The Slice: During his rite of passage, we hope he used the blinker

One recent Saturday, Diana Lynn Rehn was parked outside a local driver’s licensing office.

She saw a smiling teen boy and a man she assumed to be his father exit the building.

“I watched as they walked toward the car and saw the young man hesitate for a moment like he wasn’t sure if he was the driver or the passenger. Then his father handed over the keys to the $50,000 vehicle.”

As the boy prepared to get in, his father got ready to take a picture. The boy held up his license and grinned.

Rehn watched them pull out of the parking lot. “I wish the young man a safe and happy driving career.”

Next Saturday is National Clean Out Your Garage Day: Please consult the quotations of 1960s Faber College student John “Bluto” Blutarsky for advice about how to approach that occasion.

This weekend during Expo ’74: In an NFL preseason game played in Spokane, the Denver Broncos beat the New England Patriots.

Just to clarify: The Halloween stuff you see in stores right now is for Halloween 2015. Retailers assume you already have addressed your 2014 holiday needs.

Shuddering at the thought of what might have gone viral: There are people of a certain age who are happy that their college roommates did not have camera phones back in the day.

Speaking of higher education: One time-tested rebuttal to negative reviews of how you have decorated your dorm room is “Well, it’s all satirical.”

In the parlance of our times: Cats have been saying “What the …?” since long before any such expression existed.

Warm-up question: Which takes the longest? A) Society changing certain attitudes about race or gender. B) Getting a second-grader out of bed in the morning. C) The passing of a geologic era. D) Your best friend getting to the point of a story. E) A college football game featuring a lot of incomplete passes. F) Other.

Today’s Slice question: In the Northwest, a Labor Day picnic isn’t a Labor Day picnic without …