Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but that’s just your hair falling across your eyes!
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you were just listening without paying attention!
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you’re just very confident in your belief that you should be listened to!
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you’re just unhappy!
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you were just wearing headphones!
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you were just standing next to someone worse!
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you’re just highly critical!
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you just smile more with one side of your mouth than you do with the other!
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you just have access to people and places that I never have!
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you were just standing against a sunset!
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but I was just hungry!
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you just have mesmerizingly attractive forearms!
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you’re just good at layering button-down shirts!
Tags: relationships, things that are commonly mistaken for being interesting
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you just have mesmerizingly attractive forearms!
I count on this, *rolls up shirt sleeves suggestively to the elbows* *flexes* ladies and gentlemen.
one time I was out with friends and there friend of a friend I was into and he went to the bathroom and came back to our table and my blackout best friend was like ROLL UP YOUR SHIRTSLEEVES SHE LOVES IT
and I tried to crawl under the table but honestly the guy did and he looked great so…
#TeamForearms
Oh no! I thought you were interesting but I was just hungry!
Story of my life. Seriously.
I like that we had the same reaction to that.
Mine is: “Oh no! I thought you were a jerk but I was just hungry! I’m the jerk!”
Mine is more like:
Oh no! I thought you were interesting but I was just ‘thirsty!’
/Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you’re just unhappy!/
That is the realest shit I have ever heard.
Yep. Fell for this waaaaaaay too many damn times in college.
See: mistakes I made, ages 18-22
Reader, I married him.
(thankfully I divorced him before his unhappy made me dead)
::dies of cringing::
waaaaaaay too much of my dating life
Percentage of these things I have done deliberately to appear more interesting: 70%
(This includes withholding food.)
Indeed, I am taking this as “A Guide to Looking Interesting”.
‘Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you’re just highly critical!’
YES
And, whoops! I thought it for too long and now I know better but also I’m in love with you!
“now I know better but also I’m in love with you!”
GPOY
AKA every single person in a grad school seminar.
+1. The sole virtue of the grad school seminar is in the hours and hours you’re required to spend listening to people be endlessly, tediously critical, until there is no longer any chance you could confuse it for something of interest.
“Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you were just standing next to someone worse!”
distilling the origin story of every college party/bar hookup down to one sentence, that is
That was my very real strategy back when I was online dating. I figured that I didn’t have to be the best candidate, I just had to look a lot better by comparison than the other schlubs on the site. And as luck would have it, proper grammar and spelling and basic human decency are pretty damn good proxies for being interesting in the online dating world!
Exactly, you don’t have to outrun the dragon, you just have to outrun the halfling.
Right for the jugular, this one. Too real, Mallory. Too real.
“But you just have some very rudimentary understanding of basic philosophy!”
I have personally fallen for that so many times. Actual knowledge of philosophy IS interesting, these people are not.
Never, ever trust philosophy majors. Ever.
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but I was just hungry!
Isn’t that one usually more like, “I thought you were an a$$hole, but I was just hungry!”? At least that the way that one goes for me. Otherwise, spot on. The mesmerizing forearms might be enough, tho. 😉
“‘but you just have access to people and places that I never have!”
Oh, OUCH. Too real, Mallory. Too real.
see: All hs / college bfs…
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but I was just hungry!
welp
“…but you just smile more with one side of your mouth than you do with the other!”
This might explain why I am so taken with Carey Mulligan, although my SO repeatedly tries to persuade me that she is not actually Everything.
nope, carey mulligan is actually everything.
I was indifferent to Carey Mulligan until I heard an interview she did with Terry Gross and she was just charming, so now I’m on board. Plus, she has a surprisingly sexy voice for someone who’s as cute as a leetle ladybug.
Oh no! I thought you were interesting but you’re just really good at making up stories about monks who like to draw!
“Layering button down shirts to appear more interesting” was a legitimate socialising strategy I used during my first years out of high school.
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you’re just very confident in your belief that you should be listened to!
Every dude I ever met who was interested in politics in college. Every. Single. One.
That one applies to most dudes I’ve ever met.
yep.
You know what would do most dudes a lot of good? Being ignored more. Or mocked, gently. Not, like, enough to shatter them into millions of fragile pieces, but just enough to switch off the ‘EVERYONE SHOULD LISTEN TO ME!’ tendency.
Edit: I put my husbands willingness to listen as well as be listened to down to having two sisters who were teens when he was born, meaning his formative years were full of being treated as combination practice baby and medical experiment, all with a certain amount of scorn for his baby opinions. Plus his mum was a headteacher. When women talk his instinct is to shut up and listen. It’s amazing.
So I actually called a man friend out on this yesterday, calling his love of arguing for the sake of it “oh, dudes.” He told me that it’s actually nothing to do with gender, and that his guy friends also get annoyed when he does the same thing to them. I then called him out on “um, actually”-ing my callout. RIDICULOUS.
Did you marry my husband without telling me? I mean, he’s worth sharing (thanks, decade+ older sisters!), but it seems like I ought to have been informed.
I thought you were interesting but you’re just my boss
“Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but that’s just your hair falling across your eyes!”
Companion piece: Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you just had really great hair!
Guilty as charged.
Yuuup. There was a guy in college who looked way more interesting than he was, and it was mostly his hair. Also the rest of his look, but the hair was a lot of it. We each had to have a full conversation with him to realize it, though. He was SO interesting looking!
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you just quote interesting people a lot!
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you’re just highly critical!
Um. gpoy?
Oh no! I thought you were interesting, but you were just trying to get with my roommate!
“but you just have access to people and places that I never have!”
Wait. I legit find talking to people who have access to people and places that I never have interesting. I live in DC, though?
it was just shorthand for “you’re richer than me,” not like, “you’ve taken thoughtful advantage of the myriad experiences this world has to offer”
Yeah I know a lot of people where it’s like “oh cool, you’ve traveled all over the world and have a degree from a really fancy university? You must be a super-smart badass!”
NOPE JUST RICH PARENTS
Yes! Nothing is more disappointing than people who have been to all these cool places… except they didn’t actually go past the touristy parts.
ETA: Touristy parts aren’t bad at all. I should have said something more like “failed to recognize that it was a different culture and didn’t embrace it accordingly”
Or they have been past the touristy parts but it was for some kind of resume-padding bullshit. Or they quit their job to go find themselves by backpacking in the wilderness (probably as part of some eco-tour package) and are now bragging about how brave and adventurous they were to visit such an “exotic” place (on mom and dad’s dime).
Oh no I thought you were interesting but you just had cute cats!
this is how I trick people
Former co-worker: I’m a very interesting person!
Me: Not really?
FCW: No, I am, I’m very interesting!
Me: Ok, what’s interesting about you?
FCW: Um, uh… er… I put my hand in an alligator’s mouth once.
Me: You… *blinks*… was this at a tourist trap? Because that doesn’t count.
FCW: *argues about the definition of a tourist trap*
(I can’t even remember why he brought up his supposed interestingness in the first place. Possibly something about dating?)
Oh. Oh dear. Isn’t it some kind of unwritten law that if you have to assert or insist that you are interesting (or nice, or attractive, or intelligent), you are categorically not the thing you are asserting?
C.f. “classy.”
Also: “laid back”/”drama-averse”
I once had an incredibly awkward first date with a trans man who kept insisting that he was a very interesting person. And I kept thinking “you keep saying that but I am so bored on this date!”, so eventually I said “okay, well, what should we talk about? I’m not sure what questions to ask you”, and that’s when he was like “you should ask me all about being trans and what procedures I’ve had done!”.
I was horrified.
I ended up saying “Oh…actually, I think I’m okay. I have a lot of trans friends, and I’ve done a lot of research, and I don’t think it’s appropriate to ask about your medical history on a first date. We’re in a bookstore; can we maybe talk about books?”, and then he proceeded to shit on every book I love without having read most of them.
I have concluded that no interesting person feels the need to describe themselves as interesting. The most interesting people I know think themselves very dull, because they’re fascinated by everything and therefore feel like they know nothing when they actually know quite a lot!
I always describe myself as boring. Does that mean I’m interesting and don’t know it?
Probably, I’m just boring, like most people.
But now we know how to trick people into thinking that we’re interesting.
See also: “really funny”.
His dating profile pic is him standing next to a tiger.
Oh no! I thought you were interesting but you just have adorably floppy hair!
Omg have you been reading my journal
c.f. Hugh Grant.
this is a cousin of the game i play called “am i in love with you or are you just wearing a denim jacket?”
O hello, all my boyfriends age 19-34! Gosh but I was easily duped.
Bringing me back to Simon Amstell and “Is she interesting, or does she just have short hair?”
Oh crap, he’s on to me.
Oh no! I thought you were interesting, but I just love the way you lean!
Oh no! I thought you were interesting but you’re just really absent-minded about returning texts.
Goddamnit. This is happening to me RIGHT NOW.
Oh no! You thought I was interesting but you have come to your senses!
Bravo.
Oh no! I thought you were interesting but you’re just a beer ad/meme…
*snort*
I hate those ads so much.
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you’re just highly critical!
EVERY college relationship I had. Liberal arts kids…
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you just quit Facebook!
Quitting Facebook is great, but people who have quit Facebook are the worst.
GOD. let’s not even start.
B-but I am interesting!
This describes online dating so so well… 🙁
Aw jeez who told you?
Oh no! I thought you were interesting, but you just ask a lot of questions to prevent anyone from learning anything about/getting close to you!
(Sometimes I want to smack the: “omg! a guy who asks ME questions? And REMEMBERS things I say? How exceptional!” version of myself.)
It took me a long time to realize that somebody can have clothes/ tattoos/ etc that are stylish, artistic, or unusual even if they do not themselves possess these qualities.There were so many people I chased around campus in college because I saw her haircut from a distance and JUST KNEW that we were destined to be best friends.
Corollary to this: “Oh no, you are in fact as interesting as I thought you were, but your entire life is a terrifying mess!”
See example: basically every friend I made in high school
Yes for me, but limited to freshman year. I wonder what the hell happened to those kids…
In my experience, rehab and/or an ill-advised young marriage.
This happened to me my freshman year of college. He actually ended up pulling himself together after having to leave school at the end of the year, but that ended up making his visits to the campus kind of weird because even though he was still a charismatic, interesting guy, all our mutual friends kept expecting the wildness that made him both the life of the party and totally self destructive, so they were confused when they got a reasonably responsible human being.
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting, but it’s just me! I’m interesting!
PREACH. *deep sigh*
“I thought you were interesting but you can just quote a lot of Monty Python.”
this seems like an almost impossible mistake to make
Cf. very early xkcd:
…I just used the Dead Parrot sketch to tell a derailing troll to hush.
::throws self away::
My mother insists that this is how my father convinced her he was funny. She wasn’t allowed to watch anything that wasn’t on PBS growing up, so when they met in high school and he quoted TV and movies she had never seen, she thought *he* had come up with it. It was only years later, when they actually started dating, that they watched some things together and she started to realize where all his jokes came from. (Fortunately Monty Python quotes aren’t the reason she married him.)
but you were just the Crawling Chaos! oh the Facebook preview image doesn’t seem to be on the article WELL IT WAS REALLY UNSETTLING FOR THOSE WHO DIDN’T SEE IT
see this is why the quickest way to make me want to stop talking to you is to tell me I’m so interesting (and/or smart and/or different than everybody else), because I guarantee you’re just feeling at least one of the things on this list.
Oh, no! I thought I was interesting, but it’s just my incredible self-absorption!
I thought you were interesting, and I was right! Bringing out the best in people… no shame.
And, yes, having some of these qualities–no matter how shallow or irrelevant–help attract people so that we MAY show them our interesting sides!
“…but you just smile more with one side of your mouth than you do with the other!”
I am 80% certain that this was inspired by a disappointing date with Katie Holmes.
Yup, that happened my freshman year of college.He managed to pull himself together after leaving school at the end of the year, but that ended up making his visits to campus kind of weird because even though he was still a charismatic, funny guy, all our friends kept expecting him to be the absolute wild man we’d gotten to know and were confused by the reasonably responsible human being he’d become.
I thought you were interesting, but it was just the drugs you were on.
Also: "laid back"/"drama-averse"
I thought you were interesting but it was just gas.
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you’re just wearing glasses.
Oh, no! I thought you were interesting but you just have a British accent.
Despite being surrounded by them, I fall for this a lot more than I should.
Despite being surrounded by them, I fall for this a lot more than I should.
Oh no! I thought you were interesting but your real life boringness was just way more interesting to me than the scores of imaginary perfect boyfriends and hybrid imaginary/real crushes that I have been dreaming up since middle school.