ON TARGET: When local employment consultant Ruth...

ON TARGET: When local employment consultant Ruth Fassets calls companies about hiring the disabled, she says, “They usually talk about cutbacks or needing a fast worker.” Officials at Target in Irvine were different, she notes: “They not only were enthusiastic, they set up working hours for one to accommodate his bus schedule.” . . . . Result: the Irvine store will be honored today by the Orange County Employment Advocacy Network for “best innovation” in employing the disabled.

GOOD POET SOCIETY: Comedy skits and lively Latino music will fill the air at La Casa Garia restaurant in Anaheim tonight. But its purpose is a serious one. . . . Edelmira Marin, 17, was just a few steps from her home in La Habra when she was fatally struck by a car two months ago. Her family, struggling financially, is still trying to pay off her funeral expenses. The Chicano Poet Society put together tonight’s fund-raiser to help them.

OPRY STEPS: Ed Applegate of Laguna Hills jokes that he goes country dancing “about every night.” It’s paying off. . . . He and dance partner Tina Bright of Costa Mesa are Southern California winners of a free trip to Nashville, Tenn. They’ll be finalists in the “Best Two-Stepping Couple in America” contest at Opryland. Bright and Applegate say they hadn’t expected to win--other couples had impressive, preset routines. “We just decided to have fun, and we clicked,” Applegate says. “The judges liked that.”

NOT SO FUNNY? It was a comedy team not meant to be. When John Wayne Bobbitt announced he wanted to try comedy, comedian Todd Glass, currently performing at the Brea Improv, was interested. Bobbitt gained notoriety after his wife, citing his physical abuse, cut off his penis. . . . “We wanted to do something clever with it; he would draw people,” says Glass. Problem is, Bobbitt didn’t want to be part of Glass’ act, and negotiations broke down. Just as well, says Glass: “Comedy and wife abuse just don’t go together.”