The Slice: Let’s keep wreckage to a minimum

When the skies of November turn gloomy …

I‘ll send a coveted reporter’s notebook to the reader who does the best job of singing a couple of lines from “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.”

Leave me a phone message today. Please do not perform the entire song.

“Overrated local icons: “How about Mount Spokane?” wrote Dagni Harkema. “Our family calls it Mound Spokane.”

Hmmm. I’ve always had a soft spot for Mount Spokane. But you have to admit that images of, say, the Cascades or Sawtooths, make it seem pretty modest.

Let’s move on.

After readers nominated Bing Crosby for the “overrated” designation, The Slice heard from the last of the celebrated entertainer’s family still here.

“I didn’t realize that Spokane was awash in icons,” wrote Ed Crosby. “I would suggest that your uninformed readers check out Gary Giddens’ book on my late uncle.”

Crosby then listed just a few of Bing’s towering achievements in record sales, movie box-office popularity and technological innovation. It is, of course, a staggeringly impressive list.

“I suppose in those readers’ minds that those accomplishments pale in comparison to the body of work of other local icons such as Craig T. Nelson,” wrote Crosby.

Actually, it was the nature of Bing’s relationship with Spokane that gave a couple of people pause. Yes, it could be argued that, in many ways, Spokane shaped him. And certainly no one could begrudge him moving on to pursue fame and fortune. That’s the American way.

Still, this city was already in his rear-view mirror when he became the star the world remembers. And for some, that taints his “local” status. Unlike Elvis, who pretty much stayed in Memphis, Bing became a Californian.

Nevertheless, I’m reminded of something professor and author Bill Stimson noted in The Slice a few months back. During the recording of “White Christmas,” Crosby almost certainly would have visualized one particular city when referring to a snowy Christmas “just like the ones I used to know.”

You probably don’t need two guesses to name that city.

“Apres train: A Slice reader named Lori who works for a film production company in downtown Spokane said she can really feel it when railroad cars are rolling right next her building. “After it rumbles by, shaking our building, the floor, my desk … I almost need a cigarette.”

“It was not a scientific survey: But most readers reporting trick-or-treat head-counts indicated numbers were down.

“Today’s Slice question: What did you say to a foul-mouthed friend or relative about cursing around your kids?