GiddyapSome mamas don’t have to worry about...

Giddyap

Some mamas don’t have to worry about their babies growing up to be cowboys.

The only mustangs these folks ride come equipped with a convertible top and pedals for stop and go.

Ron Wechsler’s rodeo students at Pierce College, on the other hand, know about broncos that don’t come with four-wheel drive, and pintos that don’t become dented if you run into them, although they might get a tad testy.

These student descendants of the wild, Wild West will put on their annual Intercollegiate Rodeo on Friday and Saturday, playing host to competitors from 10 other colleges in California and southern Nevada as well as an expected 15,000 spectators. This will make it the largest event of its kind in the country, Wechsler says, citing National Collegiate Rodeo Assn. figures.

There will be bareback and saddle-bronc riding, bull riding and individual and team roping both nights. On Saturday, there will be a barbecue followed by a roping event in which college students are paired with celebrities such as Bruce Boxleitner, C. Thomas Howell and Lee Horsley.

Wechsler, who heads up Pierce’s agricultural program, thinks one of the reasons the event attracts such a large crowd is the diversity of the program. It will include performances on both nights by a professional Roman riding team whose members stand on galloping horses and jump them through flaming hoops and onto a moving vehicle. This is not something you’d want to try at home.

Wechsler said professional rodeos attract upwards of 16 million people each year, according to figures from the Professional Cowboy Rodeo Assn., but adds that collegiate rodeo has never drawn as well.

“It’s too bad, really,” he said, “because the collegiate riders are every bit as exciting as the pros, and the level of skill is very high.”

Although Wechsler admits the organizational work involved in preparing for this event is a logistic nightmare, he doesn’t mind because proceeds go to the Pierce agricultural program.

Happy Returns

McKenzie Westmore’s 14th birthday was rolling around and she wanted to invite the 43 other members of her eighth-grade graduating class at Laurel Hall in North Hollywood to the celebration.

Her parents, Michael and Marion Westmore, agreed to let her hold it at the Moonlight Rollerway Skating Rink in Glendale.

They reasoned that she is a good person, a straight-A student, and that this would be one of the last times she and her classmates would all be together because they are off to various high schools in the fall.

Her parents also agreed to her unexpected request concerning presents, which is how dozens of baby layette items ended up being donated to the young women at St. Anne’s Maternity Hospital in Los Angeles.

“I heard about another girl who wanted her friends to give things to a charity instead of getting birthday presents, and I thought that was a great idea,” McKenzie said.

“I knew, from a family friend, that the teen-age pregnant girls at St. Anne’s needed baby things, so I asked if my friends would bring diapers and baby clothing and bottles instead of the presents.”

And they did.

Among the party guests was Helen Cohen of St. Anne’s outreach program, who gathered up the baby items and took them to the home.

McKenzie said all of her friends and their parents thought it was a good idea, even though the boys who lugged bathing tubs, teething rings and rattles looked a little sheepish.

“At first, a lot of the guys thought I was crazy passing up birthday presents,” McKenzie said. “But, once they got into the idea they thought it was great.”

Limousines, Ho

It was one of those ideas that just took off.

Halle Farokhi, a part-time sales associate at I. Magnin in Woodland Hills and a full-time student at Calabasas High, mentioned to her store department head, Kim Castellon, that she had to find a dress for her June 1 prom.

She also mentioned how complicated proms are these days.

The guys rent tuxes, shoes and limos, buy corsages and coordinate the after-prom activities with friends, while the girls just have to look beautiful. These days, however, getting beautiful can mean not only having the right dress, shoes and accessories, but having one’s hair and makeup done.

The more they talked, the more Farokhi and Castellon started thinking along the same lines. That’s why more than 60 people are going to have a unique three-hour party beginning a few hours before Calabasas High prom night.

“All the girls who have gotten their dresses from the store may come for them the afternoon of the prom and get dressed here with the help of our staff,” Castellon said.

“We will have people here from our cosmetics department to do their makeup, and we are bringing in people to do comb-outs on their hair.”

Castellon says that in case the girls need something at the last minute, they can run downstairs for another pair of stockings or another pair of earrings if the ones they brought don’t look just right.

To add to the party atmosphere, the store is inviting the parents who bring the young women to the store to stay for wine, cheese and a chat with the other parents while their pampered darlings get dressed.

Then, as the limos start stacking up in the Promenade Mall Shopping Center, the young men may come in to fetch their dates and have their pictures taken before heading downtown to the Biltmore Hotel.

Picking Dates

Daryl Raposa is another lady who comes up with novel ideas.

First she offered a personal shopper service at Personne Complet, her unisex beauty salon in Woodland Hills. That meant that while you were getting nailed and blown dry, someone else was running your errands or doing your shopping.

Then she came up with the idea for a matchmaking program which she called the Clean Hair Dating Service. That meant that while you were sitting there with tin foil sticking out of your head, she would be rummaging through her computer files for the perfect date for you.

Now Raposa is taking her dating game on the road, or at least as far as the Warner Center Marriott and the Canoga Park Racquetball World.

Howard Wasserteil, general manager of the sports club, said Raposa will be matching members on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays between 5 and 9 p.m. and Saturdays between 9 a.m. and 1 p.m.

He says many of his members are single and looking for dates, and this will take a lot of the guesswork out of the exercise.

In addition to the date brokering, Raposa will preside over several social activities.

Beginning June 6, there will be casual mixers at the club for all enrollees, between 6 and 10 p.m. the first Thursday of each month. And there will be a dress-to-the-teeth soiree every second Tuesday, beginning July 9, in the Tickets Lounge at the Marriott hotel in Woodland Hills.

Both the club social and the Marriott mixer cost $15 per head, except for the June 6 opener which is being called the “Recycle, Reuse, Past Relationships Party.” Anyone who brings an ex-boyfriend or ex-girlfriend to that one automatically gets in free.

Overheard

“Actually I think he’s more of a rhinestone cowboy. I’m sure his $300 boots have never come in contact with the stuff real cowboys kick.”

--Woman to her lunch companions at the Wine Bistro in Studio City