What's the best question to ask someone who you don't know very well?

ᙖᖇƐ>ᜊᙃ ッ@lemmy.world to Asklemmy@lemmy.ml – 134 points –
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I find that this backfires sometimes because many people don't seem to have any hobbies.

In the context of an interviewer, I sometimes ask "can you teach me something cool about one of your interests in 5 min?" It's not the same context obviously but you learn a lot about a person quickly that way. Bonus point is, I learn cool stuff about new things I'm probably not familiar with haha

If you ask me about my hobbies you'd better have some free time and a comfortable seat.

🍿🛋️ Ok, let's hear them.

Well to start I play the guitar, bass, two kinds of banjo, drums, synthesizer and sing. I'm not picky about genres. I record using a DAW called Reason. I made my electric guitar about 5 years ago out of lumber sourced from the cabinet of a dead transistor organ I could never quite get to work properly that my wife finally told me had to quit taking up space. I have a Lofi synthesizer and a theremin that I built also. I'm also slowly building a collection of homemade effects pedals. I enjoy RC. I have a small helicopter and rock crawler truck, but no airplanes that are air worthy at the moment. I build Gundam models, and have also dabbled in kitbashing unrelated models like cars and airplanes together. This hobby I share with my 12 year old son. I have a couple of 1980s Honda 3 wheelers that I keep alive and occasionally ride. I bake often and I will never be skinny again because I'm good at it. Oh, brewing. I do like to make mead and occasional fruit wines. I'm especially fond of making floral meads with hibiscus or chamomile for example. I've been known to paint when the urge takes me. I have a 3D printer. I have even made a few useful things with. I designed a well working samba whistle that I keep forgetting to upload to thingiverse, and a few other things I have managed to wrestle out of blender. I know I'm forgetting something. My wife calls me a hobby spider.

I have friends that claim they "don't have hobbies" but the truth is that they spend all their time with their kids and working.

So if they say, "well I don't do much in the way of hobbies because I'm too busy working and taking care of my kids." You can then follow up with "well what do you do for work?" Or "what's the last vacation or outing you did with your kids?" Or "what are your kids interested in? How old are they? Tell me about their personalities."

The fact that they "don't have hobbies" isn't necessarily it backfiring, you then just need to pivot based on their answers. This is just a way to break the ice with someone.

Everyone spends their days doing things, you are really just asking them "how do you spend your time?" Everyone has an answer to that...unless they are in a coma.