I got into an investment with a friend. My girlfriend at the time told me that I shouldn’t do it, because if something went south, I could lose my best friend, as well as money.
I clarified a few things with the friend, which limited my loses when it did go south.
At some point, I figured out he was lying. I pulled my money and lost a little, he lost a lot more and the friendship didn’t survive.
Neither did the girlfriend, but that was for different reasons.
Not at all. Thank you for answering.
RUDE GUY ON THE PHONE: Here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to go to your bank and get a loan for the $6,000 you owe us, or we’re going to garnish your wages.
ME: Good luck with that.
An hour later, I was in the lawyer’s office, filling out bankruptcy paperwork (there was a lot more to it than just the aforementioned $6,000, but that was the kicker).
They never got their money.
Everyone on the planet told me not to marry my husband. I won’t say it has been one long idyllic picnic, but we have been happily married for 30 years now.
Final PR class: If you don’t get an A in this class, you have no business practicing Public Relations.
I got a B. And he was right. I’m not quite sleazy enough to whore myself out in promotion of just any old cause, regardless of my personal integrity. I think most PR people must get a claim check for their souls in case they ever find a job in another industry.
Thing is… Why wait until spring quarter my senior year to tell me that? Horse was pretty much long gone outta the barn by that point. I needed to hear that advice fall quarter freshman year. I could have changed majors then.
End of the day: Doesn’t matter. I work as an editor. That journalism degree has served me well, and many of the people skills from the PR major have also served me well.
Mom took me out to lunch and began to innumerate the many, many reasons that moving 2000 miles away would be the stupidest thing I might ever do (besides eloping with a man I really didn’t know - and we’ll be happy together 17 years in 3 weeks). I had to agree. You know how “they” tell you to make a list, advantages on one side, disadvantages on the other? My disadvantage list was huge. She added some I had not thought of.
But there was some persistent little burr inside me that I couldn’t ignore, despite the list, despite my mom. I moved. It was one of the best decisions I ever made, second only to eloping with a man I really didn’t know.
Bibby
I loaned a friend $2000 so he could make the down payment on a house.
He paid me back the next day (situation where he couldn’t get to his bank on time, but I could get to mine). And he bought me a nice vase at Goodwill that turned out to be worth about $40.
But this is fundamentally different situation than most people who are asked for loans. In your case, the friend had the money in the bank and simply wasn’t able to get it that day.
Most people who want to borrow don’t have the money in the first place.
Oh, yeah, the burr. That’s a good description of what made me go into the army. Listen to the burr, people. You don’t necessarily want to do what it says, but at least listen to it. The burr knows what it’s talking about, and it’s probably picked up on something your conscious mind missed.
I mean, unless the burr is telling you to go out and buy an AK-47 and clean it obsessively at three o’clock in the morning while humming to the tune of the Star Spangled Banner. Then, you might want a second opinion.
Those aren’t quite in the spirit of the OP, but they are nice to hear.
Around 7-8 weeks ago, a certain someone decided to cancel a date with me before she even met me. She just couldn’t waste time with yet another loser guy. She’d had it. Both her colleague and her mother advised her to just give it a chance, because you never know, right? Nope. She’d have none of it. They kept trying to talk her into it. Finally, she caved in and went.
We couldn’t possibly be more deeply in love.
Fortunately for me, he was telling the truth. He could have been bullshitting me and I could have been a lousy judge of character and out $2000 – by disregarding the common principle of never loaning friends money. (I didn’t make him sign anything or give me any collateral; I just trusted him. What a sucker!)
That sounds like a painful loss.
Niacin -
My doc said my cholesterol was high, would I like him to set up a niacin program for me.
I figured, why go through a bunch of appointments and tests, niacin is an over-the-counter vitamin, so I’ll just try a tablet a day and then in a few weeks have my cholesterol checked again, which I can do without seeing the doc.
The bottle says “May cause skin flushing, itching, or rash” - which I read and ignored then *completely *forgot about.
A few days later, when I had terrible skin flushing, itching, and rash, and also vertigo and a feeling the room was spinning. I never thought of the vitamin but looked for things I ate or flowers coming into bloom. I was ready to go to the emergency room when I happened to look at the bottle again. Then went to the web, and found out all my symptoms were there, plus some more dangerous stuff like liver and kidney damage.
I gave up the niacin and immediately got better and after four days was symptom free.
Of my fiance, my sisters all said that “if Daddy likes him, run like hell.” That marriage lasted just over two years.
I think that often the problems with loaning friends money develop from incompetence, not malice: what happens is that the friend that owes you money can’t pay you back for some reason–they lose their job, or the windfall they thought was a sure thing doesn’t come through, which then creates problems for the loaner. In this case, there wasn’t much room for incompetence or bad luck to interfere.