Wait till he finds out that people...

Wait till he finds out that people try to lose pounds here: Jay Berman of Manhattan Beach was at the Bradley Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport when “a well-dressed Englishman sauntered into the bar. Lacking U.S. dollars, the man asked the bartender, ‘Do you accept sterling?’ The bartender looked at him strangely and said, ‘All we got are plastic glasses.’ ”

*

Seems like it was just the other day: We’re indebted to Babs Woodcock for her reminder that Mother’s Day is less than eight months away--at least in Palos Verdes.

*

This item is supposed to be bad: John Ashman took first prize in San Jose State University’s annual Bulwer-Lytton Writing Contest for an admittedly awful piece of work. Of course, the competition honors terrible opening sentences to imaginary novels. It’s named for the 19th Century English novelist who began a novel: “It was a dark and stormy night.”

Ashman won for a pun-filled passage about Paul Revere spotting a spy’s girlfriend in a restaurant and telling the waiter, “I’m going to follow the chick an’ catch a Tory.” (Didn’t catch the pun? OK, we’ll pause here.)

A retired oil executive, Ashman said he preferred another of his entries (that is, he thought this one was worse): “Looking around him at the shattered and collapsed buildings, cracked streets, and broken water mains in his Southern California hometown, Jason shook his head and declared, ‘The San Andreas couldn’t have done this,’ but he had always been generous to a fault.”

Well, we warned you.

Asked what the grand prize is, San Jose State English professor Scott Rice said: “A cheap word processor.”

*

Amazing discoveries: It’s time to review the latest report from our gang of proofreaders at-large. Some of their bizarre findings:

* A house for sale in Torrance that boasts such luxuries as “walking closets.” (contributed by George French)

* A flyer from a doctor who’ll gladly accept patients “between ages 40 and 999.” (Chris Parnell)

* A housecleaner offering commercial “rats.” (Archie Robin)

* A package of frozen stuffed potatoes bearing the shocking warning: “May contain some skin or pieces of the natural potato.” (Terry Kirker) (We hope that admission doesn’t give frozen food a bad name.)

* A sign in a public bathroom that said: “Please flush only toilet paper down toilet.” (Chuck Nordhausen)

* A “lawnmore” shop. (Michael Bird) Shouldn’t that be “lawnless”?

* And, finally, a weather forecast that warned it would be “partly sunny tonight and Sunday.” (Florence Hirt)

Poor Bulwer-Lytton! Surely the British novelist would be more respected today if he’d only been imaginative enough to begin a novel: “It was a dark and sunny night . . . “

*

OK, dear, let’s see your driver’s license: Two of our colleagues, Frank and Dana, were helping a relative move to South Pasadena recently when they had a slight mishap. Frank backed a truck into the car that Dana was driving. What gives this tale an honored place in L.A. car culture lore is that Frank and Dana are married to each other. Oh, yes. And when they crashed, each was driving a friend’s auto.

miscelLAny The Hiatt & Peek gift shop in Long Beach displays a sign that says: “No food, no drinks, no pets. Hold children --and husbands--by the hand.”