The new Farmers’ Almanac says that this is going to be a bitter winter across the Prairies and around the Great Lakes. I imagine that it will be even worse farther north, where many of our snowbirds happily reside in B.C., Alberta, Manitoba, Ontario and Quebec. That’s the bad news!
I know, I forgot Saskatchewan and the Atlantic provinces. Does anyone actually live in northern Saskatchewan during the winter? If so, please send me a picture or two. I used to live in Nova Scotia, many years ago, and I know what winters are like there. They are all bitter, with a biting wind off the ocean that will chill your bones! I do not want to be too negative here, because the Atlantic Provinces are probably the best place in the world to visit, or even live, during their wonderful spring, summer and fall seasons.
The good news, of course, is that most of us are going to escape to much warmer places such as California, Nevada, Florida, Texas, Mexico, Spain, Italy and other parts around the Mediterranean and even farther south. Some of us will even migrate to the Southern Hemisphere where it is actually summer, in the middle of winter here in Canada. Panama, Uruguay, Argentina, Australia, New Zealand and other locales can be wonderful destinations to explore or to just relax in the warm sunshine.
Many news sources are saying that outbound travel will be down this year, but I don’t believe a word of it. As most of you know, we have just completed our Early Bird travel insurance sales season. Are sales down? No, they are up!Several hundred newclients purchased our Early Bird package over last year. Sure, some of them were kicked off of their credit card coverage when they turned 65 and several came to us from other companies that cut them off at age 70, 75 or80. But that is all fairly normal; this year, there are just more of them. It is too bad that these snowbirds did not start buying from Medipac eight years ago; then, they would have enjoyed an additional 8% off of their rates now. That is on top of our 10% claim-free discount(if you qualify, of course).
We have kept our excellent rates unchanged for the Early Bird season, but were forced to increase them marginally for the upcoming season. A small (but large to some) increase of 2-3% will apply to all new policies. All of the governments are putting the boots to we retired people because there are just so many of us, and we are growing in number every year. We are easy pickings for their disgusting policies. It is theft of our medical benefits, theft of our pension benefits and theft of our social benefits− all of which we have paid for many times over. Their abuse, and breach, of the Canada Health Act is just a small thing, but it will affect us all in the long run.
An even worse government policy is to debase our dollar. When we gave the government our one dollar in 1965 to invest and save for us, for our retirement, it would buy five loaves of bread or four quarts of milk. Do you remember? Instead they, of course, spent all of the money. When they finally, and reluctantly, give that one dollar back to us in 2019, it will not even buy one-half a loaf of bread…and milk? It will only buy onecup of milk. That is 16 times less (approximately) than what we gave them. These are numbers straight out of the Canadian Bureau of Statistics. “The Horror,” as they said in the movie Apocalypse Now.
Now a short “holier than thou” speech for our smokers and vapers and grass inhalers. It has been proven over and over again that this stuff kills you. We see it every day in the hospitals, where we are trying to make you healthy again. Some people are in hospital because they smoke, and others are in much more trouble than they should be, because they smoke.
I did too, for almost 50 years. What an idiot I was. I gave up at least 50 times, of course, but was always drawn back by the sirens of stress and the false sense of relaxation and social interaction. Ninety per cent of us smoked when we were young, but it is long past time to get the monkey off your back. Go to a laser (stop smoking) clinic and get lasered. They shine a light on you and your massive cravings disappear – for about four weeks. Then get a booster laser and you are off cigarettes for good. It works! I have no idea how or why, but it sure “cured” me. There is only one side-effect – you get to save about $100 a week. The cost of this is $100 for the entire session and they will usually give you a free booster when you need it. You will save that amount in ONE week, since you don’t have to buy cigarettes anymore.
It is too late, you say – wrong, it is not too late. Your lungs start to heal immediately. Your doctor could prescribe you some Ventolin and this will dramatically improve your lungs and speed the healing process. One clinical test showed that lungs were 95% normal in two years. That’s amazing and worth your effort. So, for our new season, we have reduced the waiting time for best insurance rates from three years to two years for smoking. You can save 20% by giving up smoking, every year! If you bought Early Bird and paid the smoker surcharge, and have been off cigarettes for two years, we will give you your 20% back.
We can beat this stupid habit and, although it is a long shot, we may even be able to beat these governments. Please write, e-mail, show up on their doorstep or otherwise contact your MPs and MPPs and scream bloody blue murder. The Canada Health Act is your law− obey it! I recommend requesting a minimum $1,200 per day in hospital for any reason…and that is cheap.
Labour Day is past and you can feel the chill in the air. I am excited. I am ready to head South. I can hardly wait to see my friends again. What a wonderful life we lead!