“I gotta admit, climate change would have certain advantages,” said Cliff Murray the other morning as he took off his winter coat and gloves at  Mabel’s Grill and blew on his hands to warm them up.
    “Yeah, I hate getting on my heavy clothes to come to work these mornings – in the dark, no less,” said Molly Whiteside as she delivered menus to the guys at the table.
    “Funny how quickly we forget what a great Fall we had – lots of sun and temperatures way above normal,” said Dave Winston, as he perused the menu. “If we start getting all Falls like that so I can get my corn off I don’t mind climate change at all.”
    “Oh all this talk about climate change,” George Mackenzie scoffed, slapping down his menu. “Every year is different from the year before and always has been!”
    “I can see the head of the United Nations saying, at that big conference lately, we had to do more to stop climate change. Didn’t make much impression on you,” Molly said.
    “What about the leaders of some of the island nations saying they were worried their countries would be flooded out by rising sea levels if the ice in the Arctic and Antarctic kept melting?” Dave wondered.
    “First of all, I’ll believe it when I see it,” said George, “then if it did happen they can always move to some place that doesn’t flood.”
    “Nice for you to say, living high and dry in Ontario,” sighed Cliff.
    “Look, the weather has always been changeable,” George said. “I remember one year when I was a kid my parents got me a new toboggan for Christmas but we couldn’t use it because there was no snow at Christmas time that year.”
    “Christmas is the one time of the year when people like to have snow,” said Dave. “My uncle and his family fly home from their Florida vacation just so they can have a white Christmas, then they fly back.”
    “Not mentioning how much the gas burned by their plane added to global warming and lowered the chance of a white Christmas,” grumbled Cliff.
    “Yeah, well, they save money by buying their Christmas gifts for their grandchildren in Florida where the taxes aren’t so high,” said Dave.
    “Oh that’ll make all the difference,” Cliff said sourly.
    “People are so much richer than when I was a kid,” said George. “Back then, we’d get one or two gifts and that would be it.”
    “Huh!” grunted Molly, “my sister and her husband came home for Christmas last year and they had to make three trips from the car to bring in all the presents. They had enough presents to spread over the entire 12 days of Christmas! It took them kids three hours on Christmas morning to open them all!”
    “Well maybe people will cut back a bit on Christmas spending this year,” said Dave. “I mean people sure are complaining that their cost of food and fuel is up.”
    “At least that would help climate change, especially if people don’t buy stuff made in China,” Cliff said.
    “Huh, I’ll bet if they make any cutbacks it’ll be on food, not presents,” grumbled George. “The one good thing is that vegetarian food is even more expensive than meat!”
    “I wonder if the high price of food will lead to a change in the Christmas music we sing,” wondered Dave. “I mean maybe people don’t sing about chestnuts roasting on an open fire if chestnuts get too expensive.”
    “And people won’t be able to sing about a White Christmas if we don’t get snow anymore,” said Cliff.
    “Speaking of Christmas songs,” said Molly, “I heard on the TV the other day that Mariah Carey has made $72 million from the song ‘All I Want for Christmas is You’. Imagine that!”
    “Good grief, that would be about $100 million in Canada,” said Cliff.
    “Huh,” said George, “I guess she can afford to buy whatever Christmas presents she wants.” ◊