People and Events

The first weapon that anti-war activist Jerry Rubin wielded against a Venice store was a petition.

When that didn’t work, he resorted to a spray gun Friday.

Rubin and a handful of activists painted a “No” (slash) symbol across a 12-foot-tall store sign on Ocean Front Walk that depicts a hooded man firing a handgun-- hand - cannon might be more accurate--in the direction of sunbathers.

Rubin, director of the Alliance for Survival, believes the sign imparts a “violent message” in a community already plagued by violence, noting that it has since inspired others to pock the wall with real bullet holes.

The owners of the clothing store, Local Heroes, initially said the ad would be “toned down.” When it wasn’t, Rubin’s brigade showed up, writing on the storefront, “Wanted--Venice Artists for ideas on how to make (this( sign less violent.” Store personnel blotted out the message Friday but declined comment to The Times.

Rubin, who admitted that tampering with someone else’s private property is “risky,” said he still hopes that the sign will be modified, perhaps so that the figure is aiming a dove and an American Flag, instead of a gun.

Degradable garbage bags seem like a great concept. That’s why City Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky had the city’s General Services Department look into the claims by some companies that they had invented plastic bags that would (a) begin to disintegrate when exposed to sunlight and (b) finish the process when buried in landfills.

Alas, the agency’s tests found that the bags stopped degrading when buried. And if left above ground, they required 90 days of sunlight to disintegrate.

As one General Services agent noted, there could be a problem finding somewhere to set thousands of bags of garbage outdoors for 90 days.

So, for now, degradable bags rank down there with such other failed technological experiments at City Hall as a talking trash can (1983), which contained a hidden speaker urging people not to litter, and battery-powered toilets (1987-1988), whose pop-out plastic covers scared people.

It was speculated that one reason that Osco decided to resume the Sav-on name at its Southland drug stores is that its moniker sounds like the Spanish word asco , which means sickening.

That might come as a surprise to some Anglos, as would a few other translations for melodious local names.

For instance, Restaurant Row is on ritzy Swamp Boulevard ( La Cienega ). Pacific Palisades is the home of the fashionable Street of Fleas ( Las Pulgas) . And La Canada Flintridge has its very own Vagrant Street ( El Vago ).

In honor of, or perhaps in spite of, Valentine’s Day, Family Planning Centers of Greater Los Angeles plan to distribute free condoms today at a booth on the Venice boardwalk. The fashion-conscious will be pleased to know that designer condoms are also available for a small charge.