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The Slice: How to offend online without really trying

How many ways are there to accidentally offend someone online?

Right off the top of my head, I can think of three (and I’m not even on Facebook, Buttchat, SpoCant or any of those other social networks).

1. Someone wants to connect with you on LinkedIn. But you don’t really use LinkedIn and can’t remember your password in any event. So it just seems as if you are ignoring the request which, I guess, you are.

2. Someone sends you an email. It gets snagged by your spam filter. But you never check your spam filter repository. So you never see said email and, of course, don’t respond. And the next time you see the sender there is an inexplicable frostiness in his or her manner. So you decide that person is a troubled waste of time.

3. Someone follows you on Twitter. But you have sort of lost interest in Twitter. You don’t check it all that often. So it seems to all the world that you are rudely ignoring the fact that this person is now following you. Or worse, it looks like you saw it but just have no interest in following him or her back.

OK, what would you make No. 4?

Things that pass through your mind for a millionth of a second: The other night, a graphic on our TV screen at home mentioned a National Hockey League player named Nick Bonino. An individual in my household glanced at this and thought it said “Rick Bonino.”

Rick is a friend and former S-R colleague. But in the short time spent possibly confusing “Rick” with “Nick,” one might have considered …

A) That’s something, to see a guy with the same name as our friend. B) Has Rick become an NHL player? C) That is one unusual second career for a guy his age. D) And he still has time to write about beer! E) Other.

INW trivia: Happy birthday to born-in-Colfax TCM host Robert Osborne.

Warm-up question: How is your place of employment referred to in your home?

A) “The salt mine.” B) “The coal mine.” C) “Bailey Building & Loan.” D) “Work.” E) “Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce.” F) “The cannery.” G) “The Michael & Elliot Co.” H) “Acme.” I) “Cogswell Cogs.” J) Other.

Today’s Slice question: What does it mean if you are taking an inkblot test and you think every image looks like two marmots dancing?

Write The Slice at P. O. Box 2160, Spokane, WA 99210; call (509) 459-5470; email pault@spokesman.com. My favorite recent compliment (from a reader moving to California): “Thanks for being such an awesome peripheral presence in my life all these years.”

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