The Slice: So thirsty he could buy beer wagons

The Slice asked readers how much beer they have consumed over the years.

And retiree Mert Turner said his wife, Anna, estimates that he has purchased enough of one particular brand to have paid for at least four full teams of Clydesdales.

Slice answers: So how goes the battle?

“The Visigoths are at the gate and we are all out of boiling oil,” wrote Jim Markley. “Sometimes I’ll add the tag line (not original to me) of, ‘but we do have lots of delicious, hot, chicken soup.’ ”

Kelly Reinlasoder would go with “Loose lips sink ships.”

Annie Zeck proposed “All’s quiet on the western front. At least, on West 24th anyway.”

Mack Stanhope said his answer is “I don’t know. No one will tell me.”

Darel Maxfield offered “Moving out smartly.”

Steve Paulson wrote, “From the looks of Second Avenue, all is lost.”

Larry Krueger would answer with “On which front?”

Then there was this from Cryss Thain.

“What’s your best answer to ‘How goes the battle?’ What my Dad always told me the next day when I asked how the movie ended (which was after my bedtime) – ‘The good guys won.’ ”

Debugged: Eric Johnson saw The Slice’s mention of magpie-sighting variability in different parts of Spokane.

“I don’t know about birds, but I’ve noticed that June bugs seem to be a microclimate thing,” he wrote.

“When I lived out by where Wall and Monroe join on the North Side, we used to get big fat June bugs that covered the screen doors every summer. I’ve never seen any in the Ninth and Perry area where I’ve lived for 40 years now.”

That’s OK with him.

For the record: In a Slice last weekend, a reader referred to the long-ago practice of the S-R giving a dollar to the first kid to bring in a buttercup. But a former colleague reminded me that it was actually a Spokane Daily Chronicle columnist who started that tradition.

Today’s Slice question: How would your life be different if you could go back and keep yourself from uttering the 10 stupidest things you have said in your life?