Huckleberries: The Big One got away from birthday tracker

Kerri Thoreson was keeping track of everyone’s birthdays in Kootenai County before Facebook arrived and wanted to be friends. Kerri, a woman of many hats (Post Falls councilwoman, Coeur d’Alene Press columnist, KVNI morning host), rarely misses wishing the best to locals in print and on the radio show she co-hosts with “North Idaho Joe” Paisley. So Kerri was embarrassed when she missed the Queen Mother Of Local B-Days last week. Anna Pearce turned 65 Wednesday. Mebbe you know Anna by her screen/stage name: Patty Duke. Who wrote the New York Times best-selling autobiography “Call Me Anna.” Patty’s 65th birthday makes her eligible for Medicare benefits to go with those Social Security bennies she’s been touting in public service announcements.

Curses, foiled again

Many in Coeur d’Alene who know Patty Duke also know that Coeur d’Alene Councilman Mike Kennedy is her nephew. Yeah, Mike and Hobbit Samwise Gamgee (Sean Astin) are cousins. Aunt Patty began following Mike on Twitter last week. Which prompted this tweet from Mike on Thursday: “This sucks. I can’t curse on Twitter any more because my aunt is following and will call my mother” … Speaking of Twitter, your Huckleberry Hound doesn’t know what to think about the last four followers who signed up for HucksOnline tweets: Obama for America/Idaho, Idaho Board of Education, ComcastSpokane – and Las Vegas strippers. P’haps @HucksOnline is giving off the wrong vibe? … Kennedy, by the way, attended a kindergarten Christmas play last week in which the young Joseph nervously uttered his first sentence to the innkeeper loudly, clearly, and “very, very rapidly.” Sounded as though Little Joe said: “My waffle’s having a baby.” Actual words repeated in a Take 2? “My wife will be having a baby.”

Huckleberries

Some jokes stand the test of time, according to Phil Corless, of Coeur d’Alene, who pulled this one from Dan Crompton’s “The World’s Oldest Joke Book”: “Hairdresser: ‘How shall I cut your hair, sir?’ Client: ‘In silence.’ ” They were yucking about that one 2,000 years ago … Scanner Traffic: Responding to a patrol officer’s request Friday morning to check on people living in a Kootenai County home, a dispatcher said: “I’ve identified four people at that residence. None are elderly except one born – in 1955.” Elderly? 1955? Ouch … A patrol officer from either Post Falls or Rathdrum who was running late for work Thursday afternoon had a fool-proof excuse: Another cop had taken his patrol car and the key he had didn’t unlock the replacement’s doors. He. Didn’t. Sound. Happy. About it … United Conservatives of North Idaho, the group furthest right in the Kootenai County GOP spectrum, bleeds red, white and blue. So ’twas amusing to see photos of its organizational meeting in Rathdrum last week showing a U.S. flag draped on the speaker podium seemingly brushing the floor. A no-no.

Parting shot

Coeur d’Alene Mayor Sandi Bloem is too classy to say that she Tebowed the Spokane mayor and Spokane at that bell-ringing contest to raise funds for the Salvation Army at two local Fred Meyer stores Dec. 10. But Huckleberries isn’t. Her Sandiness and Coeur d’Alene helpers raised $5,533 to tromp Mary Verner and her elves, who raised $1,263. Bloem & Co. raised more at one location than all Coeur d’Alene area bell-ringers do in an average day.