Do you find ritualistic greetings awkward?

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I find that I get a little annoyed with ritualized greetings at times. These are the "Hey! How are you doing?", "What's up?", "How's it going?" type of questions. For me "So, what do you know?" is the worst. I can recognize these questions for what they are, a mere social convention that carries little semantic weight, but I still have a tendency to want to either answer them literally or simply not know what to say. "What do you know?" Know about what? I know a lot about a lot of different things and very little about other things. I'm going to assume you don't want to hear about GPS satellites staying in geosynchronous orbit or ancient Mayan culture when you ask such a question... But how are you supposed to answer? "Not much." That's certainly not true. I usually say "Not much new," but that still feels awkward. Anyway, that's my rant. How do you respond when asked such questions?

Oh, yes.

But since moving from the Bay Area to the southeastern states, I have finally learned the expected chit-chat, cold. Just figure out some stock answers and stick to them faithfully! For example:

1) Query: Good morning! Response: 'Morning. How are you?
2) Query: Hi, how are you?" Response: Just fine, how is your day going?
3) Query: Ugh. This day. How is your day going? Response: Just fine. Yours?
4) Query: Nice day, isn't it? Response: Sure is. Enjoy your day!

....and just be done with it!

Another ritualized greeting that used to bother me to no end is "So what do you do?" I can't help thinking people who ask that are being evil.

Ooh! I hate that question too. Similar to worst interview 'question' ever: "So, tell me about yourself." Evil, evil, evil... But I do think that question is equally hated amongst both Aspies and NTs.

Yes! I think it's probably normal for anyone to hate those questions if they don't have their career just-so in our society. But knowing what to say is hard. I do think having stock answers for all these questions helps, and the understanding that not very much is expected, in terms of a response! I have seen again and again, in my corporate work environment that the NT responses are pretty much what I stated, plus or minus a few incidental details.

P.S. that question: "What do you know?" may truly be The MOST annoying question ever.

Here's a possible response to that one: <give exact factual facts that you "know" "to-date" about the hell-damned subject as a segue into a more interesting discussion of "Next Steps" for said hell-damned subject. >

I don't usually find them awkward, because they are so routine, it's like playing a tape recorder. It's just tedious to have to do them over and over. Some people even do it more than once, they greet me,, then a few minutes later they go through the whole routine again. I've had people ask me how I'm doing, up to 3 times within 5 minutes, and each successive time I want to say, "Same as I was doing two minutes ago! and you don't really want to hear a real answer anyway, do you?"

I find them unnatural, but I still appreciate them. They're an assurance that things are still functioning socially and that I'm acknowledged, which is much nicer than being ignored unless I'm needed for something or not being sure whether or not someone is still interested in talking to me.

Yeah I get that questions to if somebody asked me how I'm doing I will always just say good no matter how I'm feeling some maniac could just shot me in the leg if I see you in the hall way I'm still going to say doing good.

Same thing with hello I could've seen you 10 times today but every single time I end up talking to you I'm still going to say hello. I think you get the hello how are you and never get past that and the other person who usually says it. Oh yeah I can't start up a conversation with you but I can sure say hello and sometimes even the how are you over and over again.

If we were supposed to be doing smalltalk then I think that we were doing premie talk.

Akward wouldn't be the word I would use. Nausiating is the way it feels to pertake in these phoney, generic personal encounters. I try to avoid greeting people and allot of people think I'm a jerk because of it.

I commonly respond, "Good Morning."

Even if it's noon, night, or even if they said, "Hello" and not "Good Morning."

It's a conditioned response...no thought given to it.

I hate it when people say "hows it going" or "how are you". I never know exactly what to say in response, as saying "O.K." or "Fine" sounds trite, and I don't really want to give people a full description of my current emotional state.

I prefer phrases like "what have you been up to" or "been doing much recently". They are a bitr more specific and not so emotionally loaded.

I find all greetings awkward with the exception of welcome to Wrong Planet

These greetings seem to serve an acknowledging purpose, rather than really wanting to know how one's morning is. Granted, a simple "hello" could do the job just as well, but people tend to want variety in their greetings. So more salutations are coined, such as "good morning" or "how are you?". We're just interpreting them a bit more literally than intended, so they sound awkward to us.

I absolutley hate all the greetings type of stuff, I would far rather skip them all and just say something that is relavant later.

I'm sure I sometimes seem rude because I skip the 'how are you?' 'how was your weekend' type of stuff a lot but I have also conditioned myself for years to play along, so can do that too. I really dislike 'bye' and 'goodnight' and whatever, seems so fluffy and pointless lol.

This is why I like my dog, he never asks pointless stuff nor expects me to ask him them back