Soon to Be a Regular Feature of Local Traffic Reports: Duck Movement

Traffic reporters may have to start dividing their broadcasts into vehicle and duck advisories. A mom and her little quackers held up travelers on the San Diego Freeway recently, and another family of jay-waddlers did the same thing on Pacific Coast Highway in Laguna Beach.

Now the Dana Point News tells the story of still another duck (at least I’m assuming it’s a different female in each case) whose squawking and jumping about was a distraction to commuters.

A passerby stopped and discovered that the creature’s 10 young ‘uns had fallen into a storm drain. Authorities armed with a bucket rescued them, and no doubt told them to be more careful from now on.

Gee, it looks sharp-edged: George Bethell found a CD for home improvement fanatics like myself that contained the warning, “Do not install this disc in a power saw.”

Food for thought: After seeing a mention here of New Zealand’s Puke Puke Road, Candy Miller sent a snapshot from her own visit to that country of what must be the end of the road in those parts (see photo).

Back in L.A., Barry Baker found an eatery where the sign-maker had fouled up (see photo).

And Barbara Lawrence of Cypress shared an excerpt of a weighty medical form, commenting, “When they handed this out at work, I didn’t know whether to take it personally or not!” (see accompanying)

Annals of strange crimes: The police log of USC’s Daily Trojan newspaper reported that a student “feared for his safety after discovering an inflammatory note on his door advising him to pay his overdue fraternity dues.”

Anti-moocher defenses: Recent panhandler items here reminded Connie Nelson of L.A. of an item that featured her husband in the column of the late Herb Caen in San Francisco.

“Garth Nelson’s eye,” Caen wrote, “was caught by a grim-looking exec type pushing his way through the phalanx of Powell Street panhandlers with this button on his lapel: ‘What do you think I am? A [obscenity] bank?’” Nelson said they left him alone.

The mood in the joint was contagious: From the Huntington Beach Wave’s police log: “Main Street, 2000 block: A fight was reported outside Crabby Kenny’s.”

Marquee madness (cont.): Angelo Laiacona of L.A. writes that in 1938, the old Rialto Theater in Jersey City, N.J., offered this picturesque twin bill: SWING YOUR LADY OVER THE WALL. Count yourself as a true movie buff if you knew that “Swing Your Lady” was a wrestling yarn featuring Humphrey Bogart and Ronald Reagan.

miscelLAny: Steve Wiener overheard Dodger broadcaster Vin Scully add another entry to the massive volume of dumb reporters’ questions. Scully said that a Chicago newsman was interviewing Cubs pitcher Antonio Alfonseca, who has six digits on each hand. Asked the newsman: “Were you born with those six fingers?”

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Steve Harvey can be reached by fax at (213) 237-4712 and by e-mail at steve.harvey@latimes.com.