The Slice: Haven’t they won the award the past 9,000 years?

Spokane’s Rick Hosmer received an invitation for an event to be held in the Tri-Cities, the Kennewick Man & Woman of the Year banquet.

His first thought was of Kennewick Man, the skeletal prehistoric remains discovered in the ’90s. “I had no idea they had found a Kennewick Woman as well.”

Yes, it turns out she was the one who ran things back then even though she got paid less.

•Picture yourself rolling up a Northwest lifestyle: Bike to Work Week is May 11 through 15 this year. For information, go to www.biketoworkspokane.org or call (509) 869-2949.

The goal is to promote bicycle commuting and increase awareness that it’s not just a few nut jobs who do that.

Last year, about 1,000 riders registered.

•Slice answer: “Speaking as a retired police officer from the West Side, I can tell you there are two main reasons cops retire here, particularly in Stevens and Kootenai counties,” wrote Mack Stanhope, who lives in a tiny town north of Spokane. “We can stretch our pensions, which we would not be able to do in California or the Puget Sound area. Secondly, there is very little crime in the rural areas. Stranger on stranger crime is rare here and thus it is much safer than where we worked.”

•Where people leave notes: “Since I work days and my husband works nights, I leave for work in the morning before he and the kids are awake,” wrote Allison Blankenship. “To make sure a reminder note is seen, I stick it to the remote control. Works every time.”

•What people in Hillyard prefer to be called: “As a lifelong Hillyard resident and the current chair of the Hillyard Neighborhood Council, I’d be surprised if you get any answers other than ‘Hillyardite’ in response to your query,” wrote Luke Tolley.

He was right.

•Misspeaking: Deborah Chan remembers a lector at her church reading a Scripture passage in which someone is described as a “Greek.”

“Only instead, the reader accidentally said ‘But his father was a geek.’ ”

Much laughter ensued.

•New winter sport: The Slice heard from a reader whose 8-year-old grandniece was over visiting from Seattle last week. The kid went out to play, but soon came back inside. It seems our thaw/refreeze cycles had left the snow about as fluffy as granite.

So the kid requested a hammer. Then, equipped with the tool, she went back out and pounded on the snow for a while.

Good times.

•Today’s Slice question: What do you think of bola/bolo ties?