Even in Death, Location Is a Must

Arnold Horton saw an ad touting the availability of a “double crypt adjacent to Monroe”--meaning actress Marilyn Monroe--at Westwood Memorial Park. “What comes to mind,” Horton commented, “is the real estate industry’s universal admonition, ‘Location, location, location.’ ”

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DINING GUIDE FOR THE ADVENTUROUS: For today’s selections (see accompanying), we offer:

* An unusual tip about cold cuts,

* Some egg foo yung that is under the weather (submitted by Edith Zittler).

* And a drinks menu with something stronger than the hair of the dog (from Jim Davis).

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SUCH A DEAL (CONT.): After a photo appeared here of a not-so-great bubble gum bargain on Tuesday, I heard from the Burbank gas station proprietor who conceived the promotion.

“It’s a joke,” Ted Shachory said of the display, which offers pieces of gum at 10 cents each or 10 for $1.25.

“A lot of people laugh when they see the sign,” he added. “But at least once a day someone buys 10. If it’s a child I won’t take the extra quarter, but if it’s an adult I do. We’re not talking geometry or algebra here. . . .”

Shachory recalled that one careless shopper went the 10-for-$1.25 route and was on the San Diego Freeway before he realized it was a bad idea. The customer returned to the station to point out the disparity.

“The 405 is 7, 8 miles from here,” Shachory said. “It took him that long to figure it out. I refunded him the whole $1.25.”

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FROM SHOP GIRL TO STAR: Seventeen-year-old Angela Lansbury was working behind the cosmetics counter at the old Bullock’s Wilshire store when she got her big break: an offer to appear in the movie “Gaslight” (1944).

Her co-biographers , Rob Edelman and Audrey Kupferberg, say that when her boss at Bullock’s heard his $28-a-week employee was taking another job, he said, “Tell me how much they offered you. Maybe we can give you the same--or even more.”

“Well,” Lansbury answered, “they’re going to pay me $500 a week.”

So much for the cosmetics career.

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DOG DAY: On what was billed as “L.A. Appreciation Day,” Xerox put on a free luncheon outside City Hall, offering hot dogs and sodas to passersby. A long line of hungry freeloaders could still be seen when an official announced that the hot dogs were gone. “There is no more food,” he said loudly.

Standing in line, community activist Joe Shea couldn’t resist yelling to the Xerox rep, “Make some copies!”

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SPACEY RESEDA: I was opposed to the San Fernando Valley seceding from the city of L.A. until I saw a catalog for the Bay Area UFO Expo in San Mateo (Sept. 4-5). It lists a presentation of “high-speed footage taken in Reseda, Calif.” that “proves there is an unknown life form that exists among us.” There is “nonstop broad daylight footage of these incredible objects. They are in our skies, in our oceans and in our homes!”

Look , we don’t want any trouble, Reseda. If you want to secede, go on.

miscelLAny:

I mentioned James Morgan’s book, “The Distance to the Moon,” an account of his cross-country driving odyssey from Miami to L.A. In case you were wondering about the title, Morgan said it refers to a calculation by novelist John Updike that the average American male drives the equivalent distance from the Earth to the moon every 17 years. With a side trip to Reseda.

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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.