Pint-Size Advice for White House

It’s still early in George W. Bush’s presidency, so he might want to pick up some valuable pointers from teacher Valerie Williams’ third-graders in Pasadena. Williams asked her kids at San Rafael Elementary School how they would spend the day as president. The savvy responses from Room 9:

* “In the morning I will get up at 10:50” (Vanessa Negrete)

* “I will work on my speech so I could be on TV” (Kathryne Villagrana)

* “I will read ‘How to Be a President’ ” (Anthony Vincelli)

* “I will send the Navy to see if there’s anybody polluting the ocean” (Michael Gomez-Tagle)

* “I would go eat lunch with the old President Bush and his wife. We could not talk with my mouth full” (Susan Galvan)

* “I will go to my office to see my customers” (Pray’cious Oliver)

* “I will get all the drugs and set them on fire” (Bob Cristo)

* “I would want a new big building so I could put all the people that are poor in it” (Carlos Chavez)

* “I will eat dinner, then eat junk like Cheetos” (Kevin Cortez)

* “I will stay up until one o’clock in the morning” (Frank Duran)

GUIDE TO DARING DINING: Today’s servings (see accompanying) include:

* A convection oven that took on a new meaning through a typographical error (submitted by Bob Noble of Santa Monica)

* An unappetizing-sounding burger sometimes served at conventions (from Gerald Schiller of Newbury Park, who revealed it was on a menu in Alaska that was supposed to say North “Slope”)

* Some strangely meat-based veggies (Michael Ramakrishnan of L.A.)

* And, finally, for your after-meal enjoyment, some real fake Irish cream (Bob Brigham of Manhattan Beach)

STUPID DRIVING (AND CLEANING) TRICKS: A Harold K. of Sherman Oaks was behind a motorist who was “leaning very close to the windshield, watching the wipers and water spray as she attempted to remove a large bug that had struck her car. She was so intent it was obvious that she wasn’t slowing down for the stop sign or the car in front of her.

“My dilemma was, should I honk my horn to alert her, or would that distract her even more? Before I could decide, she ran right into the back of the slowing car. Fortunately, there were only minor injuries.”

AS IF SHE WASN’T BUGGED ENOUGH: Harold K. said of the windshield-distracted motorist: “She claimed the brakes failed but her pride was damaged more than her forehead when the CHP officer received my statement relating the facts.”

TODAY’S ENGLISH LESSON: “I was driving in England’s West Country and decided to have lunch in a small-town pub,” wrote Betty Wright of Huntington Beach. “A sign was posted alongside the road that said: ‘Do Not Park on the Pavement.’ Puzzled, but anxious to obey, I carefully parked my car on the sidewalk. Later I learned that in England ‘pavement’ MEANS ‘sidewalk.’ ”

miscelLAny:

In his “Lane Ranger” column in the Rocky Mountain News, Kevin Flynn recounted how drivers whose lane was closed merged smoothly with other traffic on a Denver freeway. Flynn wisecracked: “Must not have been any Californians in the line.”

Mike Palmer of Torrance, who sent me the column, said that for Californians, Flynn’s comment was “another form of Denver boot.”

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Steve Harvey can be reached at (800) LATIMES, Ext. 77083, by fax at (213) 237-4712, by mail at Metro, L.A. Times, 202 W. 1st St., L.A., 90012 and by e-mail at steve.harvey@latimes.com.