The day they invent the unsend function for email will be the best day.

December 15, 2015 7:03 AM

Oh hai, I think I sent a potentially embarrassing and rambling email to a person I've been befriending and um, do I send an apology? Blush-faced snowflakes within.

All right, here is the short story version:

Musician makes amazing music. I tweet about musician because his stuff is new to me. He starts following me on Twitter. Yay! My husband convinces me to parlay this into an interview for our radio show. I do. He's very nice so yay again! I don't think about it after that because I am not a natural interviewer so I never got back to him about when it would air until he emails me a week later. I apologize, tell him how he can listen to it, etc. Well, we have become email friends over the past month--no funny business, he is married and I am married and I keep my partner in the loop about us emailing--which is neat. I mean, the response time between emails is often 2 to 5 days because of our differing schedules (he's on the West Coast).

ANYway, the last email I sent on Saturday was a little weird and rambling (me mostly talking about how much stress I've been under recently) so I am worried I embarrassed myself. He asked for suggestions about a roadtrip he wants to take with his missus down South so I may have also rambled on a bit too much about my own roadtrips back home. In essence, I am 99% sure I am made an ass out of myself.

Do I send an apologetic email saying that I didn't mean to come off as weird and I hope we can remain friends? Or do I just let it go and "stop overthinking it" as my husband says? (Before anyone asks, yes, I had had a couple of drinks. In hindsight, I should have just responded the next day when I hadn't had any alcohol in my system.)

posted by Kitteh to Human Relations (21 answers total)

Best answer: Possibly the only thing weirder than a weird email itself, is sending another weird email apologizing for the weirdness in the first one.

haha - yeah, let it go - you're overthinking it!
posted by JenThePro at 7:07 AM on December 15, 2015 [38 favorites]

Best answer: Sending a rambling email to someone you are friendly with is not embarrassing or weird.

Sending an email apologizing for a rambling email to a friend is a little weird.
posted by grouse at 7:11 AM on December 15, 2015 [13 favorites]

Best answer: If it came off like this question, all rambly and not completely making sense, you are just going to make it weirder by commenting on it. Just let it go, and don't adknowledge the weird parts unless he does first.
posted by Aranquis at 7:23 AM on December 15, 2015 [4 favorites]

Best answer: don't send an apologetic email. i think that adds to the awkward. just make sure your next email is not wacky. if you want to reference the prior email at all i would keep it to asking how his trip planning is going and that's about it.

a couple years ago i sent a completely bizarre text meant for a close friend to someone i had not yet met in person but who i knew i would soon be working closely with on a volunteer basis. not quite the same since i could send back a whoops, not for you, but the subject of the text was a dead person, self help seminars, murder and a tv movie made about someone i knew. If that person can consider me remotely normal after that you are way in the clear after rambling about stress and sentimental road trips.
posted by domino at 7:23 AM on December 15, 2015 [3 favorites]

Just saying...

In Gmail:

To enable Undo Send:
Click the gear in the top right .
Select Settings.
Scroll down to "Undo Send" and click Enable.
Set the cancellation period (the amount of time you have to decide if you want to unsend an email).
Click Save Changes at the bottom of the page.

Max delay time is 30 seconds. Doesn't help in this case, of course. Just let it go, it'll be fine.
posted by Huck500 at 7:28 AM on December 15, 2015 [10 favorites]

Best answer: Follows you on Twitter? Self deprecating tweet about how much you wished you didn't ramble on so much in your public timeline (i.e. No @mention, etc)

That gives you the "I've done something" closure, comes off as sensible and generally self aware, and lets you put it behind you.
posted by ambrosen at 7:35 AM on December 15, 2015 [4 favorites]

Response by poster: Well, he still follows me on Twitter and I do gab A LOT on that thing so yeah, I can safely say this might not be a surprise to him if he actually reads my tweets.
posted by Kitteh at 7:38 AM on December 15, 2015

Best answer: Yeah, I think in almost every circumstance, following a slightly-weird email with a wow-sorry-I-was-weird email just compounds any awkwardness. All you do is remind the person, who otherwise had probably already dismissed the email at least partially from memory, that it was weird. I'd just leave it alone and make sure your next response is composed sober and is minimally rambly.

I know it's really hard not to obsess about this stuff but I'd try to let it go to whatever extent you can. You're thinking about this way more than your new acquaintance is, I guarantee it.
posted by Stacey at 7:46 AM on December 15, 2015 [2 favorites]

Best answer: Don't stress out about it.

He probably thought your email was fine and is just too busy to respond.

If he hasn't responded by next week, feel free to start fresh with a new, concise email topic.
posted by samthemander at 7:50 AM on December 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

Best answer: I bet it's totally fine, he might have even thought it was nice. Your question is not that rambly either-- sheesh! Tough crowd.
posted by easter queen at 8:01 AM on December 15, 2015 [4 favorites]

Best answer: Just to back up the above, it might have been an embarrassing email, but isn't that the kind of thing you do in front of friends? At worst he'll just think you were having a weird moment, at best he'll be flattered that you're not afraid to be yourself in front of him.

While always easier said than done, don't worry about it and start a new conversation next week if there's been no emails in the meantime.
posted by DancingYear at 8:23 AM on December 15, 2015

Best answer: Sometimes the problem with apologizing is that it seems more like it's meant to make the apologizer feel better, rather than to make something right for the intended recipient. Personally I always feel an obligation to reassure people when they apologize for something that's really no more than a little socially awkward. As everyone else suggests, your best bet here is to let this go ... and of course, no more Emailing While Intoxicated.
posted by DingoMutt at 8:26 AM on December 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Sometimes the weird oversharing moment is what actually helps a friendship cement. I would let it go for now.
posted by jaguar at 8:34 AM on December 15, 2015 [5 favorites]

Best answer: As someone born with a foot or 2 in her mouth & a tendancy to overshare. The best way to handle these sort of thing is to carry on regardless. No apologizing email, say nothing, & if you see or talk to him again just try & be a little more yourself. On the very very unlikely chance they say say anything, make a quick light joke about drinking & emailing & then move on. Remember too that most people we are in casual contact with don't think about us as much as we think they do.
posted by wwax at 10:26 AM on December 15, 2015

Sometimes the weird oversharing moment is what actually helps a friendship cement.

Totally totally agree.
posted by kate blank at 10:29 AM on December 15, 2015

Best answer: Most of the times someone has apologized to me after a social interaction like this, I was not offended in the first place and was confused to get an apology.
posted by w0mbat at 10:30 AM on December 15, 2015

Best answer: A few days ago my boss forwarded me an email, saying: 'Contact this guy and see if he has any good ideas but I think he's probably a total f***ing idiot.' Or words to that effect. I then forwarded that very email to the guy, which obviously included the part about him probably being an idiot, asking what ideas he had. Argh.

I have buried the shame deep and resisted the urge to acknowledge it in any way. I started a new thread at the first opportunity. Your sins are mild in comparison, and you should do the same.
posted by StephenF at 10:30 AM on December 15, 2015 [12 favorites]

Best answer: I once sent my boss a text message meant for a friend. In it, I shared that the trainer of my business seminar was unimpressed with my leadership skills and that I'd had a series of dumb moments following that assessment. And I wrote him all that in lolcat-speak.

I got a gentle ribbing for it the next day and that was that.

Honestly, shit like that happens to everyone, including this guy. If I were you, I'd ask in a few days if he'd had a chance to look into a specific recommendation of yours. Just weave this moment into the professional/friendly tapestry of your communication.
posted by Omnomnom at 10:49 AM on December 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: I would like to thank the Hive Mind of Metafilter for reassuring me that I am overthinking this and stressing out like crazy over an email. I do appreciate it. I figure if I haven't heard from him by the end of the week, I will send an email because I did find an interesting article about one of his favorite bands I think he would probably be interested in as well as wish him and his family a Merry Christmas.
posted by Kitteh at 10:56 AM on December 15, 2015

Response by poster: Update: My friend emailed me and it was like nothing had ever happened. He did say he was sorry I was very stressed though.

Yup, I overreacted. Now he wants me to explain the appeal of Donald Trump to my fellow countrymen...
posted by Kitteh at 12:22 PM on December 15, 2015 [6 favorites]

Glad it all worked out! I was just going to say, probably a lot of why you were stressing out is because of his status, and that made you imagine that he had severe (or more severe) standards about people, and would judge you according to them. But don't forget he's a musician! So he probably knows (and likes, and tolerates) tons of weirdness in his friends, and his friends tolerate tons of weirdness in him. It was nothing!
posted by Clotilde at 11:02 AM on December 17, 2015 [1 favorite]