Where Are Dasher, Dancer, Prancer . . . ?

Santa Claus is coming to town, and he’s coming in style.

Last weekend, the promotions people at University Towne Centre in La Jolla had Santa arrive at the shopping center in a brand new Porsche. At the same time, the folks at Fashion Valley Shopping Center convinced the jolly old elf to be led in to their shopping mall by the Clydesdale horses of Budweiser beer fame. And their neighbors at Mission Valley Center really went all-out by having Santa enter through an elaborate smoke screen, behind the wheel of a cherry-red, 1946 Lincoln Continental. A fireworks show followed.

And you thought Christmas was getting too commercial.

Hot Christmas Advice

Santa obviously will be comfortable and happy this Christmas, but less fortunate people are particularly prone to depression during the holidays. To cope with the stress, the Alvarado Parkway Institute is sponsoring a Holiday Hotline, offering professional confidential advice to its callers.

In the spirit of the season, Alvarado also offers the following variation on a popular Christmas carol:

On the 12th day of Christmas I called Holiday Hotline with,

Ten bouncing checks,

Nine pending lawsuits,

Eight pounds to lose,

Seven running noses,

Six urgent deadlines,

Hol-i-day blues!

Four tins of cookies,

Three hard - luck stories,

Too much dirty laundry

And a Christmas card with someone else’s name.

A Wrong Number

Like any savvy politician, Sen. William Craven (R-Oceanside) never passes up a chance to publicize one of his accomplishments. But you had to admire the zeal of Craven’s staff members who set up the press release touting the senator’s efforts to bring emergency freeway call boxes to San Diego County.

The photo of Craven standing beside a call box on a San Marcos frontage road adjacent to California 78 was a real eye-catcher because the emergency phones are not expected to be in place until after the first of the year.

To set up the picture, Mary Jo Martin of Craven’s staff had to borrow a “Call Box” road sign from Los Angeles County. And the call box in the photo was clearly labeled as property of “New York City Police Department.” Martin said she did not have to go all the way to New York for the box--only to the local offices of Comstock Communicators, which manufactures the devices.

Dirty Secrets for TV

In the grand tradition of tacky game shows comes a San Diego-based television pilot that has great potential to set new bounds for bad taste. It’s called “True Confessions TV,” the brainchild of Mark Shapiro of Reel-Time Productions.

A recent press release touting the as-yet unsold pilot program said it is “looking for individuals who are willing to tell all. . . . those with dirty secrets, skeletons in the closet, perpetrators of heinous crimes, etc. to appear on the show to confess to millions of eager views who are curious and nosy.”

Shapiro warns people appearing on the show who have committed crimes: “Be aware, you might actually be arrested. But we will listen to anything.”

Low-Flying Stunt

Vista High School is traditionally one of the football hotbeds of San Diego County, and its huge contingent of boosters, some of whom have paid $350 for lifetime seats at the school’s 7,000-seat stadium, ranks with the most passionate prep fans anywhere. But somebody’s enthusiasm was decidedly out of hand Saturday night as the undefeated Panthers beat Mira Mesa, 36-7, in the San Diego 3-A Section quarterfinals.

As the third quarter of the game began, a small Cessna flying only about 200 feet above the Vista stadium cut its engines, turned off its lights, and let loose a barrage of leaflets that were, to put it mildly, decidedly uncomplimentary about the visitors and their fans. “Mira Mesa Lags” was in one of the leaflets--one of the few that is printable in a family newspaper; some of the flyers included inflammatory anti-homosexual messages as well.

Vista officials were decidedly red-faced and contrite. The stadium public address announcer issued an apology to Mira Mesa before the game was over. And Alan Johnson, Vista High School principal, began working early Monday morning “to find the person responsible for this act of infinite stupidity and put him behind bars.”

Johnson has contacted the Federal Aviation Administration in an effort to track down and prosecute the pilot. “This is awfully hard to handle--we’re all stunned that such an ugly incident could occur by someone claiming to be pro-Vista,” Johnson said. “Not only was this embarrassing but dangerous as well. That pilot’s actions absolutely were against the law, and I want him in jail.”

“I’ve been going to high school football games for 22 years,” said Johnson, who for the last seven years has been Vista High’s principal, “and I’ve never heard of anything this bizarre. I suppose somebody thought it would be a real neat prank.”