The Mystery of the Golf Club Manager
This just in--the police log of the Los Alamitos News-Enterprise reports the following false alarm: “Katella Avenue, 4900 block, 10:58 p.m. A suspicious man seen exiting the kitchen door of the Cypress Golf Club and reentering was the manager.”
*
SUSPICIOUS MINDS (CONT.): In Seal Beach, meanwhile, the News-Enterprise said that “a woman called police because she was afraid of a noise. It was a swimming pool filter.”
*
MORE SOUNDS: The column item here about the two readers bothered by mockingbirds prompted a note from Sheila Cassidy Federman of Santa Barbara. Federman says that her mother, Anne, used to live in Cucamonga, where a local mockingbird began imitating her front lawn sprinkler.
“One year, she checked out a vinyl record set of North American birdcalls from her local library, solely for her own edification,” Federman continued.
And what happened? “The mockingbird,” she said, “began imitating the songs of birds never seen in Cucamonga!”
A nice ending. Then again, it’s not like the bird was making the sound of something really scary, like a swimming pool filter.
*
TRANSLATION, PLEASE: Thomas Leventhal of Long Beach found an auto repair shop that specializes in fixing such German models as der Corolla, der Maxima and der Civic (see photo).
Gracias, Thomas.
*
NOT THAT THE MEMBER WOULD CARE . . . A club with a rather self-evident policy toward death caught the eye of Dede Stokes of Duarte (see accompanying).
*
JUNK E-MAIL I NEVER FINISH: “Wouldn’t it be great to never get junk e-mail again? Well, no one can make you that promise unfortunately. . . . “
*
NAME GAME: Jack Murphy of the San Bernardino-based National CB Handle Registry, explaining the origin of some truckers’ handles:
* “UPSIDEDOWN has been in three (count ‘em) truck rollovers.”
* “HILLBILLY is named Billie Hill.”
* “DUCKY is named Mike Waddle.”
* “SILVER PAWS is a walking, breathing, jewelry store, with dozens of expensive rings on her fingers.”
* “FINGERS has no fingers on his right hand, only a thumb. This ex-driver had his pinkies in the holes of his custom steering wheel when a front tire blew out. ‘I shelled fingers all over the cab!’ Fingers said.”
* “BEERMAN is David Brewer.”
* “BODY SNATCHER is Steven Vincent from Newport Beach. He hauls cadavers in his refrigerated truck.”
*
TRAFFIC OBSTACLE DU JOUR: Jeff Bliss of Newbury Park ran into a traffic jam on the Ventura Freeway and eventually discovered that the cause was a disabled Army tank, which was resting on a flatbed bed truck on the shoulder.
At least the tank driver didn’t have the same problem as UPSIDEDOWN.
miscelLAny:
In the “you think you have problems” category, Norm Schneider of L.A. writes that he’s “in the process of overcoming a case of shingles, which is painful enough. But the information sheet for the medication provided by Kaiser Permanente’s pharmacy is even more painful, I think. The medicine, it states, may cause ‘nausea, vomiting, diarrhea or headache.’ ”
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.