Westside wildlife: “Please find this bear,” says...

Westside wildlife: “Please find this bear,” says the sign at a Pacific Palisades playground.

The creature’s described as “blk/wht, 9 inches tall, dirty and worn . . . 2-year-old’s special friend.”

Which probably accounts for the amount of the reward offered for the toy: $100.

No questions asked.

Storybook ending: The Book-of-the-Month Club was surprised when it learned that a Los Angeles woman had left it $5,000 in her will. Why the gesture? “We’d like to believe (she was) a satisfied member . . . but a search of our database couldn’t verify that,” spokeswoman Katherine Burkett said.

The money will be donated to the L.A. County Public Library’s Black Resource Center.

Venice Joe: On a sad note, a remembrance will be held Tuesday morning outside the Sidewalk Cafe for Joe Sigler, the proprietor of Joe’s Venice Walking Tours.

“Joe was a real institution on the Venice Beach Boardwalk,” Venice activist Jerry Rubin said of the bearded, blue-jean clad figure.

Sigler, 49, who was homeless, died earlier this week from the effects of a seizure and a fall. An encyclopedia of Venice lore, Joe had his moment of glory when he was featured in a humorous Pacific Telephone ad. It was ironic, Joe said later, explaining: “I don’t have a phone.”

She still thinks it pays to get out of bed: You may recall that a Beaumont, Tex., inventor announced last month that he was sending his Earth-Quak bed to Caltech seismologist Kate Hutton free of charge. The inventor had read that Hutton jumped out of bed to take cover from the Yucca Valley quake earlier this year. Either the mail’s slow or he’s changed his mind about sending the covered structure, which was advertised as temblor-proof.

Hutton is relieved.

“I don’t have any room for it,” she said.

Guerrilla graffiti: Perhaps a Security Pacific executive is angered over the fact that Bank of America received top billing in the recent merger of the two corporations. Whatever, readers John Heist and Che Malcolm noticed a Bank of America billboard on La Brea Avenue that has been altered by someone to read: Bankrupting America.

Welcome signs of the ‘90s: A Burbank residence displays a warning about what sounds like an unusually homicidal mutt.

License plates of the ‘90s: Sara Meric of Santa Monica spotted WHY LA on a passing car. The question is: Does the plate predate the riots?

miscelLAny:

Possibly the least-known U.S. gold-medal winner at the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics was Lee Blair, who finished first in the watercolors and drawings category. Until 1948, the Olympics offered a series of events in the fine arts competition.