The Slice: Either you’re a messy eater or you’re saving food for later

It’s not as if it is some big burden.

But yes, it’s true, you have spent a fair percentage of your adult life asking waitresses for extra napkins.

Let’s move on.

Life in a northern town: People who meet Tara Leininger at conferences, seminars, et cetera, often get a kick out of learning that she is both a longtime church pastor and director of the community theater in her hometown. Oh, and she’s also the mayor.

Leininger typically invites them to come visit her in Metaline Falls. She doesn’t expect many to take her up on the offer.

Well, about a week ago, a couple traveling back to Bellingham from Minnesota decided to get off the main highway and pay Leininger a visit. (Tara had met the woman at a retreat near Leavenworth.)

“When they pulled into town, they found the town hall closed and our visitors center is unmanned,” said Leininger.

So the couple stepped into a shop and asked how to find the mayor. In short order, Leininger was tracked down.

“Isn’t it wonderful to live in a place where everyone knows where to find you?” she said.

Travels of Inland Northwesterners Dept.: “You mentioned Dumfries, Scotland, in a column recently,” wrote Bill Brock, of Pullman. “It triggered a memory from the spring of 1981. It was my first-ever day in Scotland and I was riding my bike through Dumfries. A festival was under way, so I stopped for a bite to eat. I’d heard a lot about haggis and I figured this was my chance to try one, ahem, in the flesh.

“A street vendor was selling local cuisine from a booth. I stepped forward and, in a voice tinged with trepidation, ordered ‘One haggis, please.’

“The vendor sized me up – Yank, green as May grass, hesitant – and asked without missing a beat: ‘D’ya want a live one?’ ”

I asked Bill how it tasted. Here’s his answer.

“Aye lad, ’orrible it was.”

Today’s Slice question: How might your life be different today if you could go back and take do-overs on the 50 dumbest things you have ever done or said?