Stockholm Syndrome Strikes Laguna Beach Man

Life, as they say, is all about making choices. The crime log of the Coastline Pilot reported that a Laguna Beach man “called police saying people were trying to hold him hostage” at 1:29 one recent morning.

“After police contacted the man,” the newspaper continued, “he said he’d rather remain a hostage than visit the police station.”

Old business: A man left a phone message for Blake Hennon, the editor in chief of USC’s Daily Trojan, saying it was an “urgent matter.”

“I was afraid we had accused some innocent person of a crime or something,” Hennon said later.

Instead, the man explained that he had just remembered making a winning bet with a couple of people on a USC-Notre Dame game a while back. He was wondering if the Daily Trojan had an article or a video of the game he could have as evidence.

Hennon said he needed some details about the game. The man could only recall that Notre Dame had jumped out to a big lead of 20-0 or so but that USC had eventually won by several touchdowns.

Hennon realized the absent-minded bettor was talking about USC’s 55-24 win over Notre Dame -- in 1974.

Test columnist: Doug Stokes of Duarte studied the writing on one envelope -- especially his designation in the address and the designation of the sender -- and immediately forwarded it to me (see accompanying).

“I ain’t opening this one up!” he said. I took the chance and it was a junk mailing for diet pills. Of course, junk mail will test anyone’s patience these days.

But it got me to thinking: There are so many diet plans out there that this column (always following the pack) is inspired to issue one of its own (see accompanying). For example:

* Instead of drinking a soda, just look at a photo of one (submitted by Gwen Schlick of San Jacinto).

* For dinner, just gnaw on your own hand (an anonymous gourmet).

* Or wrestle a bearded, horned animal with a booze problem (Steve Harris of San Diego).

* And, for dessert, nothing kills the old sweet tooth like a rodent on your plate (Terry Kirker of Whittier).

miscelLAny: Whoops. I just noticed that drunken goat is not a meat dish. Harris wrote that “it’s actually a cheese (not a very delicious one, either).” Oh well, it still sounds like the perfect appetite suppressant.

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Steve Harvey can be reached at (800) LA-TIMES, Ext. 77083 and by e-mail at steve.harvey@latimes.com.