'Stalked' by an old friend
Well, it felt like it at the time. I've a couple of old friends from my old school who I don't keep in contact with as well as I should. This initially had something to do with them living two towns away, then I moved to London and that made it even more impractical. We've still got contact details for each other, they're just never used. A bit like nuclear weapons, really.

So, having not heard from one of them for several years, I am suddenly quite surprised to receive an e-mail. "Why, it's [him]! I wonder what he's up to these days..."

Then it occurs to me: he's e-mailing my uni e-mail address. I never gave him my uni e-mail address. Plus he dropped a couple of hints that he had a rough idea of what I was doing with my life at the time. I politely enquired: how did you get my new address...and how do you know this much?

It turns out he put my name into Google, and the real ale soc I was running at the time had my e-mail on the website. But the guy had an old (but still working) e-mail address for me, I'm sure he had my mobile number, if not he definitely had my parents' number, who would have been all too happy to furnish him with my number. Why did he feel it necessary to Google my name?

It became even more ridiculous when I met up with him. Turned out he'd moved to a flat which was now in the same town as my folks. About 5 minutes' walk from where they lived. He knew where they lived. There was a chance I might even have been home if he just walked down the hill and knocked. Why did he Google my name?

Length? About four years since I'd seen him...
(LongJohnBaldry, Fri 1 Feb 2008, 14:41, 9 replies)

it could be
for the same reason I occasionally Google the names of people I went to school with - because they are complete cunts and I hope their lives are amusingly unfulfulling since they made mine hell for long enough. Usually they are local store managers for Tescos or else they work in HR so I'm thinking justice has been served.

Er, I am not suggesting you are a cunt at all, merely giving you a potential glimpse into his psyche.
( crackhouseceilidhband Fuck off back to Mumsnet, Fri 1 Feb 2008, 14:50, closed)

Out of idle curiousity?
It may seem a little odd, but it's not as if he hired a private detective or something.
( wangmaster2000, Fri 1 Feb 2008, 15:00, closed)

I google people all the time
I don't necesserily conatct them though

I have hooked up with a few old friends that way

It's odd mind you
(sittingduck Attention seeking, bullshitting fuck-knuckle, Fri 1 Feb 2008, 15:32, closed)

You
are worrying too mauch.


Let it go.
(Spokes, Fri 1 Feb 2008, 15:40, closed)

I google
my old school chums' names all the time, it's interesting. Although I'm 'friends' with nearly my entire year from secondary school on facebook now so there is less scope to stalk...
(Evilweevil is covered in bees, Fri 1 Feb 2008, 16:21, closed)

it's just a way to find our what old friends are up to these days
also a good way to see if there's any gossip on them...
(The Empress it seems you CAN polish a turd!, Fri 1 Feb 2008, 16:55, closed)

I always Google people
Well, men anyway.

I want to know exactly who (or what) I'm dealing with and Google often provides that.

Strangely enough according to Google I'm an ice hockey pro in the USA...strange really when I've only skated two or three times and I live in the UK.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Fri 1 Feb 2008, 17:41, closed)

I think
that googling someone is a fairly normal thing to do these days. I would find it less creepy for someone to google me than to turn up at my parents house having to explain who they were and that they were dropping by on the off-chance a friend from years ago might be in.
( MadAdamUk was last alive on, Mon 4 Feb 2008, 4:24, closed)

I stand corrected...
...Googling people is obviously a more common practice than I originally thought.

I have to admit, I think I may have pitched this story incorrectly - particularly given some of the far more terrifying answers I've read on this QoTW - I didn't think of this as any kind of clingy-creepy-stalkery behaviour, I just thought it was a little odd and faintly amusing that he chose this convoluted way to contact me.
(LongJohnBaldry, Mon 4 Feb 2008, 14:45, closed)