S ingin’ in the ...How does that...

S ingin’ in the ...

How does that song go? (It’s been so long.) Anyway, the wet stuff wasn’t enough to cause a Hermosa Beach ski and surf shop to suspend its promotion--”Fifth Annual Drought Sale.”

Regarding our observation that one hears about North Hollywood and West Hollywood but never South Hollywood, City News reporter Cathy Franklin says she saw this sardonic variation scrawled on a wall in South L.A.:

“HOLLYWATTS.”

By the way, we apologize to Hollywood Riviera for mistakenly placing it in Redondo Beach the other day. The community has a Redondo postal address but is located in Torrance (who says the post office doesn’t have a sense of humor?) The name was the inspiration of a long-ago promoter who thought the area resembled the French Riviera. What, Torrance doesn’t sound romantic enough?

While we’re at it, we’d also like to apologize to the San Fernando Valley on behalf of Caltrans.

Motorists at one point on the Santa Monica Freeway are informed by signs (see photo) that they can go straight ahead to Santa Monica, south to LAX, or north to Sacramento--a mere 386 miles away. Locals are prone to exaggerating about how close everything is by car, but still . . .

Why couldn’t Sherman Oaks or Van Nuys get billing instead? One more argument for Valley secessionists.

List of the Day:

Some streets and businesses with colorful names in the industrial section of L.A., southeast of City Hall:

1--Produce Barber Shop.

2--Hemlock Street.

3--Factory Place.

4--Industrial Street.

5--Terminal Liquors.

6--Wholesale Street.

7--Nuts to You (nut store).

In his 1952 book, “Muscatel at Noon,” the late L.A. columnist Matt Weinstock recounted how a 22-year-old man came forward with a story about a gun-toting, red-haired female who supposedly forced her affections upon him in a Palos Verdes parking lot. The man said the bandit then stole his trousers and $1.

We mention it because Weinstock included the tale in a chapter titled, “Only in L.A.”

Which reminds us that Henry Tobias, of the song-writing Tobias brothers who wrote such classics as “Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree,” has set out to fill a 209-year-old musical void. He’s writing what he hopes will be accepted as the city’s first official ditty. Title: “Only in L.A.”

We tried to write one once, but got stuck trying to rhyme “ozone.”

miscelLAny:

CHP officers in L.A. County wrote 152,073 tickets for seat-belt violations in 1990.