The Slice: We could all start saying this

So I was riding my bike to work Thursday morning when I heard the perfect slogan for Spokane.

It was early. I was rolling through a quiet neighborhood when a group of four or six younger cyclists approached from behind and whooshed past. As they went by me, one called out “You’re welcome to join us.”

I thanked him but said I needed to get downtown. Still, the moment left me with a buoyant feeling. And I thought about what that guy had said.

“You’re welcome to join us.”

Isn’t that a wonderful offer? What powerful, friendly words. I cannot imagine a context where hearing that would not lift your spirits.

I’ve heard worse ideas for our city’s motto.

Next time, I just might join them. Getting to work could wait. I wonder if I could keep up.

Just chill: Annie Shiffer has enjoyed the stories about various items put in the freezer. They remind her of her dear, departed parents.

She shared a freezer story of her own.

“When I was growing up in Richland, Wash., my avid birder parents would put the roadkill birds they found in the freezer and then deliver them to a friend who was a professor at Whitman College in Walla Walla who studied avian parasites.”

So far, so good. “One night Mom sent me down to the basement freezer to retrieve a loaf of French bread.”

Annie headed downstairs. She got what she thought was a loaf of French bread. But what she had picked up was actually a snowy owl wrapped in plastic.

“Right size, wrong food group.”

Another reader, who shared a house with two zoology majors in college, once found a foil-wrapped chinchilla in the freezer.

Summer rerun from 17 years ago: What’s your favorite G-rated nickname for breasts? (The first time around, answers included chalupas and puffers.)

One downside to working for yourself: Mark Charbonneau, whose family operates a rural general store, acquired a marijuana home test kit. His plan was to take the test and then report that, because of the results, he would be unable to go to work.

“The next morning, I did call my wife, who was working behind the counter, and told her I failed the drug test and could not come to work. She was not amused and requested my presence pronto.”

Today’s Slice question: When do you start to hear summer’s death-rattle cough?

Write The Slice at P. O. Box 2160, Spokane, WA 99210; call (509) 459-5470; email pault@spokesman.com. Anyone in the Indian Trail area have a tribal background that matches his or her street name?