Please don’t feed the candidates! Mike Woo...

Please don’t feed the candidates! Mike Woo was late for a campaign appearance at the Blue Line terminal at 7th and Flower streets Wednesday morning. A frazzled aide who was waiting there for the mayoral candidate was overheard barking into a two-way radio to Woo’s driver: “I want him here right now. We’ll feed and water him later.”

Probably not at Richard Riordan’s nearby Original Pantry cafe, though.

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Stupid criminal tricks: When police phoned Michael Feiman of Studio City to tell him that they had found his stolen car, he feared the worst.

But his 1991 Ford Escort, rather than being trashed, was equipped with a new set of stereo speakers, new seats and new floor mats, and it had a full tank of gas.

“Before, I’d been having trouble rolling one window up and down, and they fixed that, too,” Feiman said.

Police theorized that the thieves were preparing to sell the car. They’d even gone to the trouble of having it washed. “I found the punch card from the carwash,” Feiman said.

He added: “I get the 10th wash free.”

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If you’re upset about Dan Rather’s new assignment . . . The Venice-based L.A. Cacophony Society, which calls itself a “network of free spirits . . . beyond the pale of mainstream society,” is planning an “Art of Television Execution Contest” in July.

The 17 people who send the group the most creative suggestions for bashing boob tubes will each be given a working TV to man- or woman-handle. (We promise to relay any entries mailed to Only in L.A. and will publish some of them during the next sweeps period.)

“Executions should not exceed 10 minutes,” the society says. “Any special props, tools, costumes or crew required, etc., must be provided by contestants.”

More morbid thoughts: No sooner did we get the notice of the grim TV set execution than Kenneth Bragunier of Gardena mailed us a restaurant flyer with an ominous-sounding typo (see excerpt). And, not far from The Times, one of our photographers observed the sad sight of a hearse with a deceased engine. We presume the hearse was unoccupied.

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How many politicians fit that definition? Val Rodriguez of Signal Hill, a schoolteacher for several years, says he deducted a point for spelling but gave extra credit for imagination to the student who defined vertebrate this way:

“You are a vertebrate if you reach around with your hand to the back and you can fill a backbone.”

miscelLAny:

The records aren’t clear on how many presidents besides Bill Clinton have visited the San Fernando Valley. But at least one Archbishop of Canterbury has visited the region--just over a decade ago. The English prelate was supposed to land at L.A. International Airport but because of a mix-up, arrived at Burbank Airport. He remarked good-naturedly that he had heard of Burbank on Johnny Carson’s “Tonight” show.