[Dottore]

I'm down at my garage today when my neighbour pulls up with his pick up truck full of boxes from the hardware store. He opens his garage, and I see that it is stuffed to the rafters with more of the same boxes.

"WTF?" I ask.

Turns out he's discovered that you can buy copper scouring pads at Home Hardware and Costco for less than the price of copper - and he's hoarding this stuff waiting for the price of copper to rise still further. (Seems it's $4.00 +/- a pound now, and one of these ten-packs from Home Hardware also weighs in at a pound but only costs $2.49 - and sometimes less.)

The things people do. This guy is one of the brightest guys I know, but smokes far too much reefer and has never done a serious days work in his life. In the early '80's he was peripherally implicated in a plot to assassinate Margaret Thatcher and did some time, but since then he's just been cruising. Almost cornered the mustard seed market once and made a bundle.

But copper scouring pads?