The Slice: How will you deal with pumped-up volume?

As we close in on Loud Noise Coming from Next Door season, it’s time to formulate your 2016 policy.

If a party in an adjacent backyard is simply too raucous, what will you do?

A) Pretend you don’t really notice it, even though the sonic vibrations have shaken several items off your living room walls. B) Go next door and politely note that it is now 1:17 a.m. C) Call in an air-strike. (Being careful to provide exact target coordinates.)

D) Unleash the hounds. E) Call the police and deal with insinuations that this is something you ought to be able to handle yourself. F) Anticipating the inevitable verbal escalation, ask yourself if you are willing to get into a fist-fight over loud music.

G) Cone of Silence. H) Move to a new neighborhood before morning. I) Pray for rain.

J) Challenge your neighbor to a duel. K) Plan your own party. L) Wait for the offending neighbors to try to sell their house, then start flying a huge Confederate flag in your front yard. (Of course, that might not be a great idea if what you want is for them to sell their house and move.)

M) Ask yourself, “What would Tony Soprano do?” N) Record the boisterous bacchanal and post a video on social media, accompanied by snarky comments. O) Get about 100 of your bulkiest friends to come over and then go all “Game of Thrones” on your noisy neighbors.

P) Hire a skunk. Q) Ask yourself, “What would Kwai Chang Caine of ‘Kung Fu’ do?” R) Guard against hoping several of the revelers drink themselves to death. Remember, that would be wrong.

S) Call the police again, report your latest decibels reading. T) Ask yourself, “What would Mr. Hand in ‘Fast Times at Ridgemont High’ do?” U) Plan to mow your lawn at 5 a.m.

V) Ask yourself, “What does the Code of the West require that I do?” W) Vigorously contemplate country living. X) Something bold involving drones.

Y) Tai chi and meditation. Z) March next door and note that their music is jejune.

Today’s Slice question: What would your father or grandfather have thought of these outdoor grills that have control panels resembling something you might see in the cockpit of a commercial airliner?

Write The Slice at P. O. Box 2160, Spokane, WA 99210; call (509) 459-5470; email pault@spokesman.com. A WSU professor once told me a good way to find out what insects live near you is to leave a peeled banana in your backyard for a few days.