The Slice: She was happy to toot her own horn

Getting used to certain things takes a bit of training.

Sue Retan, who lives west of Cheney, read last week’s column about hearing railroad noises in the wee hours. Then she left me a phone message complete with the sound of a horn-blowing freight train rumbling by not far from her home. It was remarkable.

Retan, who sounded quite cheerful, said she is fairly used to it now. She has lived where she is for 16 years.

She has heard a lot of trains, day and night.

Wide-eyed adult guests really notice it, she said. But little kids reportedly love it and get all excited. “A train! A train!”

Those horns, though, are something to hear.

“I once had a dream where I thought someone was honking at me,” she wrote.

Name game: “When I was younger my name was not as common for a girl as it is these days, and it was hard for some people to remember,” wrote Dana Freeborn. “I’ve been called Donna, Danna, Deena, Dinah, DeeAnn, Deanna, Dianna, Danae, and one man never could remember so he just called me Little Lady.”

Recycling newspaper bags, continued: Larry Schneiderman saved his and then donated about 700 bags to the Carver Farms U-pick vegetables/flowers operation. “The lady who accepted them was very gracious and thanked me with a big smile,” he wrote.

Vince Eberly offered a how-to on using the bags. “Dana and I use the newspaper bag to pick up cat barf and other disgusting things,” he wrote. “You stick your hand in it, grab the paper towel, wipe up whatever, and pull your hand out while inverting the bag. No mess on your hands and everything is neatly bagged up. With four cats, we use a fair number of them.”

(It’s a little known fact that countless Spokane area cats and dogs work for The S-R.)

Deer Park’s Mary and Ben Boschee are saving theirs so the bags can be used at next month’s St. Mary’s Church yard sale.

Warm-up question: Do you have a works-every-time tactic for tuning out football talk?

Today’s Slice question: Ever get an angry note mailed with a “Love” stamp?