No returns of dead goldfish:Joyce Clark Shults...

No returns of dead goldfish:

Joyce Clark Shults noticed that the reopened Northridge Fashion Center has posted a visitors’ Code of Conduct, which prohibits, among other things, bringing in “animals, living or dead.”

MOVING ON TO DEAD GUNSLINGERS: Art Vinsel, a former newspaper guy who lives in San Pedro, shed some light on the 1981 theft of Billy the Kid’s tombstone. The Ft. Sumner, N.M., marker, as we said, was found in a Huntington Beach bedroom. Police noticed it while questioning the occupant about another burglary.

The suspect, it turned out, was from New Mexico. And when police asked why he would swipe a tombstone, he responded:

“I just wanted something to remind me of home.”

WAITER, BRING ME A BACKGROUND CHECK: Nancy Forcher of Palm Desert sent along the enclosed menu item, asking, “Do we really want to know about the crabs’ past for $13.90?”

FREAK MANUSCRIPT: Talk about your historic finds! Publicist Cary Baker, who’s involved in the re-release of the late Frank Zappa’s recordings, writes: “I came across this relic from a 1968 Frank Zappa press kit, designed by Zappa himself.”

Titled, “Freak Out Hot Spots!” it is the iconoclastic performer’s sardonic guide (complete with map) to the various haunts in the Sunset Strip area. By this time, the area had made the transition from old-style gangsters and starlets to long-haired hippies and teeny-boppers.

Return with us now as we recall such spots as the Red Velvet (“for the plastic & pompadour set”), Gazzarris (“still happens on a hard rock custom pompadour sport-coat level”), and P.J.’s (“the greatest place in town to see Trini Lopez in action”).

One of the most useful features of the guide was the pinpointing of clubs where police raids were likely. Pandora’s Box on Sunset was styled as a “teeny-bop underground stronghold with ingenue freaks and lots of atmosphere, but tiny. Try sitting at Frascati’s across the street and watching The Heat surround the place, while the kids scramble for cover. Keen fun.”

Alas, Pandora’s Box is now a traffic island.

Sic transit whatever.

MORE ON THE FREAK GUIDE: Note to reps of the Huntington and Getty Museums--please contact publicist Baker, not us, if you are interested in acquiring the Zappa manuscript.

WE DIDN’T KNOW HOW TOPICAL WE WERE: We just mentioned the novel “Di and I,” which has a British princess eloping to Rancho Cucamonga with a screenwriter. Then we read that, in real life, Diana has been linked to a millionaire printer from Sylmar. Yes, our Sylmar--the one near Granada Hills.

THE UNOFFICIAL L.A. FREEWAY SLOGAN: A colleague of ours was cut off on the Pasadena Freeway by a driver whose bumper sticker said: “Nevertheless, Me First.”

miscelLAny When British actor Hugh Grant was arrested for lewd conduct in Hollywood on June 27, he was wearing a Dodgers baseball cap. The Dodgers lost 10 of their next 13 games. Call it bad karma, or carma.