In the age of Twitter, reader boards still bring a smile

Reader boards forced people to write short, pithy messages before Twitter was invented. Low-tech and made of thick plastic, they don’t show the temperature or how the stock market is doing, they just tell it like it is, and sometimes they make you chuckle.

“Only dead fish go with the stream,” at Golden Rule Brakes on North Monroe Street.

“Home: Where I can look ugly and enjoy it,” at ABC Mini Storage in Airway Heights.

Dallas Low, the owner of Golden Rule Brakes, comes up with new inspirational messages or puns every Monday at his three shops.

Low said the funny reader boards were his dad’s idea about 20 years ago, and they have become a big part of Golden Rule Brakes’ identity.

The signs leave 60 characters, including spaces, that Low can use to craft his message. On Twitter, he would have more than twice that: 140 characters.

“I never even thought of that,” Low said, laughing. “The limited space forces you to be concise; that’s really what I like.”

The sayings may be original or gleaned from quote books, magazines and online.

Low said a good message offers a different angle on something and is thought-provoking. “A penny saved is a penny earned” doesn’t cut it.

“No one is going to think about that,” Low said, adding that he rarely uses his reader boards for advertising.

Angela Miller, site manager at ABC Mini Storage in Spokane Valley, compiles many of the messages for that business’s popular reader board north of Interstate 90.

She’s got only 56 characters in which to be creative.

“We put stuff up there that makes people think,” Miller said. “Stuff like, ‘Why do noses run and feet smell?’ ”

At Garland Auto Service, Kelley Arnold is in charge of a reader board well-known for its jokes.

Last week, it read: “Soldiers who survived mustard gas & pepper spray are seasoned vets.”

Arnold’s father and the owner of the shop, Roger Kimmet, has the last say on the messages, but Arnold said she’s also somewhat constrained by her other job.

“I’m the bookkeeper at church,” she said. “That kind of keeps me in line.”

They’ve updated the sign at least once a month for the last 28 years and are at a point where they may be repeating old material.

“Not that it really matters, if it’s that long ago,” Arnold said.

Jokes are popular at Garland Auto. Like, “I asked my wife: Boxers or briefs? She said: Depends.”

Kimmet keeps a file folder full of material and said lots of people look at the sign and comment on it.

“They know we are the shop with the funny sign,” he said. The mechanics there joke that their suggestions are too salty to make it on the board.

“We have so much fun with it,” Arnold said. “We just want to make you laugh.”

No politics or religion

At Golden Rule Brakes, customers often suggest new sayings for the signs. Sometimes people stop in with treats for the mechanics.

“We even got flowers for the sign one time,” said Low, the owner. “And people take pictures of it all the time.”

He veers away from politics or anything too controversial, including religion.

“I’m a Christian, and I don’t want to apologize for putting a Bible message up there,” Low said. “But we rarely do that, and we never do politics.”

When people are occasionally offended, Low tries to calm them down, explaining it’s just humor.

Sometimes that works.

A sign reading, “If attacked by a mob of clowns go for the juggler,” upset a local juggler, who said the message didn’t follow the Golden Rule.

“We all thought it was funny, but she was very offended,” Low said.

Miller, at ABC Mini Storage, also refrains from politics and religion, but like Low, she has occasionally offended people.

“We had a sign that read ‘dyslexics untie’ that didn’t go over very well,” Miller said. “And we really don’t want to offend people. That’s never what we want to do.”

Spelling police are on the beat

At Valley Glass, owner Cory Romano is in charge of the sign that faces busy Pines Road, just south of Sprague Avenue.

Last week’s “Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is not putting it in fruit salad” got a lot of good feedback, Romano said.

The sign at Valley Glass is large, leaving more room to be creative, but Romano has only gotten into a little bit of trouble once.

“It was something about why women couldn’t just put the seat up so men don’t have to do it,” Romano said. “One woman didn’t like that – but all of us here thought it was pretty funny.”

Romano finds inspiration in magazines and online and among his friends.

“Friends send me quotes all the time, and I can tell right away if it’s too long for the sign,” Romano said. His sign has seasons: In summer, it’s mostly funny, and toward the end of the year it’s expressions of thanks.

“In the beginning of the year we try to be inspirational; everyone needs a little lift in early January,” Romano said.

Garland Auto’s Arnold said she finds inspiration in magazines, books and online. She’s a big fan of the Facebook page Spokane Memes, which has more than 25,000 followers.

“Sometimes I use some of their stuff,” Arnold said, “because they are just so funny.”

Low said Golden Rule Brakes had a friendly sharing competition going on with a furniture store years ago.

“He’d steal our sign and post the same thing,” Low said. “Sometimes, we’d do it back. It was all in good fun.”

Most of Low’s inspiration comes from the Internet, Facebook and books full of quotes.

But the spelling and grammar police are quick and merciless.

“Oh my goodness, if we misspell something or put a comma wrong, we hear about it right away,” Arnold said.

Low said any mistakes on his signs rarely make it for 24 hours before the phone begins to ring.

Miller had a couple of signs that were completely misunderstood.

ABC Mini Storage hosts a large garage sale once a year, which is perhaps why a sign reading “Guitar for sale; no strings attached” got the feedback it did.

“People called and wanted to buy the guitar,” Miller said. “The problem was, there was no guitar.”

Miller said she wished people would stop taking themselves so seriously.

“You have to have a sense of humor,” Miller said, “or you are just going to be miserable all your life.”