Column

I have a hundred – do I hear $200? Yes. That’s two hundred.

Dodging puddles in the drizzling rain, I hustled from one meeting to the next. Hands in my coat pockets, head down, wishing I’d taken the time to grab my umbrella. While waiting at the crosswalk for the light to change, I looked up to see a small boy heading down the sidewalk toward me. Clutching his mother’s hand, he purposefully veered toward the biggest puddle on the sidewalk – the one I’d carefully avoided.

There are people in our midst who do not particularly like winter but nonetheless root for at least a few stretches of bitter cold. You see, they want teenagers who wear shorts and eschew warm coats to suffer for their fashion statement.

The most intriguing candidacy in our region came from someone who didn’t make it to Tuesday’s main event. Dave Wilson ran as an independent for Cathy McMorris Rodgers’ seat – a seat in which she has proven once again to be as safe as a bubble-wrapped tricyclist. From the first, Wilson’s candidacy seemed like a challenge to voters to put our ballots where our mouths are. He staked out positions that were clearly located between the poles, he steered clear of the unproductively divisive dead ends, and he said practical, obvious things that flouted the conventional and intentional horse puckey that comprises 97.4 percent of all campaign speech.

Today’s that special day when we – the “mad as hell and won’t take it anymore” electorate – will ensure our continued discontent by voting along the same old party lines, just like always. Welcome to Election Day 2014.

Those of us with asthma have been known to make all sorts of interesting sounds when breathing. You know, tweets and whistles. Chirps and clicks.

So OK, Halloween is over. What’s next? Election Day, of course. Then Veterans Day is a week from Tuesday. Nov. 11 is also Washington’s statehood day.

In this world of gigabytes, downloads and digital this and that, George Ward is more at home with tuning eyes, vacuum tubes and condensers. Ward, 77, is an old-time radio man.

Idaho Secretary of State Ben Ysursa is predicting a 58 percent turnout in Tuesday’s general election – that’s 58 percent of registered voters, and is equal to roughly 39 to 40 percent of Idaho’s voting-age population. “It’s not something to write home about,” he said. “I am disturbed, troubled and concerned about the decline in voter participation.”

Patrick Jacobs, Coeur d’Alene’s unofficial king of food, fashion and fun who died too young last Sunday, was a huge fan of former Coeur d’Alene Mayor Sandi Bloem. Her Sandiness, longtime owner of Johannes Jewelry in downtown Coeur d’Alene, was known for rocking outfits and bling while presiding over Coeur d’Alene City Council meetings and riding as a passenger on the back of a Harley-Davidson at the city’s Fourth of July Parade. I dug this mini-review of Sandi’s stylish taste by Patrick after a council meeting in February 2007: “One thing is for sure: Sandi Bloem is a hard-core fashionista. Did anybody catch her outfit at the 2/20 City Council meeting? I tuned into red-hot CDA Channel 19, and my jaw dropped when I saw her squeezed delicately into a shiny plastic grey-and-black leopard print jacket and wearing her usual amount of bling. Her trademark salt-and-pepper upswept hairdo was 10x more vicious than usual. She must have decided to go with an extra-fierce look for the evening since she had to charm everybody into helping her sneak that little $3 million Kroc doo-dad through the system.” The Kroc Center, of course, is a smashing success. And Patrick’s observations about life and personalities in Coeur d’Alene are already sorely missed. Strike two

The Slice asked how readers get off the phone with someone who will not stop talking. Eric Rieckers had an answer.

It all started with Geordi La Forge. When Kobie Boykins was growing up, he had to engage in one of the crucial decisions facing young people interested in science and space: “Star Trek” or “Star Wars”? Boykins was a fan of both, but he was a “huge” fan of the second-generation Star Trek series, and in particular of La Forge, the chief engineer of the Starship Enterprise played by LeVar Burton.

When I was a kid in the 1960s, there was a dad on our block who would trick-or-treat with an empty shot glass. My father would pour him a half jigger of Old Crow or Canadian Club. At least that’s what I remember hearing. I’m pretty sure I was out with the children of the night when Mr. Ellsworth showed up on our porch on Halloween.

As an Ingrown Empire lifer, I learned to accept the more modest achievements that come Spokane’s way. Seattle, for example, has a groovy Space Needle.

In five days America will have its say in the midterm elections. And the very next day the pontificating regulars will grab the mics again and issue forth with their braying outrage over whatever seems politically expedient to be outraged about. But haven’t you enjoyed the relative silence since midsummer, when most of the grandstanders managed to tuck away their moral indignation in advance of the election lest they say something that might tilt the electorate away from their interests? They will miraculously rediscover their outrage and emerge from cover to have at it again.

Here, according to a little girl named Kate in Mrs. Hoffman’s first/second grade class at Garfield Elementary, is how you turn a pumpkin into a jack-o’-lantern. “1. First you need a pumkin. 2. You take the pumkin home. 3. You need a grownup to hellp you carev the pumkin. 4. You take off the top and get all the gutts out. 5. You take a mrkr and draw a face on the pumkin.”

One obituary is a portrait of an individual. Several add up to a portrait of a community. Recent obituaries document the passing of a family doctor and an Air Force commander, a meter maid and a barber, a farmer and a PR man. Here are several of them, summarized from recent notices published in the newspaper:

Halloween rears its haunted head Friday, and you know what that means. That’s right. Every Spokane-area bank, office and mortuary will be crawling with witches and vampires and the rest of them pretending to be Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson.

So maybe you don’t get much trick-or-treat action where you live and you are thinking about leaving your porch light off and sitting it out this Halloween. That’s up to you. But here are a few things to consider.