One of the things I love about my current living situation is the non-invasive social aspect. I really enjoy having people around, but despite the huge growth I've had in the area over recent years, I still remain fundamentally socially awkward, and interacting with people is a lot of work for me.

I usually hang out in the kitchen playing on my computer. During the day I'm typically the only one home, but its nice to say brief hellos and occasionally talk with other house mates who pass in and out.

The key part that makes it work for me is that everyone here is very respectful of my attention. Even though I'm not "doing anything important," people rarely interrupt me to try to pull me into their agendas. They do sometimes interrupt me, but usually only if there's something they specifically want to discuss with me, as opposed to just walking in and telling me all about their day or chatting. And on the occasion that they do interrupt me for other things, its usually something exceptional that is fun or exciting.

And on the other hand, I often do feel social when people are around, and at those times, I pull myself away from my computer and engage in conversations with people about what they're up to, or talk about what I'm up to, or whatever we end up talking about ;)

I think sometimes I'm a little too respectful of other people's attention around the house, in that I often don't interact with people because I don't want to bother them. I recently confirmed that I am indeed correct in my feeling that some others feel similarly to myself, in not wanting to be dropped in on.

This makes it tough to talk with the upstairs house mates very much, because I generally only go upstairs specifically if I want to talk with them or feel like chatting. But in discussing this, I was just given the great suggestion that perhaps I could play on my computer upstairs ;) This sounds like a great way to make myself present but not so invasive in their space :)

We'll see how well it works in practice... the down side is that it might be tough for more than one person (especially introverts) involved with their private ventures to get to a good social mode at the same time... in fact, its a large part of why I don't hang out in Patri's room with him when he's on his computer very much ;) It seems like often when we're having computer/reading time together, one or the other of us gets annoyed about being interrupted too much. But we do both enjoy it in moderation.