{"id":2452996,"date":"2020-01-08T05:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-01-08T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/?p=318798"},"modified":"2020-01-08T05:00:00","modified_gmt":"2020-01-08T12:00:00","slug":"roger-marolt-it-is-as-bad-as-it-feels-but-not-as-bad-as-you-think","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/roger-marolt-it-is-as-bad-as-it-feels-but-not-as-bad-as-you-think\/","title":{"rendered":"Roger Marolt: It is as bad as it feels, but not as bad as you think"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure class=\"wp-block-image p402_hide\">\n<div class=\"caption-container\"> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"457\" height=\"620\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2019\/11\/MaroltRoger-CMNM-mug1.jpg\" class=\"attachment-large size-large wp-post-image\" alt srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2019\/11\/MaroltRoger-CMNM-mug1.jpg 457w, https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2019\/11\/MaroltRoger-CMNM-mug1-221x300.jpg 221w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 457px) 100vw, 457px\"><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText DropCap\">Years ago, when I was young enough so that I\u2019ve forgotten most details of that time \u2014 but not so young that I looked forward to a good head cold because it meant a few days off from school \u2014 I read or heard that when your body fights off a potent virus, it creates a substance in your system that, on top of fighting the bug that has made base camp in your nasal passages, also destroys cancer cells in your body.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">I don\u2019t know if this is true. I have never heard anything else about it and I don\u2019t dare Google it because the idea of it still gives me a boost when I come down with a case of the crud.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">I am not talking about getting you through flu season here, though. Well, actually, if this interferon anecdote helps you through the aches and pains of fever, congestion and coughing, I will be overjoyed that it did so. But what I really want to do is parallel this narrative to dealing with the craziness that is our busy times of year in a resort town, recently past, present, and yet to come. I firmly believe that Presidents\u2019 Day should not cause anyone to consider moving to another part of the world where there are no special days set aside to celebrate its dictators, as everyday is Dictator Day in these countries, so there is, therefore, no reason for long weekend vacations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Last week, an Aspen politician posted something somewhere in cyberspace about tourists. I am being purposefully vague about the delivery of his message, if that is even what it was, because I am not an expert in the area of social media. I read about it in the newspaper which means that, not only did crap hit the fan, it was flung on the wall, slid off and overflowed the digital gutter that is always sloped so that its subject matter splatters to the greatest negative effect, resulting in the messiest clean up possible.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">I will paraphrase what he said: \u2018Town is packed beyond capacity, driving is frustrating, parking impossible, grocery shopping unadvisable, and a lot of people who come here during the holidays are beyond unbearable. Life stinks!\u2019<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Admit it. You had these same \u201cnormal\u201d thoughts at least once during the 12 Days of Christmas and had about your fill of the 10 lords a leaping for the nine ladies dancing to the point where you couldn\u2019t wait for the partridge to get south already. I know I did.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">During a time like this, the thing I think works better than whiskey and certainly better than an adult eggnog several days past its expiration date is to know, without a doubt, that lots of good comes from the throngs of the upper-middle class and higher descending upon us over these two weeks of winter holidays, along with Fourth of July weekend, Labor Day and X Games.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Please excuse me as I\u2019m still recovering from the melee that I am talking about here, but I didn\u2019t have time to confirm this as a fact: I have heard for many years from many sources that many retail stores and restaurants make almost half of their profits for the year during the six busiest weekends of the year. If this is true, then hotels and other local ancillary businesses probably have their fiscal years made or broken during these times, too.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">When you think about this, it is great news. Let\u2019s suppose all six of these big weekends are long weekends. This would amount to less than one full month of tolerating our resort bursting at the seams in order to produce an outsized portion of the profits that allow us to live here in relative bliss for the other 11 months of the year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Maybe I\u2019m weird \u2014 actually, I think that has been confirmed \u2014 but I think that is a great trade off.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">This is only another perspective that proves what we all know and what real estate prices confirm: Aspen-Snowmass is a great place to live. That said, I think it is OK to shove perspective to the side and get frustrated when you drive through downtown Aspen at 6 o\u2019clock on Christmas Eve because you need to pick up your Tamiflu prescription while your fever rages and there is no place to park. Don\u2019t sweat it, that\u2019s normal. But, it\u2019s also foolish to vent about it on social media, especially if you are an elected official.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText Tagline\">Roger Marolt quit looking for a vaccination against busy times as soon as his immunity kicked in. Email him at <a href=\"mailto:roger@maroltllp.com\">roger@maroltllp.com<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/snowmass\/roger-marolt-it-is-as-bad-as-it-feels-but-not-as-bad-as-you-think\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Years ago, when I was young enough so that I\u2019ve forgotten most details of that time \u2014 but not so young that I looked forward to a good head cold because it meant a few days off from school \u2014 I read or heard that when your body fights off a potent virus, it creates [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2452996","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-18 22:00:19","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley&#039;s Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2452996","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2452996"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2452996\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2452996"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2452996"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2452996"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}