SO SORRY, PAPA: Newport Beach veterinarian Dave...

SO SORRY, PAPA: Newport Beach veterinarian Dave Curtin loves Ernest Hemingway--especially for parody. . . . Monday night he won first place--and a trip to Italy--in an annual Hemingway imitation writing competition in Century City (E4). It’s for the worst Hemingway. Curtin won it in 1987 too. . . . Curtin as Hemingway: “It was during the happy time. But the happy time was many lawyers ago.” Curtin considers Hemingway among the greats: “He’s got his moments where he’s as good as it gets.”

MULTIPLE GUITAR: It’s 25 years since Jimi Hendrix died, but his music is still going strong. A three-day Jimi Hendrix traveling truck show arrives Friday at the Hard Rock Cafe in Newport Beach. Under a pitched tent, Hendrix fans can watch tapes of his concerts, call up his music on Touch TV or watch him in a high-tech visual arts show. . . . How do they keep the famous guitarist’s sounds inside the tent from running into each other? “We don’t,” laughs Hard Rock’s Kirby Veevers. “It’s a cacophony of Hendrix; fans love it.”

SUSAN DID IT: Susan Toibin of Huntington Beach will be one of the award winners Friday night at the annual Visions and Visionaries gala of her alma mater, Cal State Fullerton. Toibin is among its most famous alumni, after writing a string of best-selling mysteries. . . . If you don’t recognize the name--she writes as Elizabeth George. Says her husband, Ira Toibin: “She wanted to use her maiden name of George. But there was the British actress Susan George. It’s about 50-50--her longtime friends still call her Susan.”

BERRY PUSHERS: The state’s Strawberry Commission holds its annual research conference in Irvine today to see plant breeding and pest control testing at the University of California’s research center there. . . . But the highlight of its two days here will be the screening of a new, 30-minute strawberry infomercial, which will run nationwide on cable TV. Among its strawberry statements: California grows 80% of the nation’s strawberries.