I saw a report which said the costs of producing a penny or nickel have exceeded the face value of the coins.

Sounds like my kind of deal.

I think I have been the victim of the networks. If what I have heard is right "W' is going to address the country tonight from seven to eight. Uh-oh, that's into my DOND programming. Maybe NBC will condense his speech into a commercial break.

Speculation is that "W" wants to put the national guard along the border with Mexico. One network had a news bite saying "W" would command a national audience. I doubt "W" can command his own bodily function.

What we have here is a conflict between fantasy presidency and reality presidency.

I bet Jeb would like to distance himself from his brother.

I was very disappointed in Survivor Panama. I didn't want either of the finalist to win. In my book Terry was the most deserving. He did what he did against the odds, against the numbers. I suppose if there was any solace for me it was that he voted for Aras (the eventual winner). I liked it when Jeff Probst took a straw pole vote of Danielle against Terry and she still lost.

I wonder if Aras will get his own place now? If I were his folks I would freeload on him! What goes around comes around.

As if I didn't have enough little projects going on, I got another one this weekend. Just over ten years ago, we had to rebuild our backyard fence. One side was taken to the ground with wind gusts, the two remaining sides were "ready" to follow suit but were "propped" up preventing this.

Krl and I built this fence and neighbors laughed about it when we built it. A tornado could come through and all the houses might be blown down but the frame work would remain. If I had a crystal ball ten years ago, I would have named it doppler. Of the three sides, one neighbor didn't contribute anything, money or help (they have since sold the home and moved away, current neighbors still wonder why the fence is a foot inside our property line), another neighbor shared in the cost of materials, the final neighbor shared in the expense and helped install the fence palings.

I guess in parable terms we have a good neighbor, another that likes nice things, and the final neighbor was a parasite.

Our good neighbor came to me Friday evening and told me he was fixing to replace his other two fences. We laughed because ten years ago he had needed to do this. As the conversation progressed he brought it around to the fence we share. What would you think about replacing it? He asked. I told him I had noticed some palings had rotted around the flooring screws that hold them in place. We discussed what we could have done to prolong the life of the materials (sealer, or perhaps siliconing on top of the screw heads). He was contemplating a "scab" repair to get a few more years out of it. I thought about things and after I had to repair our gate (which the lawn service had damaged), I decided another option was to place three new screws per paling (splitting the original screw placement) and we could probably get three to five years more from the existing fence.

The good neighbor finally told me he wanted to replace all the palings, but he didn't want any money or help because it was just cosmetic. He wanted all of his fence to appear the same. I told him we would try to do whatever was fair.

Turns out even though he doesn't want any help I got to do some fencing. He was wanting to have the fence down by Monday morning which meant I had to have something in place to keep our hounds home.

Sounds like my kind of project. Receive a reprieve followed by a punishment.

The temporary fence is in place. The neighborhood is safe from being ravaged by wild poodle hounds.

I suppose next weekend I will get to take it down.

Be the real deal.

FATHER, I don't even know where to begin,.... but YOU do.