The Slice: That’s an invitation to ignore

Ed Clark’s granddaughter, 7-year-old Madeline Johnson, carefully drew a spooky Halloween picture which included a tombstone.

But instead of the usual “R.I.P.” her grave marker said “RSVP.”

That’s either oddly cordial or especially chilling.

You make the call.

•Coyote sightings: Readers told of seeing these animals on golf courses, in residential neighborhoods, near downtown Spokane, in parks, out by the airport, along the river, crossing busy streets, on hiking trails, in parking lots and just about everywhere else you could imagine.

It would seem that they’re pretty smart.

So be on the lookout Friday night, in case a candy-craving coyote shows up at your door pretending to be a little kid in a costume.

•Get out the vote: Spokane’s Roger Stephens recently received a campaign mailing from political candidate Don Couch.

Nothing really unusual about that. Except that Couch is running for a seat on the Maui County Council. In Hawaii.

The correctly addressed flier has Stephens stumped.

“I was stationed in Hawaii in the ’60s but haven’t been back since,” he wrote.

Is there another Roger Stephens in a parallel universe? “If so, I want to live that other Roger’s life in Maui,” said Stephens.

•Mixed messages: Dwight Hume saw something that struck him as tellingly symbolic of one college football team’s fortunes.

“I came upon a disabled STA bus today with its front sign clearly indicating ‘Out of Service’ but the side window sign was still flashing in bright yellow letters ‘Go Cougs!’ ”

•The other Mr. Darcy: “Whenever we have orphan calves (usually two or three per calving season), we name the ones we have to bottle feed,” wrote Cheney area rancher Genny McKinley. “Each year we have a theme.”

Those have included Mexican foods, Seattle Mariners, candy bars, Snow White’s seven dwarfs, and characters from “Peanuts,” “Pride and Prejudice,” and “The Lord of the Rings.”

•Actually, this was explained in the article: Spokane Valley’s Julie Lehman saw a headline atop a news brief earlier this week that read, “Elk man injured in two-vehicle crash.”

She had questions.

“Who or what is Elk Man? Should we fear him? Does he have hands or hooves? Maybe that has something to do with the accident.”

•Today’s Slice question: What would Spokane be like today if the Cuban Missile Crisis had led to a nuclear war?