The Slice Christmas Trees Just Waiting For Match With Right Family
There are three Christmas tree lots near the intersection of Sprague and Sullivan in the Spokane Valley.
None of them was all that busy at about 2: 30 on Saturday afternoon.
One lot sat right beneath the Huckleberry’s electronic message sign. If you looked up at just the right moment, it was possible to imagine that the phrase “Free range” pertained to the fragrant fir trees.
An appealing Rottweiler named Cassie helped run the place.
At one of the other lots, a sign said “Montana Christmas Trees.”
A customer was fending off the gentle advances of a salesman by saying no decisions could be made until his wife arrived. “We’ve got to wait till the boss gets here,” he said.
At the third lot, which featured colored lights and a barbed-wire fence, a family of four had made a choice. There was a mom, a dad, a little boy and a little girl. And now they had a tree.
They placed it in the open back of their white El Camino. And the little girl stood over it. She gave it a pat. It was as if to say, “You’ll be OK back here till we get you home.”
Then all four of them loaded into the front seat and they drove off toward Christmas.
OK, it was sort of a trick question: More than 70 readers phoned in guesses about the venue for the 1961 concerts noted in Saturday’s Slice.
The vast majority said the shows featuring the Shamrocks and the Wailers would have been at the Armory or Nat Park.
Nope. Think about it. That would have been too easy.
Only Moses Lake High School teacher Doug Robertson correctly identified the location as Jungert’s Auction House in Clarkston. He wins the Swell Paper mug.
Robertson, 54, lived in Spokane in 1961. And he had a band called Doug Robertson & The Good Guys.
He remembers going down to Jungert’s to see shows on nights when his own band wasn’t booked somewhere.
Today he plays in a group called the Spokane Rockers. They often include a couple of Wailers songs in their performances.
Slice survey: Percentage of babies and toddlers who freaked out about having their picture taken with Santa Saturday morning at the Spokane Valley Mall: 15.
Warm-up questions: Who in the Inland Northwest has the most impressive security clearance? What’s one thing that will never be obtainable at a drive-through? Who’s the richest man in town?
Today’s Slice question: Is hanging Santa in effigy (seen on the South Hill) the best way to protest the commercialization of Christmas?
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo
MEMO: The Slice appears Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Write The Slice at P.O. Box 2160, Spokane, WA 99210; call (509) 459-5470; fax (509) 459-5098. Few things are sadder than the sight of a teenager smoking alone.