Date Check Solves Baby Boom Mystery

Registered nurse Carla Niessink and her colleagues noticed an unusual number of births one night at Kaiser Hospital in Bellflower. “We said, ‘Where are all these babies coming from?’ ” she recalled. “We wondered what happened nine months ago?” They did the calculations and found the approximate start of the gestation cycle was . . .

Valentine’s Day.

Niessink said she mentioned Valentine’s Day to one new dad who had remarked about the overflow of babies that night. “He thought about it for a moment,” she said. “Then he smiled and said, ‘Oh, yeah.’ ”

PROVOCATIVE SIGN: It’s winter vacation time and, so, this column issues its annual reminder to skiers to--well, let a snapshot taken by Richard Gilbert in Big Bear get the point across (see photo).

PUTTING THE BYTE ON PASSERSBY: In Santa Monica Joyce Thompson spotted the sign of a high-tech panhandler that said “www.why lie. i need a drink.com” (see photo).

WHICH REMINDS ME: As 5-year-old Ethan Faneuff of Long Beach took part in an annual holiday lighting ritual in his house, he exclaimed: “Look, Mom, the Christmas tree’s back online!”

WALK, DON’T RUN: Ed Schlossman of Thousand Oaks came across a “pedestrian” sign that caused him to remark, “No problem. I can’t walk that fast anyway.”

DO YOUR HOMEWORK: I missed the motivational speech of Donald Trump at the Arrowhead Pond of Anaheim the other night. But I hope he made this point: If you want to become a multimillionaire, be sure to have a multimillionaire father, as he did in developer Frederick Trump.

AND THEY WERE OFF AND SHOPPING: Newsman Ron Fineman of KNX-AM (1070), who dissects the broadcasting biz on his Web site, ronfineman.com, was annoyed to hear a television anchor describe the day after Thanksgiving as the “official kickoff of the holiday shopping season.”

Fineman points out that the proper adjective should, of course, be “unofficial.” After all, he said, it was “not like the official beginning of dove hunting season. You can’t get arrested if you shop the day before, can you? The government wouldn’t take your shopping license away, would it?”

No, though I think some budget- minded parents and spouses feel that wouldn’t be such a bad idea.

WELL, THE MAN CERTAINLY KNOWS ABOUT DISASTERS: The L.A. Business Journal reports that a Hollywood director was spotted at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena the day after the Mars Polar Lander was supposed to touch down. He had a video camera with him, since he is reportedly working on two film projects about Mars. It was, eerily enough, James Cameron of “Titanic” fame.

SUNBURNS AND THE RED PLANET: I won’t believe one scientist’s assertion that there once was an ocean on Mars until Huntington Beach’s shrine to wave-riders officially changes its name to the Intergalactic Surfing Museum.

miscelLAny:

Fifty years ago, a Michigan newspaper published a list of predictions about the year 2000, some of which failed to materialize (i.e., martinis would be piped into people’s houses). But there was one valid invention forecast: The TV remote control. Looking into the future, I predict that in a few hours, when I decide to watch some TV, I won’t be able to find our remote control. Why lie, it’s enough to make me log on to drink.com.