Is Long Beach Ready for The Donald?

After the Reform Party revealed it would hold its convention in Long Beach next year, billionaire bachelor Donald Trump professed interest in the party’s presidential nomination. A coincidence? I think not. Forget about his presidential bid. Here are some of the real reasons that Trump wants to come to Long Beach:

* He wants to see the new Hooters restaurant that opened on Pine Avenue.

* He wants to buy Long Beach State’s Pyramid basketball arena and turn it into a casino.

* He thinks Long Beach still hosts the Miss Universe competition.

* He wants to rent the Queen Mary and sail it to Bermuda for his next honeymoon.

* He thought the Reform Party said Long “Island.”

COPS ‘N’ CALORIES: Winchell’s wants to make cops feel more at home at a doughnut shop (as if that’s necessary). The Santa Ana-based chain displays a police car’s “cherry-top” light on the counter in the morning to indicate its doughnuts are warm. Edna McCormick and Elida Torres set the red light spinning for me in a Costa Mesa shop (see photo).

Krispy Kreme, of course, isn’t standing still. The Southland invader has opened a shop in Orange across the street from the Theo Lacy Branch Jail, which has about 175 hungry sheriff’s deputies.

Then there’s the Spudnuts in Marina del Rey that has a special parking spot for the gendarmes (see photo).

HE GOT THE MESSAGE: One acquaintance of Richard Nixon who will never be saluted by the Nixon Library and Birthplace is prankster Dick Tuck. A Democratic campaign worker who bedeviled Nixon for years, Tuck does, however, merit half a page in David Wallechinsky’s “The People’s Almanac Presents the 20th Century.”

Take the Chinese restaurant trick. During the 1962 gubernatorial campaign, candidate Nixon’s chances were threatened by reports that his brother had accepted a suspicious $200,000 loan from Howard Hughes.

During an appearance at a Chinese eatery, the candidate noticed members of the press laughing. Tuck had stuffed the fortune cookies with the message, “Ask him about the Hughes loan.”

Tuck tormented Nixon with numerous stunts. Finally, during Nixon’s 1968 presidential campaign, an aide spotted Tuck near a box filled with Nixon campaign buttons. The buttons were printed in different languages. “Destroy them,” the aide said. “We just can’t take the chance.”

POSTAL WONDERS: A letter from a Redmond, Wash., firm, addressed to a business in Vancouver, was missent to the residence of Mary Helen Siordia.

She and the Vancouver business have the same street address on 4th Avenue. Only thing is, she lives in La Puente.

ONE LAST BOO FOR RUPERT MURDOCH: No matter how the Dodgers fare under the new leadership of part-owner Robert Daly, there’s already one thing to cheer about.

We won’t have to see those annoying “Your Dodgers--Fox Attitude” billboards any more.

A REAL CHALLENGE: Mark Harmsen of Pasadena sent along an excerpt from a car brochure that contains a typographical error (see accompanying). Then again, maybe it doesn’t. Maybe it’s another one of those ads directed at macho guys who want to test themselves.

PARENTAL GUIDANCE ADVISED: In a video shop, Santa Monica Sun columnist Hank Rosenfeld saw a young boy tug at his father’s sleeve and ask, “Daddy, when can I watch the videotape of my birth?”

“When you’re old enough,” his father answered.

miscelLAny:

So far, this has been the warmest November I can ever remember.

Steve Harvey can be reached by phone at (800) LATIMES, Ext. 77083, by fax at (213) 237-4712, by mail at Metro, L.A. Times, Times Mirror Square, L.A. 90053 and by e-mail at steve.harvey@ latimes.com.