Cell Phone User Turns a Deaf Ear, and 1-Digit Salute, to Restaurant’s Caveat

I wrote about the vacation find of Wally Schultz of Rancho Cucamonga: an Italian restaurant where visitors are required to deposit their cell phones in small lockers. It’s for la tranquillita di tuti, naturally.

Well, Robert Helfman of L.A. recalled seeing a more impromptu type of cell phone control at Millie’s in Silver Lake.

“Millie’s menu has a one-line ‘No Phones’ caveat prominently shown,” he said. “One morning, a friend and I observed a 20ish couple sit down at a table. The woman’s cell phone rang, and she pulled it out and started talking.

“All the servers clustered around her table like crazed Wagnerian Harpies and began chanting, ‘No phones! No phones!’ ” Helfman continued. “Within seconds, all the other patrons gleefully took up the cry. The woman looked around, gave us all a mad-dog stare and a one-digit salute, and stomped out to the sidewalk to finish her conversation.” She still couldn’t let go of that phone, though!

Easy for them to say: Cy Baumann of Irvine found another one of those instructional signs that can challenge the tranquillita of the daily commute (see photo).

Dieters beware: Mary Jane Linder of La Canada saw a warning in one restaurant that, if read the wrong way, could result in quite a mad scramble, what with the diners grabbing for each other’s food (see photo).

Annals of strange crimes: Phyllis Waggner of West Hollywood sent along a prowler/burglary report from the Palisadian-Post about a suspect who was confronted after a break-in.

“I’m not a bad person--please do not scream,” the intruder said before fleeing. No property was taken.

The report described him as a 30ish male “dressed as a woman.”

This litigious trend has gone too far: Dan Fetterly of Van Nuys noticed a “shocking” statement in a product label (see accompanying).

Secessionist songbook: Don Barrett’s laradio.com Web site reprised some of the titles that the Only in L.A. column said could serve as anthems for (or against) the San Fernando Valley independence struggle.

But a couple of Barrett’s readers challenged my inclusion of “L.A. Breakdown,” the old Jack Jones recording, as inspirational stuff for the breakaway effort.

They pointed out that the lyric actually is “L.A., break down and let me in.” Curses! My fiendish plot to infiltrate the secessionist movement with anti-secessionist songs has been uncovered.

miscelLAny: Richard Showstack of Newport Beach would confer a “Duh!” Award on the car company whose television commercial shows an SUV swimming underwater with sharks. The caption reads: “Dramatization.”

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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.