I’ve never understood the concept of tying something like cleaning to a season, like spring cleaning. Then again, there was a time in my life when I tied cleaning to moving. It always seemed easier to move than clean my oven, for example.
But the end of year is a different beast, at least if you’re self-employed and your year-end is the calendar’s year-end. It necessitates closing out various accounting and bookkeeping nonsense... or having a very understanding and expensive tax preparer do it for you.
So, having taken advantage of holiday crowds and absent snow to tackle that ugly task, I find myself wanting to catch up on a few other things. Like my inbox. The only way to do that is to amuse you with another instalment of Tales From the Inbox.
Hey Max. I thought it was a rule that column writers had to do a trite piece on New Year’s resolutions. What gives? You babble on about the muni’s Big Moves instead? No resolutions?
-Dissapointed
While I really should deal with this email the next time I clean out my inbox, since it’s just in, I can only guess you’re a recent local, Disappointed, which, by the way, is the proper spelling of your nom de plume. As stated a number of times in early Januarys past, I don’t make resolutions. And even if I did, I probably wouldn’t this year with the apocalyptic potential for, as one writer put it, the “shocking number of Americans who hope to see an aspiring dictator reinstalled in the White House.”
But if it’s any consolation, I resolve, once again, to not make New Year’s resolutions. Happy?
Mr. Maxwell: Your insensitivity and hatred toward religious people is wearing thin. I’m at a loss to understand it. I’ll pray for you.
-A True Believer
Thanks, TB, every prayer helps. Just kidding. But I believe you conflate intolerance for insensitivity. I don’t think I’m insensitive to people who choose to believe in one god or another, although you may prefer I don’t refer to your deity as that Invisible Guy-in-the-Sky. If your religious beliefs provide you with comfort and succour I’m happy for you; certainly my secular beliefs do the same for me.
But if your interpretation of your religion moves you to infringe on, discriminate against and persecute others who don’t share your beliefs, then I’ll call you out. We have too much proof, both in history and in the current battles raging in the world, that religious intolerance—and the belief among combatants that god is on their side—means religion is not a force for good once it ceases to be a personal belief and becomes a political platform for oppression and violence. So I’ll continue to see that kind of intolerance and double down on my own to work against it.
GD, what do you think is going to happen in the U.S. presidential election this year?
-Holding My Breath
Breathe, Holding. I think some old, white man is going to be elected. And I think approximately half the country is going to be happy with the outcome, the other half unhappy, fearful and outraged.
If the oldest white guy gets elected I think the other old white guy will cry foul, claim the election was stolen, pout and rile up his believers enough we may witness an insurrection that’ll make Jan. 6, 2021 look like a picnic.
If the other old, white guy gets elected I think we’ll see long lineups on the south side of our border, not that I believe Canada will be a safe place to hide from the global Armageddon unleashed by the Orange Monster.
I think the best we can hope for is both of them suffer fatal... I probably shouldn’t finish that sentence. In fact, I wish you hadn’t asked that question.
Max, you don’t seem to be a big supporter of the RMOW’s Climate Action Big Moves. Why not?
-Colour Me Green
In a word, Green, it’s because they seem kinda small. But since you asked, there are a lot of things I’d like to see the muni put the boots to.
High on my list is the neighbour who heats their driveway with propane. While they bask in the California sunshine, their driveway basks in propane heat, even though no one uses it most of the time. In fact, the guy who drives the propane truck to fill up the tank probably uses it most.
Propane patio heaters, open doors in freezing temperatures, 20,000-sq.-ft. houses, municipal workers wielding gas-engine landscape tools, and a host of other things consultants would call low-hanging fruit always seem too big for the people in power to deal with. Seems odd, considering they could realize far quicker success with a host of those actions than they’re likely to with their aspirational war on cars.
Sir, I don’t understand the enthusiasm for the municipality’s Housing Action program. I don’t see how it can be anything more than a subsidized boondoggle property owners like myself will end up paying for. But I guess since you live in subsidized housing you’re alright with it.
-Homeowner
Actually, Homeowner, I believe you have it backwards. It’s you who live in subsidized housing. I live in WHA housing. It wasn’t subsidized by you or other Whistler taxpayers. As employee housing, it is, in a sense, subsidized by me, since its increase in value is capped so the next person who owns it will be able to afford it.
That person/family will be Whistler employees. The people who make this resort town work. It is because this place works and visitors have a great time here that your home has shot up in value like it had rockets attached. No employees = no service = dissatisfied visitors = failure. What do you think the value of your home would be if this was a failed resort?
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have a problem subsidizing the increasing value of your home. Happy to do it.
I thought you were going to retire, dude.
-Disappointed
Well, at least your spell-checker works, Disappointed II. Sometimes you plan for one thing and something else happens. If you don’t believe me you should have been on a chairlift in early December talking to people who’d booked a ski holiday thinking they’d be shredding deep powder.
All I can say is there seem to be a lot more moving parts to this retirement thing than I imagined. But stay tuned and don’t give up hope. I’m sure it’ll happen sooner or later. Possibly before the next time I have to clean out my inbox
