Sleepy Students Can’t Catch a Fashion Break at Hard-Nosed Middle School

When I was growing up in the 1950s, boys were forbidden to wear short pants or T-shirts to school. And girls were required to wear dresses; at least I think they were. I’m not positive because I wasn’t a girl.

Anyway, as we all know, dress codes have loosened up considerably since then. But some school administrators have begun to clamp down on extreme fashions--even in Pacific Palisades.

A public address announcement at Paul Revere Middle School the other day declared that, henceforth, any student wearing pajamas to class would be sent home.

Dress code for the faculty? Brian Wood of Laguna Woods noticed a job opening for teachers who might wear diapers (see accompanying).

Back to the fashion police: Students aren’t the only ones who dress casually in the Southland, of course. I remember being on jury duty in Long Beach and hearing this stunning announcement:

“Do not bring your beachwear, jurors. Do not wear your swimming suits. This is not a beach resort. This is a court. You cannot wear shorts.”

Outrageous! After all, it was the summer.

Thanks for the warning: Betty Allen of Valencia spotted a listing for a house that evidently could cause some heartache for the new owners (see accompanying).

Food for thought: I’ve heard of free-range chicken, but Tilda De Wolfe of Monterey Park found a menu that had a freshwater version.

In Vermont, meanwhile, Bill Stark of Pasadena came upon a restaurant combining seemingly unrelated schools of dining. I understand the cuddfish is delicious (see accompanying).

Taming telemarketers (cont.): The subject of telephone solicitors got writer Jon Dowling of L.A. to thinking about the time his number was one digit off the local Wal-Mart’s number. He received so many wrong numbers from insistent people with toothaches, etc., that he changed the message on his answering machine to say:

“You have reached the new, Wal-Mark Pharmacy, automated drug delivery system. For prescription drugs, press 1. For over-the-counter drugs, press 2. For under-the-counter drugs, press 3 . . . “

And the result? “I would come home to messages that consisted entirely of beeping noises,” Dowling said. “People actually tried to use the ‘automated’ system. A surprising number were interested in the ‘under the counter’ drugs.”

miscelLAny:

On the subject of dumb car names, Bonnie Sloane and John Nichols point out that Thomas Hine’s book “Populuxe” recounts how Ford once asked poet Marianne Moore to supply an inspirational name for a new model.

She volunteered these possibilities:

* Pastelogram

* Mongoose Civique

* Faberge

* Resilient Bullet

And . . .

* Utopian Turtletop.

Ford rejected them all. Instead, it chose Edsel, whose sales proceeded at a turtle-like pace.

*

Steve Harvey can be reached at (800) LA-TIMES, 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.