I was hanging out with some friends last night and I was talking to some girls and whatnot, and my friend was with me, then out of nowhere he blurts something embarrassing that happened to me a couple of years ago. It doesn't bug me that much, but it lowers my value when I am talking to new people. I responded with "Why would you bring that up, you've haven't said anything good about any of your friends tonight"; He Responded "Dude, that's a funny story you, just bring up something dumb that happened to me" Nothing came to mind so I said "No, I don't like to do things like that"; come to think of it I should have said "No; there's better things to talk about". Then I lost my momentum cause I was embarrassed, but after a minute I discarded that negative moment and got my flow/composure back. It was a solid night regardless. But I know if I am hanging out with my old friends, they constantly neg on each other, hard. Its kinda funny, but I don't take part, and tend not to hang out with them often because I find that all they are good at is putting each other down. I would like to know, for the future, how to better deal with friends who'll blurt something like that out. I know a lot of places in the community say forget your old friends cause they don't want to see you succeed [VERY TRUE], but I live in a small city, and I am always going to run into them at one point or another. Thanks for any help guys.