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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

The Slice

Looking back on five years of The Slice Blog

The Slice Blog started on Monday, May 23, 2011, with a bit of a stumble.

The print SR had promoted its arrival that morning. And there were eight or 10 initial posts all lined up and ready to go.

But because of some technical glitch, the blog did not show up online.

"Fudge," I said.

Or something like that.

I called then-SR editorial online honcho Ryan Pitts at home. At about 4:45 a.m. (I would have phoned him earlier, but I had to get to the office and find his number first.)

He was gracious, as always, and that problem was fixed.

Another soon revealed itself. Most of my longtime readers wanted no part of commenting online. A few would read the blog, but they would offer feedback only via email.

I tried encouraging print readers to comment online, but my heart wasn't in it. I get it about not having a taste for being attacked by anonymous, troubled people. Before long, I pretty much bailed on the notion of significant online interaction.

That was OK. Years of producing the Slice column for a confined space in print had left me with an abiding urge to use art. Lots of it. So I spent much of the first few years posting big pictures of baseball cards, comic books, old ads, airplanes and Expo 74 memorabilia.

That was fun.

Still, I suppose this little undertaking was always going to be a bit of an afterthought. I mean, that was inevitable. It's not my day job, after all.

The blog has had slightly more than 11,000 posts. I'm not sure how many of those had merit. Maybe not many.

About the only claim I will make for The Slice Blog is that it cleared the low hurdle placed before it by my colleague Gina Boysun.

Back in May of 2011, while training me, she boldly predicted that it would not be an epic failure.

So onward and upward.

I've got some changes in mind for this blog.

What are they?

Well, you'll just have to wait and see.   



The Slice

The online home for Paul Turner's musings and interactions with disciples of The Slice.