Posted by Someone Else at 6:17am Oct 1 '10Well. I get off work at 1am. It's quite common for people to text me up to and beyond that hour and for me to respond and for things to be totally hunky dory.
I tend to assume texts won't bother people. They're, all things considered, extremely unobtrusive. Most of my friends' phones don't even make noise for a text, just a short vibration (Facebook and Twitter blowing up texting activity seems to have bottomed out a lot of my friends' desires to have a ba-da-boop noise every 15-60 seconds...), and those who do still have noise for it, it's never more than a short little beepy thing. I text people any time I feel like it. 6am and I have something I wanna say to my buddy? Yeah, I'll text it, sure. If I wanna call someone at 3am, I'll text them to ask if it's okay. Actually, for that matter, I almost never call without texting first, but that's partly cuz I work a crazy-hour shift and sleep wonky hours (rare for me to be awake before 2pm) and I don't assume anyone else sleeps or works 'normal' hours either.
Any hypothetical SO of mine is free to receive texts whenever. And free to respond more-or-less whenever--any time is fine, but taking away from quality time or otherwise being a nuisance is not okay. If sie's hiding the nature of the texts, or that sie's getting texts, then there's an issue--openness and honesty are the most important things to me in any relationship. If sie's ignoring me to have a conversation with someone, or if we're trying to go to sleep or watch a movie and sie keeps texting, then I'd probably get irritated, but that's because those are times when the focus should be on the conversation (and texts are distracting during movies--I hate when people text in the movie theater, even if you're 10 rows ahead of me it's still this bright little square of your cell phone screen and it's hella distracting). If sie's constantly texting with one particular person, regardless of gender of that person, I'd probably want to know what the dynamic is between those two. But in the end, if I don't trust my SO, either because I'm too jealous and insecure or because sie's being dishonest with me, then the relationship is a goner anyway.
A few years ago, I probably would've felt differently...but a few years ago, I was an insanely insecure jealous person about relationships...and also younger and much more immature. *shrug*
TL:DR receiving texts any time is kosher with me, replying any time is kosher so long as it's not taking away from quality time or distracting an activity.
I tend to assume texts won't bother people. They're, all things considered, extremely unobtrusive. Most of my friends' phones don't even make noise for a text, just a short vibration (Facebook and Twitter blowing up texting activity seems to have bottomed out a lot of my friends' desires to have a ba-da-boop noise every 15-60 seconds...), and those who do still have noise for it, it's never more than a short little beepy thing. I text people any time I feel like it. 6am and I have something I wanna say to my buddy? Yeah, I'll text it, sure. If I wanna call someone at 3am, I'll text them to ask if it's okay. Actually, for that matter, I almost never call without texting first, but that's partly cuz I work a crazy-hour shift and sleep wonky hours (rare for me to be awake before 2pm) and I don't assume anyone else sleeps or works 'normal' hours either.
Any hypothetical SO of mine is free to receive texts whenever. And free to respond more-or-less whenever--any time is fine, but taking away from quality time or otherwise being a nuisance is not okay. If sie's hiding the nature of the texts, or that sie's getting texts, then there's an issue--openness and honesty are the most important things to me in any relationship. If sie's ignoring me to have a conversation with someone, or if we're trying to go to sleep or watch a movie and sie keeps texting, then I'd probably get irritated, but that's because those are times when the focus should be on the conversation (and texts are distracting during movies--I hate when people text in the movie theater, even if you're 10 rows ahead of me it's still this bright little square of your cell phone screen and it's hella distracting). If sie's constantly texting with one particular person, regardless of gender of that person, I'd probably want to know what the dynamic is between those two. But in the end, if I don't trust my SO, either because I'm too jealous and insecure or because sie's being dishonest with me, then the relationship is a goner anyway.
A few years ago, I probably would've felt differently...but a few years ago, I was an insanely insecure jealous person about relationships...and also younger and much more immature. *shrug*
TL:DR receiving texts any time is kosher with me, replying any time is kosher so long as it's not taking away from quality time or distracting an activity.
*ambles in late* - Someone Else