That doesn't mean you did.
I did and I have. Here's a long boring read for you. I used to work with possibly the most self-centred person on the planet (let's call her Susan). She would talk endlessly about herself, what she'd been up to, how her studies were going, how her (other) job was going, her family, her boyfriend, blah, blah, blah. On the two days a week I worked with her, on our arrival, I would always say "Good morning. How are you?" and she would answer - in great detail. For the best part of two years, I waited to see if, just once, having finished talking about herself, she just might say "And what about you? How are you?" But no. Never. Not once. I discovered that another colleague (let's call her Helen), who worked with her on one of my days off, was having the same issue. We decided that we would both start using the "I'm fine, thanks for asking" occasionally and, if it had no effect, more often. Occasionally didn't work. We started saying it to her every single time we worked with her. That didn't work either. In the end, when we were all on a birthday night out, Helen got extremely drunk and decided to tell Susan exactly how she and I felt about her lack of interest in our lives and general well-being, and her apparently complete inability to use the simple phrase "How are you?" (and actually care about the answer). Her first reaction was surprise, then she was mortified, then she said "Is that why you've both been doing that weird
I'm fine, thanks for asking thing?" So we discovered that she'd been hearing us say it, been baffled, not bothered asking why we were saying it and, unfortunately, completely missing the point and certainly not grasping the sarcasm. The drunk conversation did, however, work. For over five years now, every time I work with her, she asks me "How are you?" before I've had a chance to say a word!
