Think positive thoughts, Rover: Marilyn Cagle noticed...
Think positive thoughts, Rover: Marilyn Cagle noticed a sign in West L.A. announcing the coming of a “Holistic Animal Health Care” shop. At last. Have you seen what vets charge these days?
We imagine the holistic store will serve up organic milk bones not to mention crystal dog collars and pyramid-shaped doghouses.
And, too, it no doubt will market a tape of holistic dog commands:
“Sit!”
“Shake!”
“Meditate!”
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Not in the chase: A reader spotted it and the Department of Vehicles confirmed the sighting. There’s a 1994 Ford Bronco with the license plate, NOT OJ S.
We wonder what the driver of NOT OJ S would think if he came up alongside another eye-catching plate spotted by a colleague on the Harbor Freeway: THE DNA.
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Which reminds us: Here’s a bit of bad news for the Simpson defense team if it’s thinking of adding to its forces. The passing rate for the California Bar exam in February was an unexpectedly low 41.6%, down from 43.3% from a year ago.
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The worst setback yet for Detroit: A while back we checked out another report with the DMV and found that there is a Southern Californian whose driver’s license says “God.” We didn’t think much more about him--yes, the DMV says that God is a man--until we received a photo from Paul Young of Marina del Rey.
Young, who parks next to God in an office complex in Marina del Rey, says he’s never seen him. (Which is no surprise, some might say.) But, Young notes, that he has seen God’s parking stall occupied--by a foreign car.
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The L.A. sound: “What Was the First Rock ‘n’ Roll Record?” a book by Jim Dawson and Steve Propes, asserts that the landmark recording was made July 2, 1944, in L.A.’s (since-vanished) Philharmonic Auditorium next to Pershing Square. The tune was “Blues, Part 2,” that included guitarist Paul Leslie and pianist Slim Nadine.
Paul Leslie and Slim Nadine, the authors point out, were phony names. Leslie was actually Les Paul, who “was in the Army at the time and not allowed to record as a civilian musician.” And Nadine was under contract to Capitol Records. The pianist was better known as Nat King Cole. Pretty fair singer, too.
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Moving on to the ‘50s: Dale Olson sent us a business card that makes a whimsical reference to a recording exec’s previous life. Discovered warbling on a street corner in Philadelphia, according to legend, he was signed to a contract and turned out such Fab 40 hits as “Tiger” and “Turn Me Loose.” Does anyone sing on street corners anymore?
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No sweat these days: Yes, now that he’s won a national title, UCLA basketball coach Jim Harrick is no longer harassed by alumni. He has, in fact, become a national celebrity. How do we know? He’s now featured in a deodorant commercial.
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Hey, mini-malls have feelings, too!Parade magazine reports that Old Pasadena, with its impressive display of upgraded historic buildings, has won an award from the National Trust for Historic Preservation. But what we can’t understand is why Parade had to say that Old Pasadena took the preservationist route “when it could have become an extension of the L.A. suburbs.”
Hey, Parade, just ‘cause you’re not into doughnut-shop architecture . . .
miscelLAny We’ve taken a vow to stop dispensing anagrams for L.A. Let’s move on to Santa Monica. One anonymous poet shuffled the letters for that city and came up with: NO SATANIC MA. Or, if you prefer something slightly more disgusting: A SNOT MANIAC.