Good Fences Make Good Neighbors

I'm sure you've heard the phrase "five'll get you ten", or "ten'll get you twenty", but I've never heard "fifty will get you a thousand".

But that's the deal I was offered today. My neighbor has a dog that thinks it has to protect her yard from anyone who gets within a hundred feet. Only problem is my back yard is next to it. A couple of little Nodlings would make a great Scooby Snack for this large white menace.

The fence is old and starting to fall down; it is in sore need of replacement -- and it belongs to me. I'd do it, except that we just replaced the driveway to the tune of several thousand smackers. My neighbor is very solicitous, however, and has offered to replace my fence with a six foot version that isn't falling down.

All I had to do was clear a pile of old deck wood that I've been saving for "when I get around to it" for the last 4 years. A chain saw and a pick up truck later, I headed to the dump with my first load. I even got to use the knots that Wynken and I just learned at the Boy Scout camp last week to tie it down.

For the low price of $60/ton you can dump big heavy stuff at the Rte 66 Waste Transfer Station. So the deal is this: I dump my old junk for $50 bucks and clean up my yard, and she'll put up a shiny new fence at her expense to keep her slavering beast hound away from my kids.

I lose ownership of that section of fence, but who cares? Sounds like a deal, because of that other saying: "Good fences make good neighbors."