Social life

Get-togethers are a typical form of spending spare time, during the week and on the weekends, for all the singles who participated in the study. Most often they meet their friends, slightly less frequent their parents and siblings. During the week they go out for a beer or a coffee, preferably with their friends. At such get-togethers they discuss current issues, tell each other about the latest events in their lives, and eat lunch or dinner. As singles usually have a lot of friends, they often go out with different people a few times a week – each time with somebody different: “During the week I meet up with my friends. I have lots of friends and the problem is that they don't know each other. That's why I usually meet one person, not a group, three or four times a week. … There is one group of people. … Loners only, or to put it another way, people who are single for many different reasons. They have nothing to do after work, so we go to pubs. It's our main entertainment” [Dorothy, 37]. Meetings during the week are preferred by singles who work or study during weekends. Some of them have a specific day of the week appointed for meetings with their circle of friends: “Meetings with my friends from university were moved to midweek.