Coworker approached my lunch with other people and asked why she wasn't invited

[Anonymous]

I typically have had lunch with the same woman three days a week in the past few weeks. Today I met a mutual friend and an old acquaintance/ coworker who she does not know for lunch. She approached our table and asked why she was not invited.

Do I owe it to her to always invite her to lunch?

[Anonymous]

I would hope she was joking, OP.

You can invite her when you feel like doing so.

[Anonymous]

Is she always socially tone-deaf?

[Anonymous]

Junior high school. Some people never leave. Ever.

[Anonymous]

If you've had a standing lunch date with her, did you let her know you had other plans that day?

[Anonymous]

Op here. I am new to knowing her but I just felt so awkward. I have a variety of friendships and it's nice to eat with new people and such but I am not sure she understands that. The other people I was eating with were mortified.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you've had a standing lunch date with her, did you let her know you had other plans that day?

It's been more casual, sometimes we would see each other at the water machine and say hey let's have lunch today. Other times one of us would email the other regarding lunch and the days in between nothing - we just wouldn't link up. Today was one of those days where neither of us had reached out before lunch . Some weeks it just happened to be MWD others TH or TWT. Just depending on whether we ran into each other or not on those days. Building an early friendship phase.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I typically have had lunch with the same woman three days a week in the past few weeks. Today I met a mutual friend and an old acquaintance/ coworker who she does not know for lunch. She approached our table and asked why she was not invited.

Do I owe it to her to always invite her to lunch?

I'm a little confused by "mutual friend" - is this someone your usual work lunch date knows, or not?

Either way yes it's very odd and rude that she did that. You can't be invited to everything. Now, there are some circumstances where I can see confronting being excluded, but this doesn't sound like that.

[Anonymous]

Op here. Yes mutual friend as in coworker we both know. Our building houses more than 1,000 people so I use the term friend to differentiate between coworkers I know well and not very well.

[Anonymous]

Well, why wasn't I invited?!

[Anonymous]

Oh sorry, Sally. I was meeting with Jill and an old friend--this is Larla; Larla, this is Sally--and we wanted time to catch up. I'll see you for lunch tomorrow.

[Anonymous]

she sounds creepy....

[Anonymous]

what did you respond with, OP

[Anonymous]

My coworker pulls this all the time. And if I go out without her she makes a big stink. My work friend and I just want to discuss our similarly aged toddlers in peace. My coworker is twice our age and doesn't remember what having toddlers is like. She kept saying remarks to us like "enjoy these years" and talking about how easy teething was. I think she just doesn't remember.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Well, why wasn't I invited?!

+2

Yeah!



Seriously, she sounds unstable. I hope it was a joke that fell spat. Otherwise, it's very single white female.