?

I like to keep my personal and professional lives separate. While I don’t mind the general question for the sake of friendly chat, I do get weirded out when people I’m managing want specifics. I also have a few people who actually listen in on my personal calls and make comments. Ugh. As a result, I’ve pretty much got a wise-ass answer for the weekend question like:

”As a crimefighter, I really can’t disclose that…”
”Oh, well, I built a full-scale replica of the Tacoma Bridge out of toothpicks..you?”
”What I do every weekend- get drunk and cry!”
”I put every one of my pennies in chronological order circling the entire interior of my house..”

I make up crazy hobbies, meetings, etc. etc.

They sort of get that they’re pushing once they ask past a certain point, but sometimes they go for it anyway…

I don’t mind the question at all. Any time that I am away from work is wonderful! If I’m washing dishes and driving my kids to birthday parties and karate it’s still better than being at work.

somethings in life just aren’t worth getting riled up about

I don’t mind when people ask me that, it’s just small talk. I looove weekends.

Oh, and I guess to answer the question, no it doesn’t bother me at all. I never thought that maybe it would bother anyone, to be honest – I ask people how their weekends were with wild abandon on Mondays! :)

@curiouscat don’t get me wrong, i love weekends too. but sometimes the weekend can be demanding trying to play “catch up.” if you have family and you are also a person who is in demand for other things that suck time out of your life, those supposed two days off makes you wish there was an 8th day.

Sometimes. Especially when I’m not able to mention the fact that I spent it with my lesbian partner. That sort of thing doesn’t quite fly when teaching at a Catholic school.

@jmah he he. I can see that being a conversation stopper.

A couple of weeks ago on Saturday morning my husband said to me, “vacation.” I replied, “what vacation?” He said, it’s the weekend. Certain times of the year it does not feel like a vacation, like during the fall we spend a lot of time picking up leaves, which eats into the weekend quite a bit.

When I worked full time I really only had one day a week I enjoyed, because the other day off was spent catching up on sleep and errands. I don’t have children, whcih makes a big difference too.

My advice is if you work full time (If you are married and you both work full time) get a house keeper to clean once a week if you can afford it. Americans don’t so this often enough in my opinion. My husband is Mexican and he would let me get a house keeper even when I don’t work (which I don’t do, except once every 6th months to help with things that are fairly difficult for me to do like baseboards) because to him it is part of the normal expenses rent, gas, heat, food, maid.

sometimes if I’m already in a shoddy mood, it’ll bother me. This is mostly because if I am asked a question, I must answer it. I can’t just go back to my cubicle in the corner and hide. So then I have to come up with an answer. But I can’t really say things like, “oh well I did my laundry but then I ate something that gave me diarrhea for the rest of the day” or “I saw Jesus in the drool on my pillow” or “I spent three hours looking for the perfect porn because I was that bored”... so then I have to make something up. And that requires effort, when all I want to do is hide in the corner.

incidentally, I would like to just mention as an aside.. the only part of the “activities” above that’s ever true is the laundry part.

be grateful your coworkers are nice enough to even try to start conversation with you. you could always tell them the truth – “no, i was busy doing errands and kid stuff.” then that could be a conversation starter for them, like how they had that tough period in their lives when their kids were young but it got better, or something like that.

small talk can be a way for you to get to know each other. you might just make a friend. friends are good to have.

I don’t like it when people ask me if anything interesting happened today. I mean, if something interesting did happen that I thought you might enjoy, I would tell you. Other than that, my life is average and the same things happen everyday.

@jca i’m very close with my co-workers. in my profession, we have to be. so it’s nothing against my co-workers. i don’t hate it when they ask either, so to speak. i just dump on them about the weekend or say something like, yeah, it was busy.

what i am trying to get at is, are you bothered that you don’t enjoy weekends like what seems the majority does.

There is always one good thing about the weekend – you don’t have to be at work. Even if you are doing chores and running errands, they are your chores and your errands.

Your co-workers are probably just being friendly, except for a few who want to one-up others, so just say “Busy!” with a big smile and then look at the time and say “Ooh! Gotta meeting – gotta run!”

Problem solved.

It depends on the co-workers…if they genuinely want to know, I’ll show them facebook pics as I always have facebook pics of the weekend – my weekends are jam packed with activities for the kids and us and we try to have a lot of fun…they pass so quickly and I don’t ever wait for Monday to come

@charliecompany34 It’s all about the attitude kiddo.You have kids to raise, errands to run and money to pay your bills. You could be separated from your children, unemployed and living alone in a single room. See how lucky you are?

Not at all. What I hate is when my customers tell be on a Friday to have a nice weekend when they should know that they get mail deliveries every Saturday. I usually just say, “Thank you. See you tomorrow.”

On the contrary.

It doesn’t bother me. Usually, unless I have had an amazing weekend in which case I will go into detail, I just say “fine thank you, you?” they uually say “fine thanks” back and that’s the end of the conversation. I have too many things on my mind at the moment without worrying about people’s polite little questions.