Howdy, Steve!
How many of you can honestly say you have a meaningful relationship with your neighbor? At the very most, you probably wave to them in the morning and when you get back from work. You’ll occasionally have them over for backyard BBQs, but that’s only to be polite.

This person took politeness to the next level, but it might have been the next level backward. They had been calling their neighbor “Steve” for the last three years, not knowing that Steve was actually the name of the neighbor’s pet dog. Why didn’t “Steve” correct the OP? After a couple of days of being called “Steve,” it would’ve been pretty awkward.