Too-hasty criminal overlooked the key to a car thief’s happiness
The thing about being a car thief, I imagine, is you always feel like you’re being rushed -- and it can affect your performance.
Take the case of S.P. Ostiller’s Honda, which he shipped from his home in Pacific Palisades to his son’s office in San Rafael. The car, which was being given to Ostiller’s grandsons, was left in an outdoor lot overnight. The next day it was discovered that someone had forced the door open and jammed a knife into the ignition, trying to start it. The knife had broken off and the intruder had left without taking the time to look in the unopened glove compartment.
There, he would have found an envelope marked “spare key” containing something much more effective than a knife.
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Moving on to governmental banditry: Mike Barth found a one-stop shopping center in Ventura that was appropriate for this time of year (see photo).
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That sinking sensation: Kit Hope of Garden Grove found an elevator indicator a bit disconcerting, especially because she was on a cruise at the time (see photo).
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Exactly who’s been drinking here? “Nothing says ‘DUI Checkpoint’ more than a sign with two misspelled words,” Ryan Bass wrote of a stop that he and Matt Bell spotted in Pomona (see photo).
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Not-so-lucky rabbit’s feet? Steve Propes of Long Beach’s Beachcomber noticed that a local TV station broadcast a news story with the words “Pet Foot Recall” on the graphic behind the reporter.
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Honkers in traffic: In Van Nuys, Sophia Wong and son Michael observed a motorcycle officer who had stopped traffic on busy, multilane Woodley Avenue to allow a couple of adult geese and their young ones to cross. When the little critters were unable to follow the grown-ups up onto the curb, the officer created a makeshift ramp with a long piece of cardboard supplied by a passerby.
The officer “along with a growing crowd of motorists, bicyclists and pedestrians waited patiently until each of the young toddled up the ramp to safety,” Wong said. “There were cheers, and then everyone moved on with their busy afternoon.”
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miscelLAny: In case you missed it: In the Movable Buffet blog on latimes.com, Richard Abowitz interviewed former “Hollywood Madam” Heidi Fleiss about her plans to open a stud farm for ladies in Pahrump, Nev. There have been a few complications, however, so Fleiss said she intends to open a Laundromat first.
“Yeah, instead of Heidi’s stud farm,” she announced, “I am going to open Heidi’s suds farm.”
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Steve Harvey can be reached at (800) LATIMES, Ext. 77083, by fax at (213) 237-4712, by mail at Metro, L.A. Times, 202 W. 1st St., L.A. 90012, and by e-mail at steve.harvey@latimes.com.