A Way to Strip Yourself of Phone

A Topanga club says in its latest newsletter that it’s a great place to visit if you want to get away from cell phones. I guess it would be difficult to wear one of the gizmos there. The club is the Elysium Institute nudist colony.

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STUPID DRIVER TRICKS: Jim Helms found himself behind two cars at a metered onramp to the Foothill Freeway in Arcadia. The light was red. A sign said, “Two cars per green.” The car on the left ignored the red light and proceeded ahead. The car on the right happened to be equipped with a blinking red light, which was immediately activated. It was a CHP car.

Helms said:”It has to be the quickest traffic stop in CHP history.”

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DIDN’T CATCH THE NAME: A pair of subscription pitches from the New Yorker mystified a Sunland resident. Each bore the same cartoon, but the captions were slightly different.

In the first, a businessman snubs someone named Ronald (see Exhibit A).

In the second, the name “Ronald” has been deleted (see Exhibit B) in what appears to be some hasty editing (notice the lonely comma).

Was the second version sent out because the magazine feared it had offended the Ronalds of the world? Not at all, says a spokeswoman. The plan was to send one personalized and one un-personalized mailing.

Well, gaffe or not, perhaps next time the magazine won’t use a cartoon that insults the name of the potential subscriber. The Sunland man signed up anyway, by the way, although his name is Ron Burton.

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TALK ABOUT HITTING A SOUR NOTE: A Beverly Hills man who popped his knee while helping his godmother move a piano can sue her for negligence, the L.A. Daily Journal reported. The 2nd District Court of Appeal concluded that allowing the suit to go forward would “encourage people to exercise more care in asking for help and in performing their own share of the heavy lifting.”

The plaintiff, in his mid-20s, claimed that when he and his godmother attempted to lift the piano so she could vacuum, it slid out of her hands. While attempting to avoid being struck by the piano, he said, he popped his knee.

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A REAL DAMAGE-CONTROL CHALLENGE: It probably comes as no shock to you that a woman charged with running a huge call girl ring that catered to celebrities is represented by a public relations firm. The defendant is Jody Diane Babydol Gibson and, naturally, this is a busy time for her PR firm.

I’m not on its mailing list. But KCBS received a letter and a photo from her reps, explaining, “She would appreciate the courtesy and fairness of the media to use this photo instead of the unflattering photo distributed by the LAPD.”

Those LAPD photogs just have no sense of style.

miscelLAny:

Doug Hubbard notes that the July issue of the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction carries a story, “The Lizard Men of Los Angeles,” by Lewis Shiner.

Hubbard says the story describes subterranean caverns dug by “survivors of Atlantis” and “shaped like a large lizard with the head under Chinatown and the stubby tail stretching to underneath the Central Library.” Impressive digging!

Why couldn’t the Lizard People have been around to bid on the MTA subway project?