- submitted by b-team on 07/05/2007
Bad Neighgors: An Open Letter To Our Neighbors -- Chronic Borrowers
Dear Neighbors:
You know who you are. (And we don't mean the Franklins. You're fine, especially after our little talk.) So, dear neighbors...
We love to share. It's an excellent value. We encourage it in our children. We even try to get our pets to understand the concept. But what you don't seem to get -- which even our cat does, even after her 'accident' and subsequent brain surgery -- is there are limits.
If you want to borrow our grass seed, return it. Even better, get us some new grass seed to replace the nearly full bag you "borrowed." If you borrow our lawn mower or deck chairs, try to remember they're ours not yours, and don't leave them in your garage for several months, and lend them to dozens of your other good friends.
You want that new great book we bought, or DVD, or those fabulous serving trays we just got that are perfect for parties? Fine, ask, but don't ask for everything, all the time, whenever the impulse tickles your brain.
Finally, here's the companion value to "sharing is good": If you're always borrowing our stuff, what would be really nice is that you at least occasionally shared some stuff with us. And, if you don't have any stuff that we'd want to borrow, then get some. Got it? Because, as much as you think we like you (and it's not as much as you think), we're really not that interested in becoming your free 1-stop shop alternative to buying your own things at Blockbuster, Home Depot, Circuit City, Amazon, Walmart, Acme, CVS and everywhere else normal people buy what they want.
We've talked to you about this and you've said, of course, you understand, you'll get us back those barbecue tongs and our bicycles asap. (We still haven't seen them.) You laugh and we laugh and, still, we know you've got our 2 basketballs somewhere on your side of the fence.
We've tried to be good neighbors. We've tried to go with the flow, act (even feel) like this really isn't a big deal, what's ours is yours, etc etc. But here's the thing: What's ours isn't yours. We're sick of your taking our stuff -- because too many times when we want it, we can't find it or use it; and, really the reason we bought it in the first place is because we wanted it and wanted to use it.
So, we want to be clear and, if you could see us now as we express this, you'd see that we are clear and we're not laughing or smiling; we've got what most people would describe as a furious end-of-the-line rage-filled scowl.
Return our stuff. Now! All of it. If you don't -- let's say by tomorrow --we're going to come over to your house and, after taking our stuff ourselves, give your house an appropriate and long overdue makeover. And we're not talking "makeover" that involves hanging new wall paper or replacing your piece-of-crap furniture with designer stuff. Although we are talking "makeover" that involves the liberal use of home improvement tools. (You may have forgotten, but our bro-in-laws are in the construction business and they love to use their power tools.)
One other thing . . . . We've noticed the new Jacuzzi you installed on your patio. Of course, how could we not -- you're in it all day and night, screaming and carousing like post-pubuscent teens, keeping up your neighbors half the night. But the Jacuzzi looks nice. It seems really fun. We'd like to borrow that. So why don't you deliver that by tomorrow too. You understand, yes?
Have a good rest of the day, neighbors.
We look forward to seeing you at the block party next week. (Oh yea, and try to bring something this year. We're confident this is going to be a year of many firsts for you.)
All Best,
Your (former) Regular Lenders
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