An order of sushi and a 7...

An order of sushi and a 7 a.m. starting time--to go, please:

In Little Tokyo, L.A. City Council aide Julie Jaskol spotted a dual-service vendor whose truck caters to Japanese tastes in food and in sports.

Aside from dispensing noodles, fish and several other delicacies, the driver displays a sign that says, “Golf Reservations.”

A spokesman for TV’s “Nightline” phoned The Times to say that the ABC show had explosive revelations that would “derail Gates.” The call was switched to the Metro section, which assigned a reporter to find out what would be said. She eventually discovered that the subject of the show was not L.A.’s police chief, but the nominee for CIA chief--Robert M. Gates.

List of the Day:

Selections from the Downtown News’ annual list of “Bests”:

1--”Best Cheap Dead Flowers”: In the parking lot of Gorky’s Cafe and Brewery, behind the downtown Flower Market, where transients gather at night to hawk wilted bouquets.

2--”Best Lube Job”: On mayoral deputy Mark Fabiani, who has a “prodigious quantity of sculpting gel in his hair.”

3--”Best Curbside Service”: At Langer’s Deli, on Alvarado Street, where you can make reservations to have your food order brought out to your car, though not, the newspaper notes, by roller-skating waitresses.

For Best Imitation of a Roadside Directive, we nominate the crafty company whose billboard off the Long Beach Freeway displays an ad that is virtually the same size, shape (diamond) and color (orange) as a nearby Caltrans sign. We’d also advise against driving off the shoulder to jot down the posted phone number.

Dear Occupants:

Mass-mailing maven Warren Meyer, who announced that he would open the nation’s first Junk Mail Museum last January, still hasn’t delivered on the promise.

“We’re having a hard time,” admitted spokesman Mike Venema.

Meyer, he explained, has “contacted American Family Publishers,” the producers of the strike-it-rich sweepstakes ads, “but they won’t provide a thing.”

Venema admitted that “we’ve been unable to contact Ed McMahon,” the sweepstakes cover boy. “And we’re still trying to find the junk mailings of P.T. Barnum.”

At least, Meyer has a hall for his museum in Studio City. “It’s in a mini-mall,” Venema said, “three doors down from California Pizza Kitchen.”

To show you how prestigious the Only in L.A. column is, we’ve been invited in recent days to judge a World’s Largest Cockroach contest and a Miss Nude International contest. We had to beg off because we didn’t have anything to wear to either.

miscelLAny:

The city of Lynwood was named for Lynn Wood Sessions, the wife of a local dairy owner.