People With Good Intentions Reveal How It All Went South

The road to hell is paved with good intentions. Bad circumstances are liable to arise no matter what you've set out to do. That precious family heirloom you've offered to carry for your significant other just so happened to slip from your hands, and all of a sudden you're no longer invited back to family dinner. It's happened to all of us. Reddit user, u/turtleofgirth, wanted to know about those mistaken moments when they asked:

What is something you've done with the best of intentions, but ended up making you look like an -sshole?

When I was a teenager, I was at a friendly dinner with some people and one of the girls attending was talking about a recent break up and it was making the entire table rather uncomfortable. In an attempt to change the topic and get people talking about something else, I told a story I had heard maybe a month before where someone's dog had been picked up by a hawk and never seen again.

A mutual friend nudged me. It was her dog.

I stared at the table the rest of the evening.

Big-Time-Sieve

Sitting in a chair at a party surrounded by girlfriend's friends that I'm meeting for the first time. There is a folding TV tray of drinks behind and to the side of my chair which is in front of a couch. There is also a little dog with a case of the zoomies tearing around the room.

Eventually the dog tries to launch onto the couch, straight towards the tray of drinks. I try to gently deflect it's flight path away from the drinks. Instead it looked like I was a basketball player blocking a dunk. This dog goes flying to the side and lands on it's head yelping. Then it limps off whining while everyone stares at me.

2 minutes later it was perfectly fine and running around again but it was too late for me.

rahomka

Held a door of an entrance to a hotel far too prematurely for a man in a wheelchair. I'm so socially awkward that I became paranoid of the fact that I held it beyond "societies standards" so I let it go at a time when he was just close enough and the door shut right as he was reaching the entrance.

I felt awful.

[username deleted]

A few years ago I'd moved in to a new (and my first!) apartment, and the cold winter months kept me from really running into many neighbors. I was making an active effort to at least be nice and friendly if I ran into anyone.

It was the last day of winter, I'm heading to work, and a neighbor is sitting outside on a bench, reading in front of the apartment building. This was an old dude, like, if he said he turned 30 on D-Day I might not be surprised. I wanted to say something, he was reading - enjoy you book? have a nice last day of winter?

Instead I made intense eye contact with this old guy, and said "Enjoy your last day" and hurried off. I was mortified but it was too late - and my delivery was awful since I realized what was happening part way through so it was sorta monotone and aggressive

I only saw him around the building one other time and we politely avoided eye contact.

brandnamenerd

In eighth grade we were having a class discussion/debate about the whole Merry Christmas vs Happy Holidays thing and how Jewish people might feel about it. The genius idea in my head was that when somebody were to, say, check out at a register the info on the credit card would indicate to the cashier their denomination and they would know what to say.

Unfortunately I'm an idiot and didn't know the finer details of the atrocities in WWII. What actually came out of my mouth was that Jews should have something to indicate their faith so that the rest of the public would know how to treat them.... Yeah

f-ckgoldsendbitcoin

When I was a kid I went into the bath with my clothes on. I thought I was doing a huge favour to my mom by washing my clothes and myself at the same time.

Nope. She was pissed.

svenson_26

Me and my ex were out for dinner, talking about our "relationship". How she went for a "vacation" and how she almost broke up with me for the things I wasn't doing for her (stuff around the house, waking up enough times in the middle of the night for the baby, not waking up early enough for the baby in the morning, stuff like that; I worked while she was on parental leave)

We ended up going for drinks after dinner. We got home and she passed out on the couch. I tried to carry her up to our room, got up the first set of stairs, tried the second set; couldn't do it. I lost my footing and accidently threw her into the wall, creating a huge hole in the drywall.

coolcrushkilla

Offering to pay when a friend says they can't go out because they don't have money.

Aimed for generous, landed on show off instead.

olivesolives

At a christmas fair, I got some bags of caramelized almonds. Walked by a homeless guy dressed as santa, and I felt bad and didn't have any cash. So I was about to give him a bag of the almonds, but then he just sadly smiled at me and pointed at his mouth... where there was no teeth.

Maybe not exactly an -sshole, but I felt so bad.

theZabaLaba

Oh man. When I was in high school, there was a pigeon stuck in a ledge. All the other students were looking at it, some were laughing at it (seriously, why?) and no one was doing anything. So I took it upon myself to rescue Sir Pigeon by gently helping him with his stuck leg. I held him in my hands for a while and he started wriggling, like he wanted to fly away.

Thinking this little guy wanted freedom, and with a crowd of about 50 kids watching, whispering and laughing, I let him go out into the what I thought was the sweet, sweet sky.

Except he dropped instantly.

He dropped down 5 floors.

I became a pigeon murderer that day :(

AOLchatparty1999

H/T: Reddit