The Slice: Check out the view

Take a long walk around here and you are almost guaranteed to see … Trees bursting with blooms, fast-food litter, cats secretly humming the theme from those old National Geographic specials, crows, condoms, chained dogs, dandelion incursions, and at least one parked car that had a window smashed overnight by thieves/vandals.

•Slice answers (labeling your lifestyle): “DeepRut.” — Anne Gehr

“Wobbly.” — Caye Wademan

•Things Spokane business people say when meeting the person with whom they are to have lunch: 1. “Hey, big guy.” 2. “Thought you got lost.” 3. “Just a sec. That’s my cell. Better get it.” 4. “Are you Sharon?”

•Loony tunes: My failed bird-silencing experiment with the red-tailed hawk recording didn’t amount to much (last Sunday’s Slice). But others have successfully connected with our feathered friends.

Spokane’s Joanne Hogan was at a big lake in northern Minnesota. She had purchased a stuffed-toy loon that came equipped with the recorded call of a real one.

“One warm, still evening I took my loon out to the end of the dock and played it,” wrote Hogan.

A loon from across the bay answered.

“I was thrilled,” said Hogan. “I played it again, and the loon answered back … It made my day that I had talked to a loon.”

•Multiple choice: In your family, dinner planning starts …

A) That morning. B) About five minutes before eating. C) When drawing up the weekly master plan. D) In the car on the way home. E) During commercials. F) After pulling up to the intercom. G) After the antihistamines kick in. H) Other.

•Facts of life: A few years ago, Scott Jacob’s young stepson was puzzled by something he saw on the cover of a women’s magazine. So the boy asked his grandmother what it meant to be “Good in bed.”

Thinking fast, she said it meant that the person goes to sleep right away.

The little boy had his doubts about that explanation. But the thing he couldn’t realize is that, if he lives long enough, there will come a day when his grandma’s answer will be the truth.

•A brief sampling of reactions to KXLY’s Karina Shagren: “I hear no dialogue when I’m watching those lips,” wrote L.S. of Spokane. “They are a separate entity.”

“She drives me nuts,” wrote Mary Myhre of Coeur d’Alene.

•Warm-up question: What’s the most interesting place you have tripped and fallen?

•Today’s Slice question: You know how the lead singers for country and rock bands like to shout “Helloooo, Spokane” from the stage? Sure. Well, what if there were concert venues in small towns and these bands played there. Which would you most like to hear?

A) “Helloooo, Tumtum.” B) “Helloooo, Athol.” C) “Helloooo, Schrag.” D) “Helloooo, Penawawa.” E) “Helloooo, Tensed.” F) “Helloooo, Washtucna.” G) Other.