[cripplecreek]

We're a republican county as you can see by the actions of the people.

[Kenny Bunkport]

Touching, uplifting, and one reason this is a great country.

[Houmatt]

Sounds like an episode of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition to me.

[mtbopfuyn]

What should have been a feel good story, quickly turned sour. The woman obviously has no clue of priorities. If a trip to Disney trumps a new roof, one can only imagine what else she throws her money at. I'm sitting here trying to tighten an already frugal budget and wouldn't dream of blowing it on high priced entertainment. With the high cost of gas, our outings are limited to geocaching (btw, the pricey gpsr was a gift). Education, great scenery, exercise, and excellent quality family time. What more can one ask.

[Doctor Raoul]

Mixed feelings here. Nice that they did that, but Mom's not taking care of business if that roof doesn't come first.

What other poor choice will she make that the safety net who helped her out here can't fix?

There must be more to this story.

[Melpomene]

I love these stories, but I always have to wonder...how do they pay the taxes on these gifts?

[CSM]

Cool story. BTW, I'll be on vacation for a couple of weeks! ;-)

[Petronski]

If Disney had any class, they'd refund some of her money...at least her admission fees.

[AZLiberty]

I hardly watch any network TV, but we had a house guest for a while who introduced us to ABC's Extreme Home Makeover. First, I found it very touching that they were doing nice things for people with serious life problems, but second, it resonated with me on a more general issue.

One of the problems of this society is the underutilization of human resources. Many people I know are "underemployed", in the sense that they can't seem to find a job that matches their capabilities. Whatever mechanisms are out there don't seem to do this match very well. In particular, volunteerism seems to be a vastly underutilized resource.

There was a time in this country that when a family's barn burned down, the neighbors got together and raised a new one. Here we see a case where a family's roof failed, so the neighbors repaired it (and then some). We don't see this very often in the modern world.

Many of you are probably familiar with the Wiki concept of contributing free work to an online cause. Thousands of nearly anonymous people around the world have gotten together (in a virtual way) to create the WikiPedia, a free online encyclopedia. Thousands of Freepers have assembled to animate an important discussion forum called FreeRepublic. Thousands have geeks have come together to work on Linux and other projects. A bunch of patriots have assembled to patrol our border, as the Minutemen.

I'm thinking this could be generalized into the notion of WikiWork, where people could get together in the online and the real world to do things that should be done but aren't. The Wiki folks have put together a Meta-Wiki, but this still seems focused on online content development rather than real-world activity.

The meme starts here.