The Slice: The Slice: Outside voice on fruit gives movie date zest

We’ll get to my wife’s version of the event in just a moment.

But first, I want to state something for the record. Just because I am a trained, professional observer, I don’t want you to automatically take my side in this. Please do not judge harshly my wife’s amateurish recollections of what I am about to describe.

OK, here’s what happened.

Last Saturday afternoon, we had gone to see “Gravity” at the Airway Heights cineplex. In 3-D.

I stepped up to the window to buy our tickets. A teenage girl sat on the other side of the glass.

I told her what movie we wanted to see. And because in the past that theater has offered a dollar-off discount for people over 55, I told the girl that we both qualified.

While I waited for the ticket-seller to complete the transaction, I got to thinking about smoothies we have been making at home with a new blender. And I turned to my wife and said, “We need to get some fruit.”

No big deal, right? Well, here’s the thing.

My wife insists that this is how it went down.

I approached the ticket window and, speaking into the shiny metal microphone, said: “Two for ‘Gravity.’ We’re both over 55 and need some fruit.”

I guess my wife’s point was that the girl behind the glass didn’t really need to hear about our nutritional/digestive requirements. Or perhaps my wife’s opinion was that repartee of such quality could have been kept to myself.

In any event, the picture she painted of me was of a Homer Simpson-like guy who is pretty much incapable of realizing when he is verbally expressing a thought that might better have been kept to himself. D’oh!

I guess we’ll never really know whose recollections are more accurate. By the time you get to the point where you qualify for a discount at the movies, your memory has started to go.

But we agreed that “Gravity” was pretty engrossing.

Today’s Slice question: In Spokane County, a summons to jury duty comes with paperwork that includes this statement: “Please be advised that Washington law recognizes no exemptions on the sole basis of profession.”

So, if you were to guess, people in what professions created the need for that declaration?