The Slice: Religious observance benches Hoopfest player

If the S-R tenaciously covered your Hoopfest team, what stories would the newspaper write?

Tim O’Doherty had an idea for a headline on an article about the fortunes of his downtown pub’s team.

“O’Doherty Star Out Due to Ramadan.”

Tim explained. “We lost Murad Siam, our tremendous center, due to fasting! Apparently that religious period ends on Saturday so he won’t be able to participate. This doesn’t come up a lot in a town with such a small Muslim population.”

No, but it might make for the best “Why we lost” excuse I have ever heard.

Just wondering: Some people still send postcards. I mean, they continue to sell them, right?

So when visitors to Spokane or those just passing through send postcards back home, what do you suppose they write on them?

I’ll show you my two guesses, then you can send me yours.

“Turns out Spokane is nowhere near Seattle.”

“A furry creature that looked like a tawny groundhog asked me for spare change.”

In the matter of what to call those who are the first to smell skunks: Joanie Eppinga passed along one possibility.

“My husband, Charlie Hamm, thinks they should be called ‘olfactory canaries.’”

On a related note: Elaine Thorne theorized that those who first detect skunk aroma are also highly sensitive to the smell of marijuana.

“In the 1960s and 1970s, pot did not smell like skunk but the odor of pot today is atrocious.”

She has a message for marijuana smokers whose hair and clothes have absorbed the scent. “You stink.”

Slice answer: Do you agree or disagree that a preference for either mayonnaise or Miracle Whip indicates your political persuasion?

“Disagree heartily,” wrote Cindy Matthews of Post Falls. “My folks are extremely one party and we are very much the opposite. None of us will allow Miracle Whip in our general vicinity. We all have been known to return a sandwich at a restaurant when M.W. was detected.”

Warm-up question: In your family, after you have come in from the outdoors, what do you call your attempts to determine if anyone brought in a tick?

A) Hard target search. B) Strip search. C) Frisking the children. D) Body cavity search. E) “Destroy All Monsters.” F) Other.

Today’s Slice question: Do you think there is any chance you have a tick burrowing into you even as we speak?

Write The Slice at P. O. Box 2160, Spokane, WA 99210; call (509) 459-5470; email pault@spokesman.com. The Sherri Hyams Scientific Survey: “More of us enjoy your column than those who do not!”