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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Hard to avoid bombs in public

D.F. Oliveria Staff writer

At City Beach last week, Family Phil was enjoying a swim with his daughter while his wife and son played in the sand. Perfect tranquility on the north shore? Yeah, until three foul-mouthed midteen boys started yelling and screaming in the water, about 50 yards out. Then, two of them started dropping F-bombs and S-bombs at the top of their lungs. They continued a comically long time, Family Phil commented on Huckleberries Online. Mebbe 10 to 15 minutes. Phil kept waiting for someone nearer the punks to tell them to pipe down. But no one did. Finally, the trio returned to shore, where Mrs. Family Phil was waiting with arms crossed and an evil eye. She followed them up the bank to the road, hoping to talk to their parents. But they continued on toward home in the Fort Grounds. “Apparently, they were locals,” mused Phil. However, the story doesn’t end there. On the following day, Phil headed to the Boulder Beach Water Park at Silverwood, thinking: “This will be more pleasant on my ears.” No sooner had he and his family dipped their toes in the water, than two teen cretins started flinging the F-bomb and worse. Sighed Phil: “All I can do is teach my kids not to use these words, because it seems impossible to keep them from hearing them wherever we go.” The parents of these brats must be so proud. Or mebbe they’re just as bad.

Bear with TUBOB

Berry Picker TUBOB, a Spokane Valley adventurer whose family has a cabin on Twin Lakes, admitted on his blog, The Unbearable Bobness of Being, recently that he’s afraid of bears and therefore nervous about a camping trip planned at Upper Priest Lake next week. Upper Priest, for you newcomers, is considered home turf for black bear and grizzlies. So, TUBOB spent some time online studying the quirks of the two types of bear. And decided it’s important to tell them apart “particularly late at night in your dark tent when they are shredding it about you and grabbing you in your sleeping bag and dragging you out cuz here’s the thing: If it’s a black bear do NOT play dead because it will eat you. Fight back.” And if it’s a grizzly? Again, TUBOB: “Do NOT fight back because it will bite your head off. Play dead.” Got that? Now, all you need is a copy of the late Jack Olsen’s “Night of the Grizzlies” and you’re set to go camping at Upper Priest or Glacier Park. Good luck.

Huckleberries

Look up “the show must go on” in the dictionary, and you’ll find a photo of local singer Ruth Pratt, who soldiered on with a half dozen or so Coeur d’Alene Big Band musicians at Riverstone Park Thursday – despite the mother of all windstorms that was threatening to blow them into the man-made lake. The wind was so mighty that the musicians jammed because they couldn’t use their music sheets or stands … KJRB (790 AM) newscaster Dick Haugen tells Huckleberries that Fox News did a segment Monday re: the local mother accused of abusive spanking at the Fourth of July Parade. And, of course, put Coeur d’Alene in – Iowa … At 4:30 p.m. last Monday, according to the Whitman County Gazette, the Sheriff’s Office received a report of possible domestic violence in Oakesdale, Wash. A neighbor reported hearing a woman scream at a nearby residence. She had been, too – at her computer.

Parting shot

Joee Alves was enjoying some quality time in a boat on Fernan Lake with 11-year-old daughter, Justine, when he heard a cry for help in the gathering darkness Sunday evening. A few moments later, they spotted something in the water near the Fernan docks. It was a fisherman in one of those inner tube thingies with the rubber legs on the bottom – a blind fisherman. Someone had dropped him off to fish. And the wind had pushed him from the safety of the shore into deeper water. He was in danger of being swamped when Joee arrived to guide him back to shore. Joee was still shaking his head later when he explained to galpal Heidi Weaver what happened. You probably are, too.