Pasadena Is Already in the Pink

We’re all used to hearing Christmas ads in October. But, writes Elizabeth Lent of Pasadena, it’s just a bit much that the pink stripe is already in place in her town.

The pink stripe?

Yes, she says, the line that “enables the Rose Parade float drivers to follow their noses on New Year’s Day on the big swing turn at Colorado and Sierra Madre boulevards.”

Slightly less than four months from now.

And I haven’t even set out my lawn chair on the route yet.

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MORE FOOD FOR THOUGHT: Arnold Zweig of Studio City wonders why a marquee at a mini-mall seemed to indicate that some Chinese cuisine would be served in a pet shop (see photo). I find it annoying when waiters get barked at.

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UCSB ON THE Q.T.: Just to see if anyone was paying close attention, I said Friday that the initials UCSB had fallen into disuse since early this century, when they stood for the University of California, Southern Branch (as UCLA was then known).

And, sure enough, Greg Mohr wrote to inform me that there’s a university up the coast from Ventura that has been called UC Surf Board, UC Sunburned, and UC Summer Bummer (“because of the usually persistent fog along the beach”).

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NOT TO BE CONFUSED WITH . . . Moorpark Junior College, which Gene Brown notes is “sometimes known as MIT (Moorpark Institute of Technology).”

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FIGUEROA TECH WON’T LIKE THIS: When high school baseball star Sean Burroughs decided to turn pro rather than play for USC, the Long Beach Press-Telegram quipped in its Sports Gauge feature that he had been “offered millions to not attend USC . . . we’d agree to not do that for free.”

Hey, then why don’t you attend your area’s UC school--the University of Carson and Clark--as Tracy Flaming and others have heard Long Beach City College called, in honor of its adjacent streets.

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OH, SUGAR: Blossom Marks Norman of L.A. came upon a movie with a sweet plot (see photo). For that kind of passion, chocolate must be involved.

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WHO SAYS CITIES HAVE NO SENSE OF HUMOR? In Calabasas, resident Michael Bird found a serious warning that makes a playful reference to children (see photo).

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MILESTONES IN INTELLECTUAL THOUGHT: Eighty years ago, women were urged to “raise babies instead of pampering pets” by the Long Beach Apartment House and Hotel Proprietors’ Assn.

The group adopted a resolution barring animals from their premises, explaining that pets were unsanitary. “Ours will be a patriotic service if we can start a national agitation to keep women from carrying cats, dogs, parrots, monkeys and white mice around the country,” a member told the old Los Angeles Examiner.

An exception was made for canaries, which members said were clean and “whose song was declared beneficial to invalids.”

Can’t say I agree with the group. Then again, I do get nervous when I see that woman who carries a snake around her neck at Venice Beach.

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miscelLAny:

A few years ago, John Geary was arrested by Santa Monica police for dressing up in a devil costume and waving a pitchfork at passing motorists along the 10 Freeway. It wasn’t road rage but a video project for a UCLA class. He was spoofing the idea of people spotting Bigfoot, Elvis, etc.

Anyway, Geary has made quite a turnaround. He helped design the recently unveiled Walk of Faith star for Jesus Christ outside the Oasis Christian Center on Wilshire Boulevard. No hell-raiser, he.

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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.