Inform Wildlife Before Planting

Thu., March 25, 1999

By Paul Turner srpaulturner@gmail.com

You might want to consult with the neighborhood raccoons and crows before planting that vegetable garden.

Might as well grow some stuff that will be enjoyed.

Here’s a bulletin for alienated youth seeking attention-getting modes of self-expression: It is no longer possible, even in Spokane, to come up with a hair style or hair color that shocks anyone. It has all been done before.

But there are still ways to get noticed. Feel free to pick and choose.

1. Radical courtesy.

2. Not smoking.

3. Literacy.

4. Avoiding attempts to be ironic.

5. Millennial angst as performance art.

Twelve angry lattes: We continue to hear about terrific espresso-stand workers. A reader named Aaron told about a woman named Tracy who makes coffee drinks at the Spokane County Courthouse. “She not only remembers employees’ favorite orders,” he wrote. “She memorizes jurors’ orders.”

Local superheroes we’d like to see: Liberal Arts Major Man, Marmot Boy, Minivan Woman, The Fertile Five, Buffet Boy, Grain Girl and Grandfather With a Checkbook.

Just a thought: If Spokane’s TV news teams care so much about serving your family, how come they never send anybody over to do a little light yard work or watch the kids for a few hours?

Nailed: “We knew a dear gentleman (now deceased) who regularly clipped his fingernails during church services here in Spokane,” wrote Jennie Groenig.

And that’s the west of the story: Considering that there are places named Spokane in Ohio, Missouri and Louisiana, Jeff Nadeau has a question.

“With westward expansion being the rule for discovery and development in this country, the other three Spokanes must have been established before Spokane, Wash.,” he wrote. “If this is true and we allegedly are named for a chief of the Spokane Indians, then where did the name Spokane come from in the other states?”

Warm-up questions: Have you lived anywhere else where the word “renter” is used as a slur? After someone has been calling you by the wrong name for a while, how do you correct him without causing embarrassment?

Today’s Slice question: Who holds the Inland Northwest record for getting divorced the greatest number of times?

Local journalism is essential.

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