Huckleberries: Signature-gathering can be an arresting task

Kootenai County’s deputies regularly respond to the Hayden Wal-Mart and nearby Prairie Shopping Center businesses to roust transients and panhandlers. But not so much to the Hayden Library, farther north along Government Way. Last Monday, however, Deputy Dawgs fielded a call about an “aggressive loiterer” in the Hayden Library lot. Sky Adams, of Hayden, doesn’t fit your typical description of a loiterer, transient or panhandler. He was simply collecting signatures for Americans Elect, a group that plans to choose candidates and nominate an unaffiliated presidential ticket via online caucus this spring. About 2.5 million have signed petitions in an effort to put the future ticket on the ballot in all 50 states. Sky had collected 67 signatures in four hours in the wind and cold Monday before patrons complained and library workers asked him to leave. He refused to do so – until deputies arrived. Sky was warned he’d be arrested if he returned. Unbowed, Sky is now angling to be elected as an online delegate for the Americans Elect presidential convention. Oh to be young and resilient.

Eating for baby

Reporter Kelsey Saintz of Kellogg’s Shoshone News-Press has chronicled her advancing pregnancy on Facebook and in her blog, This Is Not A Fairy Tale. Last week, Kelsey wrote about a grocery clerk in the Silver Valley who is aware of her “strange pregnancy eating habits.” On Tuesday, the clerk asked, “Are those your four main food groups?” And Kelsey responded: “Avocados, milk, sweets and anything microwaveable? Yes. Yes, they are” … Opinion Editor Kevin Richert of the Idaho Statesman was among the many prognosticators including yours truly who ate crow after Mitt Romney – not Ron Paul – swept to easy victory in the Idaho caucus election last week. Sez Kevin, with a mouthful of black feathers: “Don’t come to me next week looking for help filling out your brackets. You don’t want it.” Bingo.

Huckleberries

Poet’s Corner: “Alone by the phone/all day she will sit,/still hoping to hear/from Rick, Ron or Mitt” – The Bard of Sherman Avenue (“After they stop calling her”) … Don’t worry about that guy you may have seen siphoning gas from a vehicle at Second and Garden in Coeur d’Alene on Thursday morning. He didn’t want his ex to use the gas he bought. No hard feelings there … Quotable Quote: “Why would men stroll if they have a cycle? I don’t get it” – Taryn Thompson, of Twin Lakes area, repeating what son Bailey told her re: a menstrual cycle …  Sounded like the 911 dispatcher said that guy in a Nissan on I-90 at Spokane Street in Post Falls on Thursday was driving “erotically.” The mind races … After a weekend in the Kootenai County Jail, a guy asked for his vehicle from the Body by Scotty impound yard at Post Falls on Tuesday. But he had two problems. He was driving without privileges. And he was drunk again. Do not pass go.

Parting shot

Republican stalwart Linda Cook had this to say of her Kootenai County GOP party’s far/farther/farthest drift to the right: “Many of us who used to be categorized as right-wing knee-jerk wackos are now being called moderate sell-outs, and the irony is our positions have not changed. We still prefer personal responsibility and limited government, we just might not think everyone should have to trade in silver coinage. That doesn’t make us Democrats but neither do we preach that Dems are Satan’s spawn.”