It was just declared a holiday, so...

It was just declared a holiday, so you may find it missing from some 1991 calendars:

Malibu Independence Day, March 30.

Yup, it’s been officially designated by Malibu’s unofficial City Council.

As you may know, rebellious settlers there voted to establish their own government earlier this year. That the county has so far delayed granting them cityhood has deterred the rebels from organizing a Thirtieth of March ceremony.

The highlight no doubt will be a dramatic reading of the Malibu Declaration of Independence.

We, in the Colony, hold these truths to be self-evident, that all celebrities are created equal, that they are endowed by their Attorneys, Agents and Publicists with certain unalienable Rights (not to mention points), that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of a Septic Tank . . .

We’d go on, but we’re getting teary-eyed. . . .

Another reason to monitor Duke’s eating during the holiday season:

The county’s fee for neutering male dogs under 50 pounds is $25, but it costs $35 to perform the rites on 51 to 70 pounders and it’s a hefty $45 for 70-plus pounders.

Never-Too-Late Dept.:

Occidental Petroleum czar Armand Hammer will celebrate his bar mitzvah Dec. 11 at the Beverly Hilton at a fund-raiser for two Jewish institutions. Hammer is 92.

Anyone who made an ant farm as a science project in school can appreciate Yukinori Yanagi’s accomplishment. (Especially your Only in L.A. correspondent, whose critters staged a mass escape from Palms Junior High in 1959.)

Yanagi has created an organic art work, “World Flag Ant Farm Project,” which will go on display downtown at Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions.

It will depict the national flags of the world in colored grains of sand. The ants will remove and rearrange the grains, the gallery tells us, “eventually dissolving (the individual flags)” as the art work evolves “into one universal flag.”

Sounds impressive. But wait a minute. Those ants will be dissolving the American Flag. Is it time for another ruling by the Supreme Court?

Did you notice that four of the 20 steps to improve traffic unveiled by Mayor Tom Bradley Wednesday involved the enlargement or creation of committees?

We’d like to unveil Step No. 21:

All members of traffic congestion committees must car-pool to their meetings.

miscelLAny:

Pioneer author Horace Bell says that the most lavish hotel in L.A. in the 1850s was the Bella Union, whose earthen floors were “rendered quite muddy” in rainy weather. “If a very aristocratic guest came along,” Bell added, “a great sacrifice was made in his favor, and he was permitted to sleep on the (hotel saloon’s) little billiard table.”