Roses & Thorns: Not cool, cyclists, not cool; but that Yeti on Shadow Mountain is cool (Aug. 6, 2022)

Thorns go the roughly 100 cyclists who failed to yield to a sheriff’s patrol vehicle that was en route to the scene of a bicycle crash on Maroon Creek Road last month.

According to the account of the responding deputy, one cyclist lambasted him on the grounds that she believed she had the right of way. Other riders were oblivious to the vehicle’s urgency and didn’t flinch. The vehicle’s siren wasn’t blaring — the deputy didn’t want to alarm the cyclists — but it’s emergency lights were activated. If cyclists weren’t aware of the emergency patrol vehicle, that’s a problem because they weren’t paying attention and shouldn’t be on the road. If they just didn’t care, that’s an even bigger problem for their pastor, therapist or spiritual counselor to address. Or maybe it was both. Regardless, thorns all around for such cavalier behavior in regards to public safety.

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Thorns to each and every restaurant and bar that has added automatic gratuity to their bills. Hotel Jerome’s F&B operations, namely the J Bar, is the latest one to add an automatic 22% tip onto the ticket. They say it’s due to the economic fallout of COVID-19 that restaurants and their workers have suffered from.

Many of us locals have suffered from the pandemic too (real estate agents and luxury retailers excluded), and now with higher menu prices most average Aspenites can’t even go out for lunch or dinner. So to add more insult to injury, you are making us pay more in tips for what has become crappier service.

“To insure proper service“ is what a TIP stands for. Now there is no incentive at all to give stellar service because waitresses and waiters are guaranteed an above average tip.

It’s a gross representation of entitlement. How about these restaurants, which from our vantage point have been rocking it for over year, pay their employees more to shore up the difference instead passing their costs onto the customers?

Be sure to check with your server before you decide to tip, because often they aren’t even disclosing the policy change and as a result they are getting doubled tipped.

Pretty soon the peasants are going to revolt if local restaurants keep it up.

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A combination of roses and thorns for residents of Missouri Heights who opposed the Ascendigo Autism Services complex proposal.

The roses are for people who got involved and spoke up during the Garfield County commissioners’ review process. Anytime anybody opposes something, they get accused of being NIMBY’s. Well, who isn’t concerned about what gets built in their backyard? We don’t see that as a valid criticism.

However, we’re also giving out thorns for the ironic use of the rally cry “Keep Missouri Heights Rural.” Seriously? What about all those McMansions getting built by people who cannot or will not build in Aspen? If we really want to Keep Missouri Heights Rural, we should scrape any house built after, say, 1999 and stop the real estate development frenzy occurring up there.

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A thorn to the state agency lying to us about our roads. While as locals we are excited to have less Glenwood Canyon detour traffic in town and on Independence Pass, we’re dismayed that the Colorado Department of Transportation is lying to the public about the true status of Highway 82.

The agency stated Wednesday that Highway 82 over the pass was closed. It wasn’t.

That caused more confusion, as exampled by the incorrect messaging sent about the pass Wednesday. Perhaps they should adjust their labeling on their cotrip.org site and add a “warning” or “not advised” category, but the sleight of hand trick is not how we want our government to be treating us.

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Roses to the organizers of the Heritage Fire event last weekend in Snowmass Village. The rain Saturday afternoon could not douse the energy and spirit that the chefs brought cooking over an open fire. And there was plenty of good times and good spirit among the nearly 800 people who made their way to the lawn next to the Village Express.

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Roses to the Aspen post office for not accepting credit cards. We’d give them thorns, but we imagine their own unchecked mailbox is overflowing with them.

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Roses to whomever installed the “Yeti” on Shadow Mountain. It gives people something to talk about other than the smoke, mudslides, the delta variant, closed roads, and downtown streets jammed with motorists and pedestrians. How about some more Yeti appearances elsewhere? We’ll happily supply corsages for the guests of honor.