  Heidi ho, neighborinos. I've been reading someone elses blog (Completely and utterly unrelated to TCZ) for awhile now. I had accidently stumbled across it while hard at work and I found the circumstances he was undertaking quite interesting, if only from a "God I would NEVER do that" perspective. The quick summary is: He met this girl online through LiveJournal (He lives in Las Vegas, she lived in Wisconsin), they fell in love over the phone, and now she was going to move in with him and they were going to live happily ever after. Well, my Adam-sense went off and I lurked both his and her journals for about two months (The whole courtship -> moving thing took about a month and a half) and oddly enough, they both stopped posting for about 3 weeks after "THE BIG MOVE". One day, I'm reading the DearAsshole Livejournal community and there's a post from her being completely and utterly BITCHY.
Now I have to say, I didn't much like her from the beginning. Her profile was a big ball of bullshit wrapped in horsepucky. She had an IQ of 172, she was an attorney at 17, she was lead editor of major newspapers at 16, blah blah blah; altogether, she was the queen bee on a honeypot of vinegar (Oooh, mixed metaphor). Her post, in this big journal (Which she KNEW he read) is as follows: Okay, let's talk about consideration...... Dear Asshole: I moved across the country to be with you. You said you loved me. You said a lot of things.
I understand you don't have tons of relationship experience. I understand you've never lived with a girl before. And that is okay. I understand that means you'll have to learn some things about being in a relationship. And that is okay, too. Let's talk about what isn't okay.
I don't care how little relationship experience you have, there are certain things that are about common courtesy and human decency. Let's say your girlfriend comes home after a 12 hour long shift at her brand-new, stressful job. And this girlfriend needs to wind down, so she goes to watch a baseball game on TV - quietly, because she knows you're napping in the next room. And let's say half an hour later you wake up. And you go out to the living room and you see her sleeping, dozed off in front of the game. What do you do, what do you do?
Here's what a reasonable human being would do: a reasonable human being would either put a blanket on her and turn off the tv, or possibly wake her up so she could go to the bed and be more comfortable. But here's what YOU did instead, by way of contrast. You came to the living room, turned the TV to a different channel, and raised the volume, waking said girlfriend up - in spite of the fact that there was a TV in the bedroom you could've watched if you needed to see The Simpsons that badly. But the girlfriend was understanding and just went to the bedroom to sleep some more. What would a reasonable human being do at this point? It's pretty easy - they'd be quiet while she napped, or keep things at a generally reasonable noise level.
What did you do? You decided to do dishes. To run the garbage disposal. And to play music loudly enough that you could hear it over the garbage disposal. No reasonable man would expect to be able to do this and still have his testicles attached at the end of the day. But your girlfriend was so nice that she didn't even mind this so much - maybe, she thought, the music wasn't as loud as she perceived it.
So she put in earplugs to block it out and finally sleep. She realized when she did, that not only could she hear every lyric of the song playing, she could feel the bass line in the floor. This made her upset, incredibly upset actually. She'd had a hard day at work and was exhausted, and now she couldn't sleep - and what the hell kind of person would do that, anyway? The more she thought about it, the madder she got. And while she usually is the first to say when something is wrong, she decided she shouldn't have to tell ANYONE not to blast loud music while someone is napping in the next room, regardless of their lack of relationship experience.
So when she finally does tell you, is it your fault for being an asshole, or is it her fault for failing to ask you nicely to turn down the 80 dB music you felt was fine to play while someone was napping? Reasonable person survey says: the first one. You said the second. You said you didn't know the music was that loud. When I insisted you must have, you said you didn't think I could hear it through the bedroom door - in spite of the fact that you've turned down the living room TV as you were going to bed before so it wouldn't bother you. Then you used the usual "I'm new at this and if I make mistakes it's just because I've never been told.
" Never been told? THREE YEAR OLDS know not to disturb people with noise as they sleep. Then you resorted to calling me a hypocrite because I ask you to bring me relationship troubles when they happen - you know what? Doing that isn't a relationship problem. It's a problem with being a human being and existing in society. No one does that shit.
So when we fought, I ended up saying you were totally inconsiderate, to which you replied "but I'm not TRYING to be," as if that made it okay. Let me tell you something: no one tries to be inconsiderate. You have to try to be considerate. Well, ok, so I told you, and you agreed to be more considerate. We also agreed I wouldn't go up this weekend to meet your family, but you'd still go on the trip - leaving me alone at the apartment over the long weekend (some alone time I desperately needed). And you asked me if I'd get the oil changed in your car today so you wouldn't have to skip lunch and do that instead on your lunch break.
Fine, I don't mind doing you a favor, even after all that crap. I got the oil change, which came to $32. You gave me $40. When you got home, you asked me for the keys and your change. Because of money things, that change was the only money I had to spend all weekend. And now it was gone, and you didn't even think about it.
And you didn't even thank me for getting it done for you. And then you left. I went to grab a soda from the fridge - and then realized you'd taken all of it and there was nothing left to drink in the entire house. Fine, I decided to brew some iced tea - I'd just filled the ice cube trays the night before, so I brewed the tea, poured it into the pitcher, and then looked in the freezer - you had emptied the ice cube trays and put them back in the freezer absolutely empty. I was holding cold, hollow plastic with not a single cube of ice. These are not the actions of a person who's just inexperienced at relationships.
They are the actions of someone absolutely inexperienced with life. You are the most socially retarded person I have ever had the misfortune to meet. I have known autistic kids who know that loud noise wakes people up. I have known developmentally disabled children who know better than to leave empty ice cube trays in the freezer. What's your excuse, asshole? Sincerely, me So, the guy is a big dweeb.
Some of her complaints are relatively legitamite, some are just what you naturally go through in the first couple months of a relationship, some are just weird. She's venting, so let her vent. Anyways, not a day later, comes his response....awesome :) His post: Dear me: So you want to talk about “reasonableness” and “consideration.” Well I don’t know whether I should start from the beginning, or from now and work my way back. Either way there is no conceivable way in which I could possibly cover all of the examples of how you’ve done oh so well at exhibiting the highest standards of both. [/sarcasm] Since my mind has a tendency to go all over the place, I suppose I’ll just let it out as it comes out. I suppose the 12 hour work day would be a start.
Actually, I suppose we could go into what a rough week of work you had…..wait a second, a week?!?!? I would LOVE it if I could have gotten away with working less than two weeks in the previous two months. But no, that’s not an option I’ve had. You see, while you were busy sitting at home talking to your friends and playing on the Internet all day, I was busy working EVERY day because quite frankly if I didn’t, I’d be writing this from a cardboard box right about now. You moved out here by giving me the understanding that you’d save up enough money to support yourself for a couple of weeks while you got settled in. And I realize we got off to a rough start.
After your mother went to the trouble of warning me about the shittiness of your car I asked you if you were sure that it would be okay to make it across the country (especially through the Colorado Rockies in snow season). You assured me that it would be fine and not to worry. I trusted you, obviously that was my first mistake. Because obviously a “reasonable” person would believe that a 10-year old Cadillac with nearly 200,000 miles on it and a host of problems can be trusted to make it 2,000ish miles in 2 days. After said car died on us in Denver I rented a car with the assurance that your parent’s oh so wonderful AAA Gold membership would take care of it. Well, what choice did I have?
We needed to get home right? So even as I dreaded that, and the fact that it meant we’d have to drive back the next weekend, and drive 24 hours in two days, I really didn’t have a problem with it. I loved you and I was willing to do whatever I had to in order to make things work. Later when we realized that we wouldn’t have the money to pay for the repairs (after I’d already obtained a pay day loan to cover the charges for the rental car that I thought I’d be recovering at some point in time) I did something I haven’t done in years. I asked my father for money. Due to his generosity, inspired by a desire to help us start out on the right track, he obliged.
But much like other fiscal matters in the months to come you didn’t show me the slightest bit of gratitude for what I had done. Even after I told you how hard it was for me to ask him for money you couldn’t even acknowledge that and thank me for doing it, for you, for us. I was relieved when you told me the repairs would be far less than we thought they would be. I didn’t think the car was worth keeping for the greater amount. So you can imagine my shock (or at least a reasonable person would) when you paid the bill and it ended up being nearly twice what I’d planned for. Oh well, what was done was done.
Again, no thanks, no acknowledgement. But enough about that damn car, even if after we went to all that trouble to bring it back here it died less than a week later. And even if as of YESTERDAY I was asking you to help me move it so that it wouldn’t be towed you said “I don’t want to do it now, we’ll do it when you get back.” That’s always your response, “I’ll do it later.” That seems to have been your attitude for everything from making an appointment with a temp. service, to giving them the information they need when you finally do work. Last Saturday I had to get yet another pay day loan (both of these the first time I’ve done so in well after a year, and previously it was because of dealing with my dead car) because you couldn’t be bothered to go to the temp service at a convenient time. When I came home sick from work on Thursday I asked you if you could take care of it that day, since obviously I wouldn’t be needing my functioning car for anything for the rest of the day.
“I’ll take you to work tomorrow, and do it then” you said. This was BEFORE you knew that you had a phone interview at 2:00 that day. After that I was fine with it (although you could’ve still done both). But no, you couldn’t even stop to consider for a second that doing it that day would’ve been a helluva lot more considerate of the fact that doing without my car (especially unnecessarily) is a huge hassle to me. So anyway, as a result, it didn’t get done in time and I was left borrowing money so I could silly little things like put drinks in the fridge. Oh yes, the drinks in the fridge.
I love your renewed attitude of guilty until proven innocent. So I guess I’ll jump ahead a bit and move on to yesterday. I gave you $40 for the oil change, because I figured that would cost about $20, and it might need a new air filter, so then $20 wouldn’t cut it. According to the receipt in my car it came to just under $20. You gave me $8 and some change and told me you’d purchased a few other things. I hadn’t planned for that, but oh well.
I figured you wouldn’t buy anything you didn’t really need right? Of course a conversation about this probably would’ve been much easier to have if you hadn’t been on the phone the whole time. Silly me. If I say I love someone and they’re going away for three days I think I could get off the phone long enough to give a proper goodbye to that person and work out any necessary details. Oh yeah, so speaking of that paycheck that you couldn’t be bothered to take care of last week. Well you managed to receive that check this week.
Over $200, well over the change I took back from you so that I could eat on my way up here. When I got in the car I noticed your wallet with your ID was in there. I knew you couldn’t cash your check without that or a car, so I made a trip upstairs to make sure you had both (your ID, my brother’s car). You’d asked me the day before where the check cashing place was, so I had stupidly assumed that since you had the means to cash your check, you would so. This seemed especially reasonable as you had given me NO indication that you needed any other money. Had you said ANYTHING I would’ve had no problem taking out more than $40 and having you keep what you needed to get by.
I’m still baffled as to why you claim to be broke this weekend based somehow, on my actions. As for the drinks issue. Wow, here’s where your lovely tendency to assume the worst in me really comes to shine. When I went to hit the road I saw there were two sodas left. I grabbed one figuring you’d have the last one and that would tide you over until you could get off your ass long enough to get money and to the store. Obviously I was wrong, but this is proving not to be a first for me.
It wasn’t until I’d gotten on the road that I saw John drinking one that I figured out he’d grabbed the last one. By then it was too late, but I figured you’d manage. Afterall, would it really be THAT wrong of me if I had intentionally the last in a pack of soda that I’d paid for?!?!? So you went to get some ice, and apparently it wasn’t there. Again you assume it was somehow my nefarious motives that precluded those ice trays from having ice in them. Sorry, that’s not the case.
Upon some investigation John tells me that Robby used them on Sunday night and may have not refilled them. I haven’t touched them in weeks, but thanks for assuming that if I did I wouldn’t refill them. Before you came along if it weren’t for me they never would have been filled. But the dishes, oh yes, my washing of the dishes, the most egregious sin of all. But geez, did anyone reading this stop and ask WHY a guy with no relationship or living with a partner experience would have cause to do dishes? Anyone who knew me or my lifestyle would know that doing dishes used to be rare event for me.
Why? Because I live like a bachelor. I don’t cook, I don’t mess up my dishes, and when I do I rinse them off. So the reason I was doing dishes is quite simple. I was cleaning up after you. The problem is to say that is a gross (and I do mean that literally) understatement is putting it incredibly lightly.
I really fail to see how someone that leaves half consumed food on the stove (and that’s assuming they turn the stove or oven off when they’re done with it) and unrinsed dishes anywhere has ANY room to speak about lack of consideration. The fact that Robby got so frustrated with it after your first week here that he cleaned it himself and that you still didn’t figure out that it was a problem boggles my mind. So why did I have to do it that night of all nights? Well up until then I thought we were going out of town together to enjoy a nice weekend together with the relaxation we both deserved. I looked forward to showing you around the place I grew up and sharing the things around here that hold significance to me. I wanted to share everything with you.
But even after I thought we’d made up you didn’t want to go because you’d “rather sleep.” I can’t help but be more than a little blown away by that after you complain about my sleep habits. And ahh yes, sleep. How dare I create noise while you try to sleep? Even after I told you repeatedly that your incessant clacking of the keys and the glare of the monitor prevents me from falling asleep you keep doing it. You told me to just tell you if it was bothering me and you’d come to bed. It would be just that easy!
And yet every time I tried this it took you AT LEAST an hour to do so, and that was during the times you didn’t yell at me for expecting someone that has to work EARLIER than I do to come to bed before 1:00 am. No, all you could do was stay up all night further validating my theory that you’d rather talk to or associate with anyone who is not me. I’m sorry, did I say you were on the computer to much? Sorry, you were on MY computer too much. That’s right, yours has been down the majority of your time here and even though it would only cost a few bucks to fix (per your claim) you make no effort to do so. And why should you?
You’re on mine if you’re a) awake b) not on the phone running up my long distance charges when you haven’t paid for any of the other expenses you’re using since your first week here and c) not busy making a mess in the kitchen. And then I’m made to feel guilty if I spend five minutes on it. Remember when I’d been using it, was in the middle of the game and I got up to use the bathroom and you were on it for the next hour? Yeah, real fucking considerate. But you know what? I could get past a lot of this stuff if I thought it was worth it.
But I don’t know if I can get over the passive-aggressive manner in which you’ve chosen to address this. I mean really, a post in a LiveJournal community that you had to know full well that I was a member of? (If you didn’t, all you had to do was check my user info page, and I highly doubt you were unaware). Heaven forbid that you talk to me about this. Heaven forbid that you call me (my cell phone is rarely more than two feet away from me, but that would require you not being on the phone already I suppose….). You couldn’t even be bothered to validate ANY of the horrible things you’d assumed about me.
This continual pattern of assuming the worst of intentions in me has to stop if we’re going to have ANY hope of working this shit out. Your inconsideration runs far too deep. As misguided and stupid as I may have been, my motives that ended up upsetting you that night were based in consideration (if I clean this stuff up tonight neither one of us will have to come home from a long drive to a smelly and gross kitchen). You on the other hand, are just innately inconsiderate. You may be incredibly intelligent for your age, but you have a LOT of growing up to do. And if you can't acknowldge any of your role in this, then I really don't know what you're still doing in my home.
And my jaw just hits the floor. Best Online Fight Ever. Point, CounterPoint, a drag down punch out KILLFEST of incredible proportions. I just found it so fascinating to have this veil of 'perfection' ripped away to see what a person is really like, and there we have it. I had to contact this guy so I mailed him and said "OMG u R S LEET! " or something to that effect.
Moving on to this week, he leaves the coup de grace, PICTURES! And my friends, nothing says "I love you" more then finding out just how much of a sham a person is . I swear, by my puppies grave, I will follow this beeyatch around the Internet making sure that no one gets suckered in as much as this poor guy did. 
