Gandalf painting with caption 'the unemployed friend at 2pm on a monday'

The Unemployed Friend at 2pm On a Monday

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Published October 29, 2026

Posted to Twitter in September 2022, 'the unemployed friend at 2pm on a Monday' pairs a Lord of the Rings image of Gandalf wandering the woods with a caption imagining a jobless pal's weekday adventures. The original tweet by @alexsmokesmid inspired copycats on TikTok, Instagram and Tumblr within days, and by October 4th the format had moved to a Tom Cruise edit that collected 218,000 likes in one day.

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Overview

The joke works by matching a picture of a lone character doing something aimless or grand, Gandalf trekking through the woods or a cowboy riding across open country, with a caption that pins the behavior to a specific weekday hour. That time stamp carries the comedy, since the viewer is usually at a desk at 2pm on a Monday while the unemployed friend is off having a tiny epic15.

Earlier posts leaned on fantasy and video-game imagery, where a solitary figure in a sweeping scene sold the fantasy of a weekday with nowhere to be15. Later posts added live-action, with @charleyonhere's October tweet of Tom Cruise sitting on top of the Burj Khalifa reading as the aspirational endpoint of a free Monday afternoon10. Variations swap the hour ('1:40 pm staring at the apex legends lobby') or the character, but the setup stays the same3.

Origin & Background

Platform
Twitter (origin) / TikTok and Instagram (viral spread)
Creator
@alexsmokesmid
Date
2022

Twitter user @alexsmokesmid posted the first known version on September 21st, 2022, laying 'the unemployed friend at 2pm on a Monday' over a piece of Gandalf fan art from The Lord of the Rings1. Within two weeks the tweet had logged over 1,600 likes and 220 retweets6. Two days later, on September 23rd, @alexsmokesmid followed up with a second edit, 'the unemployed friend at 1:40 pm staring at the apex legends lobby,' over different Gandalf artwork, which went on to collect more than 2,500 likes3.

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How It Spread

The original was screenshotted onto Instagram the next day by midi.um, where it logged over 9,800 likes within two weeks2. On September 25th, obsessedwithcatboys reposted the Gandalf version to Instagram and it hit more than 21,000 likes4. Three days later, moistbuddha reposted the same image on Instagram and it climbed past 141,000 likes in a week7.

Video edits took the format off still imagery. TikToker @benjaminsburn posted a Red Dead Redemption 2 clip with a similar caption on September 28th, which logged over 1.7 million views in a week5. Two days later, TikToker @danicooldragon00 posted another video version and hit 245,000 views in five days9. Tumblr user evildilf2 reblogged the Gandalf post the same week, where it drew more than 24,000 notes8.

The clearest crossover moment came on October 4th, when Twitter user @charleyonhere captioned a photo of Tom Cruise atop the Burj Khalifa with 'The unemployed friend at 3:00 pm on a Monday,' which logged over 218,000 likes and 15,000 retweets in a single day10.

Timeline

2022-09-21

@alexsmokesmid posts the original Gandalf version on Twitter.

2022-09-22

Instagram user midi.um screenshots and reposts the tweet.

2022-09-23

@alexsmokesmid posts the 'apex legends lobby' Gandalf variant.

2022-09-25

Instagram repost by obsessedwithcatboys passes 21,000 likes.

2022-09-28

@benjaminsburn's Red Dead Redemption 2 TikTok hits 1.7 million views.

2022-09-30

TikToker @danicooldragon00 posts a second video edit.

2022-10-04

@charleyonhere's Tom Cruise edit logs 218,000 likes in a day.

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