No place to pig out:Let’s get right...

No place to pig out:

Let’s get right to the point. The menu board at Dave’s Burgers in Long Beach says hamburgers are $1.95. BLTs, on the other hand, range from $17.50 to $25.

What gives, Dave?

“Well, there was this sales manager down the street who would come in for lunch and order a BLT,” says Dave Terry, proprietor of the 63-square-foot stand on Atlantic Avenue. “Pretty soon he started bringing in his sales crew and they’d order BLTs, too. I might be making eight or 10 of them at the height of the lunch hour. The problem with a BLT is all the grease. I’d have to stop to clean the grill because it gets into everything. I basically specialize in hamburgers and it was really slowing down my operation.

“Finally,” he continued, “I said to him I didn’t think I could go on making all these BLTs. So he said, ‘Well, raise the price for BLTs. Make it worth your while.’ I said, ‘OK, man.’ ”

The result?

“The next time he came in,” related Terry, “He said: ‘Twenty-five bucks for a BLT? You weren’t kidding when you said you were going to raise the prices.’ And he left.”

Actually, Terry points out, you don’t have to pay that much for a BLT. “That’s the price if I have to supply the bacon,” he explained. “If you bring your own bacon, it’s only $17.50.”

EARTH TIME VS. CALTRANS TIME: Caltrans, as we all know, seems to work according to its own schedule. Richard Gasen of Pasadena noticed that in an apparent attempt to finish a job on the Foothill Freeway by the end of September, the agency extended the month by one day.

GRIDIRON GRUMP: As an adult, Jackson Pollock became world famous for his abstract paintings. As a teenager, he attracted attention in high school because of his contempt for football.

Pollock was suspended from L.A.’s Manual Arts High in 1928 for his part in writing an underground newspaper that questioned the school’s values and suggested, “Instead of ‘hit that line,’ we should cry ‘make that grade.’ ”

Upon his return to school, he grew his hair long and wore eccentric clothing “to reflect his artistic aspirations,” according to authors Jan Greenberg and Sandra Jordan (“The American Eye”). “Members of the football team held him down and cut off his hair. Soon after that he got into a confrontation with the coach; this time Pollock threw some punches.”

He was suspended again. And, thus, an American genius in the arts failed to graduate from a school called Manual Arts.

MORE LIGHT: Gordon Yee noticed a license plate in Chino Hills that said SUN E CA. Considering the recent hot weather, we can’t argue with the notion. The only thing unusual about the message was that it was on a Virginia license plate.

ANOTHER ITEM TO BRIGHTEN YOUR DAY: Alex Litrov informs us that the co-owner of the Santa Palm Car Wash in West Hollywood is named Kalman Sunshine.

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This year’s Best of L.A. Weekly issue, in its “Charming and/or Lovely Things” section, honors one facility in Marina del Rey for its “panoramic vistas, ocean breezes, greenery, open skies and all manner of floating vessels. It has a better view than your apartment.” It’s the pay phone at Burton Chace Park, which the newspaper rated as the best of its kind in the Southland. And the cover charge is still only 25 cents.