Sweet talkBillionaire investor Warren Buffett, whose portfolio...
Sweet talk
Billionaire investor Warren Buffett, whose portfolio includes See’s Candies, was guest of honor at the confectioner’s 75th anniversary bash. When he stepped to the podium at the Regent Beverly Wilshire Hotel the other day, he tapped the microphone and murmured, “Testing--one million, two million, three million . . . “ (What--you don’t think the guy can afford good comedy writers?)
PHONE RIVALRY: It’s our theory that USC and UCLA grads have infiltrated the telephone companies so they can lash out at each other in print.
There was the time that USC’s home was listed as Westwood in a Pac Bell map in the Airport Area directory. (We refuse to believe that the boo-boo occurred because of mere sloppiness.)
Then there was the slap in USC’s face in the form of a headline that said, “L.A.’s Premier University,” above a section about UCLA in a Beverly Hills/Westside directory.
Now comes the strange linkage of UCLA and an uncomplimentary adjective in a GTE directory heading (see accompanying). Of course, we noticed, under “UCLA Store Information,” a listing for “Bearwear,” which does strike us as sort of twisted.
SPEAKING OF STATE OF MIND: Greg Scott was struck by one sentence on the warning label of a toilet purchased by his Westchester employer (see excerpt).
TWISTED BUREAUCRATS: You may recall our item about the city of L.A.’s determined effort to collect a parking fine from Dorothy Trowbridge of Lakewood, even though she was ticketed several months after she had died.
While the late Mrs. Trowbridge’s attorney presented evidence--if you consider a death certificate evidence--of her innocence, the Parking Violations Bureau won’t give up.
Now the city has turned over the matter to LDC Collection Systems, which wrote to the former address of the late Mrs. Trowbridge, threatening to seize some assets.
Alas, the city and LDC Collection Systems are out of luck. State law holds that “a cemetery plot . . . is exempt” from seizure to help pay off a debt.
MORE HARDBALL TACTICS: A solicitation recently sent to alumni by USC says, “Remember, one year ago we introduced a plan to limit the number of letters and phone calls you receive from the USC Annual Fund. Here’s how it works. If you respond to this letter, you will save USC the cost of additional mailings and phone calls to you this Annual Fund year. Send your Annual Fund gift now, and we promise not to ask again until September 1996.”
What an incentive--send money now and you’ll receive no solicitations for six whole months!
Sounds like a collection agency, doesn’t it?
miscelLAny
Rick Rofman of Van Nuys notes that on the evening after George Burns’ death, KNX radio played an episode of the old “George Burns and Gracie Allen Show.” “It was George’s birthday on this 1949 broadcast,” says Rofman, “and the show ended with the cast singing, ‘Happy Birthday.’ Somehow, it seemed an appropriate tribute.”
