At the end of every Friday or Saturday night on the town, I like to hand my friends a friendship survey to help me evaluate my performance and highlight areas needing improvement:
Friendship Survey
1. How would you rate hanging out with Paul on a scale of 1 to 10?
2. Would you recommend hanging out with Paul to another friend?
3. What percentage of your laughs at Paul’s jokes would you consider sympathy laughs?
4. If the sympathy laugh to genuine laugh ratio was greater than 2:1, what were the things Paul did that made him sympathetic and made you feel sorry for him to such a degree that you were willing to pretend he was funny when he really wasn’t?
5. Do you have any suggestions for other things Paul could do to make himself easier to feel sorry for?
6. Did you feel Paul did an adequate job pretending to be interested in your problems and/or humorous anecdotes?
7. When a girl approached the table and Paul retold one of your humorous anecdotes but replaced you with himself in the story, and ultimately made the story more interesting, did this bother you? Or were you flattered Paul chose your anecdote as worthy of stealing?
8. How did you feel about the number of times Paul gave high fives? (circle one)
A. I could have used a few more.
B. Just the right amount.
C. Were we at a high school football team reunion and nobody told me?
9. If Paul, your girlfriend, and your mom were all in a burning building, who would you rescue first?
10. Did you feel uncomfortable with any of the props Paul used as he attempted to seem more interesting by creating an image for himself? (circle any props that seemed to go too far and weren’t believable)
eye patch, lasso, brain in jar, hook hand, spelling bee trophy, peanut resembling Abe Lincoln
11. What could Paul do better? (Note: Anything you write should be something you’re absolutely confident you do better than Paul.)
*****
As long as you’re here and already late for work, why not check out the caption contest winner and submit a caption in the new contest?
The Good Greatsby 
Kathryn McCullough
May 28, 2012
Number 10 was especially good–brain in jar, particularly memorable. Speaking of memories–Happy Memorial Day to you and your lasso-loving famiy and friends.
The Hipster
May 28, 2012
I wouldn’t worry about any wide-ranging variability in responses to Question 9. I suspect the empathy quotient would be a wild-card: some girlfriends and mothers are pretty good at engendering empathy, thereby nullifying the mystique you bring to the table vis a vis the eye patch and the brain in the jar. High five!
Bridgesburning Chris King
May 28, 2012
I suspect Paul excels at pretending interest when I speak which makes him so doggone good at anything!
The Good Greatsby
May 29, 2012
I suspect nobody is really interested in what I have to say, but still I’ll take a friend who’s willing to pretend to be interested over the friend who can’t keep his eyes open.
Laura
May 28, 2012
It would have been okay if you’d just brought one brain in one jar, but bringing three brains and juggling them was really over the top.
k8edid
May 29, 2012
Especially with a hook hand and the eye patch.
Glynis
May 29, 2012
It’s because of the two comments above that we really need a LIKE button in here !!
The Good Greatsby
May 29, 2012
But any man can bring brains in jars to a party; how many men can juggle those brains?
idiotprufs
May 29, 2012
I like the eye patch and hook hand, get yourself a fairy in jar that looks like Julia Roberts and maybe we’ll hang.
The Good Greatsby
May 29, 2012
That would certainly be impressive. I’ll look into that.
fishducky
May 29, 2012
This post was funny enough to steal–but I won’t (probably)!
mimijk
May 29, 2012
I think I’d be ok with 7, as long as you’d be ok if I then interjected “I’m so flattered that you’re re-telling my story – you must have loved it!”
The Good Greatsby
May 29, 2012
No improvising while I’m telling your story!
Carl D'Agostino
May 29, 2012
I don’t think I hang with Paul. I mean walking around the Mediterranean and Middle East like he was Marco Polo or something. Then there’s the people throwing rocks and us and getting beaten and thrown into prison. And always running to K-Mart for more pens and stationary.
Curly Carly
May 29, 2012
Brilliant, as always. I’m sure if you don’t get satisfactory responses, you could bribe your sons into filling some out the way you want.
The Good Greatsby
May 29, 2012
I have a completely different fatherhood survey.
nursemyra
May 29, 2012
I bet you do!!!
becomingcliche
May 29, 2012
Just to be clear, a brain in a jar is NEVER over the top. Unless it’s the brain of an elephant or politician. In that case, it would either be too big or too small to be of use as a prop.
Jackie Cangro
May 29, 2012
What do your “friends” get for completing this survey?
The Good Greatsby
May 29, 2012
They get an improved friendship effort from me.
qwinkly3
May 29, 2012
You left one prop off of Number 10: The smoking jacket.
Oh yeah, I went there…..
Tor Constantino, MBA (@torcon)
May 30, 2012
Usually there is some sort of incentive to complete such surveys – like some kind of Good Greatsby-themed Tchotchke?
[NOTE: I know you have a very erudite base of readers, but I provided a link to those who aren’t familiar with the trade show lingo] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tchotchke
Thomas Stazyk
May 30, 2012
Love Number 6!
zannyro
May 30, 2012
You left out one prop… the mannequin leg you brought to dinner. I feel that waving it at me every time I got up to refill your wine glass and yelling “shake a leg” didn’t make you more interesting, and yes, you went too far.
pegoleg
May 30, 2012
What a caring friend! Most people are just concerned with what they can GET from friends, but you’re going above and beyond to improve yourself. Inspiring.
arianejanson
May 31, 2012
This is great; very similar to the feedback survey I hand out on first dates. Strangely, I’ve not yet had the chance to test out my survey for second dates.
mistyslaws
May 31, 2012
Is there also a write in suggestion section? And where do I put my comment card? Is there a box? I’m not sure you’ve truly thought all of the details through, Greatsby. Unfortunately, I will have to deduct that from your total friend score.
spilledinkguy
May 31, 2012
Abe Lincoln peanut is always a classic…
unless someone has an allergy…
HoaiPhai
June 4, 2012
Hey, the items listed in #10 were what my bride carried instead of “something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue”!
Nidhi Shrivastava
June 18, 2012
I like it. Sympathy laugh to genuine laugh was cool..