The Too Nice Guy

Hi. My name is Arnie Bassette, and I was just accepted into The Weirdo Group here on Footbook. This is my first post, so be nice to me. Please.

I need some advice. I always try to do the right thing, but people get mad at me anyway. I am in one of those situations right now with my next-door neighbor, Herb.

It all started when I accidentally totaled Herb’s car. My insurance paid him, and he got a new car. He was ecstatic because he wanted to get rid of his old clunker, anyway. I was the one who got screwed because my insurance premiums went way up. My insurance company has accident forgiveness, but that doesn’t apply when the car you hit ends up being 50 pieces of metal scattered over a block and a half. The cops couldn’t believe it. They had never seen anything like it. The only reason nobody was hurt was that the car was parked when I hit it.

Although Herb was happy, I felt I owed him more than just insurance money for a new Honda Accord. I wanted to make up to him for all the aggravation and the inconvenience of having his car turned into a mess of unrecognizable scrap metal. I mailed him a formal invitation to join my girlfriend and me as our guest at any restaurant of his choice. He thanked me for the invitation, but he declined it. He also wondered why I mailed him an invitation when he lives next door. I explained that I thought he deserved a formal invitation. He just looked at me.

Because he turned down the restaurant invitation I had to find another way to pay him back for what I had done. I had a local party place make up some large mylar balloons that said, “Herb’s a jolly good fellow.” Using a piece of wood as a stake, I planted the balloons in his front yard. The next morning I found four deflated balloons and a piece of wood on my front porch, with a note that said, “Thanks, but don’t do that again.”

Over the next month, I tried hard to find ways to pay my debt to Herb. I had to resolve this. It was bothering me so much I couldn’t sleep at night. I put gifts in his mailbox. I wrote a poem in his honor and read it loud enough for him to hear it while he was having a family barbecue. I did other things, too, which I won’t take time to mention here. He rejected all my efforts, with increasing annoyance. That annoyance turned to anger the night I took my guitar and serenaded him at 1:00 in the morning with a song I had written especially for him. I thought he’d be touched by this. He wasn’t. Neither were the police.

I need advice. What can I do for Herb? The restraining order makes it impossible for me to do the usual kind of nice things for him.

COMMENT: Arnie Bassette, there have been many weirdos in this group, but you are the weirdest weirdo of all. Congratulations.

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10 thoughts on “The Too Nice Guy”

  1. You need an anti-restraining, restaurant order!

  2. You need an anti-restraining, restaurant order!

  3. You need an anti-restraining, restaurant order!

    1. Hehe! I remember that episode. Didn’t it end up with the co-worker telling Rose that because she’s his friend she should leave him alone or something like that? And wasn’t Rose happy because he had acknowledged that they were friends, even though he was telling her to leave him alone?

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