Cryptic Message May Be License to Squeal

As for the mysterious BDACTOR license plate mentioned here, Erica Simmons of Encino writes that it “could mean BAD ACTOR, but it could also mean the person in question is a porn star. BD is a common abbreviation for bondage and discipline. . . . Don’t ask me how I know that.”

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THANK YOU FOR NOT LIGHTING UP OR STICKING UP: Joe Eisaman of Beverly Hills found a pawnshop in Hollywood that has prohibitions against two forms of smoke--tobacco and gun (see photo).

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DUH! AWARDS (CONT.): Years ago, a motorist might have parked at the lot spotted by Art Vinsel in San Pedro (see photo). But nowadays, the sign’s warning seems superfluous, unless there are a lot of tank drivers in the neighborhood.

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BURBANK, WE’VE GOT A PROBLEM: The latest airline quality rating study--which ranked America West as the nation’s eighth-best airline out of 10 surveyed--reminded me of a snapshot William Child took a few years ago of a not-so-reassuring announcement (see photo).

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IT’S CONTEST TIME!: Michael Wilkinson notes that the City Council, the mayor and other city agencies have moved into the City Hall East building while City Hall is being rehabbed. And council members voted to re-christen their new home as City Hall. So, Wilkinson asks, what do we call the former City Hall?

“Lohman and Barkley’s ‘The Pointy Building’ is a little dated,” he says, referring to the much-beloved radio team of some years ago. “So I think we should open it up to a contest.”

Wilkinson, inspired by a singer who shed his name in favor of a symbol, submits: “The Building Formerly Known as City Hall.”

A colleague of mine suggests renaming it the Disney Concert Music Hall, thus ending worries that a building by that name will never be completed.

But I leave it to you civic-minded readers to send me your proposals (by letter or e-mail, only, please). As usual, I have numerous strange gifts to give imaginative entrants, including a CD by Rake & the Surftones, which features the great standard “October in Oxnard.”

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L.A.’S KIND OF PHARAOH: The Learning Channel’s special on the Egyptian pharaoh Akhenaten, who lived about 3,200 years ago, pointed out that he introduced the worship of one god, the sun. Naturally, he was an outdoors type.

In fact, one foreign envoy of the time complained of having to catch too many rays, saying people could “die in the open sun.”

Egyptologist Bob Brier, the program’s narrator, said of the members of Akhenaten’s court: “They were like California sun worshipers.”

But did they play volleyball?

miscelLAny:

Kay Waters, Joe Rubich, Lisa Stecker and several others wrote that, in the bizarre menu item published Friday, I noticed the beef “ticks” but overlooked the fried “pawn.” This comes as no surprise to my wife, who says I always order too quickly from the menu. Guess I need more discipline, if not bondage.

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.