Paul Turner

"The Rocky Horror Picture Show" scared off quite a few parents.

It wasn't the Palouse prune bread talking. It was the buzz of being at a happening.

Spilling hot coffee on your boss during a performance evaluation isn't necessarily a bad thing. That's because you could win a big-screen TV or a stereo by describing your most humiliating day at work.

"Oh, the wonderful world of computerized addresses," wrote Spokane's Dorothy Van Slyke. You see, her husband's name is Howard Van Slyke. But when he got a letter in 1993 about a dishwasher warranty, it began "Dear Va N. Slyke Ho." Uh, nice try.

So this year, we're supposed to spring ahead TWO hours. Um, April Fools. Only this isn't C. Dean Mathers said "Spokane" would be the perfect name for a "new" model Studebaker. The thing that bugs Ann Graham: People spitting in water fountains. In case you didn't memorize this in college: "Slaughterhouse Five" airs on KSPS-TV tonight at 8. More adventures in vomiting: Mary Ryerse was on her back and holding her little niece up in the air with her feet when the child suddenly threw up onto Ryerse's face. Bob Harvego recalled a time someone regurgitated into the bell of his tuba. And another reader called to report her daughter getting sick into her flute case before school. James Dodds was in the tub with his son, who was celebrating his first birthday, when the boy deposited an alarming load of cake and ice cream into the bath water. And Virginia Terpening told about an outing, at a fancy restaurant, when her 6-year-old spat up on her 3-year-old and it was so startlingly unappetizing that her husband proceeded to throw up. Coeur d'Alene's Mary Lou Wilson recalls being beneath someone who got violently ill while riding a Ferris wheel in Missoula. "I was in the direct line of fire," she wrote. Teacher Mary Anne Sullivan described a time when one little boy's power-heaving started a chain reaction in a classroom of first-graders. "It was a puke-a-rama," she said. Moses Lake's Phyllis Franz shared several airsickness anecdotes involving her family's plane. Dave Craig described a memorable spewing after his senior prom. Vickie Pratt recalled a time in fifth grade when a lad who had eaten hot dogs erupted on a demure little girl. And young Emilio Sulpizio had just sat down to dinner at another family's home when he expelled a fair amount of Halloween candy, which the quick-acting host caught with a bowl of scalloped potatoes. Today's Slice question: What's the oddest behavior you've witnessed on the Centennial Trail?

Yes, you still have to take those studded tires off even if the studs have been worn away since January. No strangers: Here, according to University of Idaho student Kathryn Cassens, is an example of how you can tell Moscow is perhaps too small. "My golf coach, Don Rasmussen, dialed a local phone number only to dial the incorrect number. But upon hearing the voice at the other end, he still knew who the other person was."

Excited kids, some wielding whistles and toy flutes, bounced around the little school gym like pinballs in sneakers. Adults of a certain height had to be alert to avoid getting head-butted in the, um, waist by revelers not watching where they were going.

Some things are worth getting excited about. We heard a wide-eyed little boy in Browne's Addition call out to some other kids: "We're going to the store and I get my own dollar."

Let's talk sightings. Among the celebrities readers have unexpectedly encountered are Lionel Barrymore at a Woolworth's in Beverly Hills, Dean Paul Martin at a supermarket in Columbus, Miss., Mary of Peter, Paul and Mary in a downtown Spokane dime store, Johnny Cash and June Carter in an elevator at a Portland hotel, O.J. Simpson at Yosemite National Park, Jimmy Carter in a V.I.P. club in Atlanta, Telly Savalas shaving in the next lane of traffic in Rancho Mirage, Calif., Hakeem Olajuwon in a Boston hotel elevator, Phil Collins at Disneyland, Tony Bennett at the San Francisco airport, Jimi Hendrix at a gas station near Sacramento, and Johnny Mathis in a men's room at the Spokane airport. And in 1987, Spokane's Lance Erie encountered a baseball legend in a men's room in San Francisco. "Ted Williams," he shouted. "I'm one of your all-time greatest fans."

You might not want to read this batch of Slice answers while eating. Gerald Ray remembers his friend's beered-up date, a nurse at Sacred Heart, vomiting at Natatorium Park while riding The Octopus. Ritzville's Kathy Becker told of an unforgettable regurgitation at a spaghetti eating contest.

There are a million stories in the furry city. At least it seems like it. Because after The Slice asked readers to tell how they came up with names for their cats and dogs, IN Life heard from A LOT of the region's pet owners.

You don't have to run for office. The community colleges are going to offer a course in clowning. "Find and develop your personal clown character," reads the description.

Something about "All you can eat" sounds good on a Sunday morning. And when you know farm women will be doing the cooking, it seems perfectly reasonable to find yourself out in the Spokane Valley at 7:30 a.m., at the Central Grange, for the public-invited Pancake Breakfast. "How're you doing," said the friendly old guy taking money with a hand that seemed big as an outfielder's mitt. "Sit wherever you'd like. Want some coffee?"

OK, we're going to move pretty fast. Try to keep up. Janet C. Lehrman of Post Falls started screening calls after a belligerent telemarketer accused HER of being rude for trying to cut off a sales pitch. Moscow's Maureen Olsen reported this is National Agriculture Week, adding "Hug a farmer!" Republic's Randi Welsh said a "Spokane" would be an expensive bicycle. Wenatchee's Brad Wollborg said it would be a walking stick.