Thought you would enjoy a letter from a reader — something off the beaten path. In Impromptus today, I have a note on the pyramids. The reason: It is now known, apparently, that the pyramids were not built by slave labor, but by free labor — which makes me feel better about the whole pyramid experience, somehow. You? Anyway, here’s that letter:
My father is an Assyriologist. One of the many joys in his life is that his region of the ancient world did not produce the pyramids. It’s the Egyptologists who have to deal with the crazies, while he is free to sit unnoticed in his corner reading cuneiform tablets. Nobody thinks that it took aliens to invent real-estate taxes and writing.
I told you it was off the beaten path . . .
P.S. If you’re feeling grumpy about your real-estate taxes, you know whom to blame.