The Slice: Don’t blame the Ballingers for our mistakes

TODAY THE SLICE salutes Jay Ballinger and his family.

The Ballingers have a phone number that is close to a customer service number here at the newspaper. They occasionally get calls from readers who want to stop delivery during a vacation or want to report that their paper hadn’t arrived that morning.

It is at such moments that the Ballingers have two choices.

1.) They can have some fun at the newspaper’s expense.

You know, “Well, have you looked on the roof?”

Or, “Yeah, I think the guy on that route called in drunk. Whaddya want ME to do about it?”

2.) They can direct callers to the correct number.

The Ballingers, S-R subscribers themselves, have elected to go with the second option.

“Sometimes we have to explain several times what these folks need to do and occasionally we get someone who thinks we are nuts and hangs up on us,” said Jay Ballinger, a regional sales manager for a company that makes fuel additives. “Usually, however, people are pleasant and grateful for the tip.”

And speaking of gratitude, I’m naming the Ballingers my readers of the month and will be sending a token of appreciation.

“Rooting around: Some people have the misguided notion that you actually have to care about sports to be interested in the outcome of athletic contests.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

As The Slice has noted a time or two, rooting against the favorite teams of people you can’t stand can be fun and entertaining (if psychologically suspect).

But once in a while this comes into play when you’re not even aware.

On Monday, in Hawaii, the GU men’s basketball team beat Maryland. Anybody who cares knew that Monday afternoon.

But then, on Tuesday morning, came reports that syndicated columnist Robert Novak is a huge Maryland fan and had traveled to the islands to watch his beloved Terrapins get thumped by Gonzaga. This made the news because apparently he got in a scuffle on the plane.

I never read Novak’s column, wouldn’t even know where to find it. But I’ve seen enough snippets of his arrogant gasbagging on TV to feel good about saying the following:

Nice going, Zags.

“Slice answer: Tina Wynecoop weighed in on the best/worst things about Spokane International Airport. Hers was a different perspective.

“I like the cottonwood tree stands and copses punctuating the undeveloped land around the airport,” she wrote. “They provide perches for raptors and serve as indicators of vital wetlands. The simple, natural beauty of these stands gives me pleasure coupled with dread that gradually they are being replaced with buildings and landscaping.”

“Today’s Slice questions: Real tree or fake? Why?