When Any Name but John Will Do

The cable channel E! sent an advance tape of its profile of ex-madam Heidi Fleiss to The Times’ James Bates, who was one of the reporters interviewed for the show.

He noticed that throughout the program he was referred to as “John Bates.”

“I called up the producer,” Bates said, “and told him there’s one too many johns in your program.”

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ROASTING CITY HALL: The play “Julius Caesar” is appearing nightly on the City Hall steps. Inside the City Council chamber the other day, comic Milton Berle was sharpening his own knives, as he was about to be honored for his 90th birthday.

Said Uncle Miltie: “It’s an honor to be here--an inconvenience, actually.”

Told that his proclamation would be jointly presented by Mayor Richard Riordan and council members Joel Wachs and John Ferraro, Berle cracked: “You’re all going to present it? I have to be on the set next June.”

He also commented that Riordan didn’t need to tell any jokes, explaining, “What you do as mayor is funny enough.”

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HEROIC PIZZA MAKER: Two column readers (whose names I unfortunately misplaced) notified me of an eatery that claims in its flier that it will save the city of Claremont (see accompanying). Possibly it meant “serve.” This sounds more interesting than the plot for “Armageddon.”

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THE ALAMO DOESN’T REMEMBER: Tom Gaul of Agoura Hills notes that if out-of-town tourists attempt to visit a couple of the attractions on the Alamo car rental map, they will be in for disappointments, not to mention wasted mileage. The map lists two vanished landmarks--Marineland (see accompanying) and Busch Gardens, both of which went flat in the 1980s. I wonder if that pizza maker could have saved them too?

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BATHTUB PIRATES? Long Beach toy store owner Wendy Salaya received a shipment of what were supposed to be rubber fowl. When she saw the label on the box (see accompanying), she confessed: “I was a little nervous about opening the carton and letting loose a flock of ‘robber’ duckies in my store.”

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BUILDING YOUR VOCABULARY (CONT.): OK, class, in our last session, we learned that the grass strip separating the sidewalk and the street has been called a “parkway” in the West and a “tree lawn” and a “boulevard” in other parts of the country.

Another term, pointed out by Edmund A. Hamburger and Jonathan Fink, among others, is a “verge.” Used in Britain, a verge is defined as “a grassy border, as along a road.”

Mimi Pond added that her mother also uses “verge . . . like on ‘the verge of insanity.’ ”

Yet another reader said he was informed by a city planner in Florida that the correct term is “swale,” which my dictionary refuses to swallow.

miscelLAny:

On this day in 1977, The Times reported one of the most confusing clashes of interest groups ever on Hollywood Boulevard. About 20 prostitutes were staging a Hookers’ March down Hollywood Boulevard when they ran into a counter-demonstration by sign carriers identifying themselves only as Christians. After some scuffling, several of the Christians left to taunt a nearby group of Hare Krishnas. Hollywood Boulevard--on the verge. . . .

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Steve Harvey can be reached by phone at (213) 237-7083, by fax at (213) 237-4712, by e-mail at steve.harvey@latimes.com and by mail at Metro, L.A. Times, Times Mirror Square, L.A. 90053.