It Was an R-Rated Cable Theft

Here’s a different type of film piracy: The Saddleback Valley News said a Laguna Hills resident filed a burglary report alleging that “someone broke into the house and charged $120 worth of adult programming on televisions.”

The report added: “Nothing was missing from the home.”

I-hate-cats books are one thing...: But John Hatt noticed what appeared to be a call for someone experienced in cooking felines (see accompanying).

Mark your calendars: Henk Friezer of Eagle Rock saw some good news: a notice indicating that flu season will only be half days this year (see photo).

A clue? Jerry Lewine and his wife, Sheryl, on vacation in Sydney, Australia, may or may not have been on G Street when they took one snapshot (see photo).

Excuses Hall of Fame: I heard a news report about a school district in Tucson that has set up a private website for parents, enabling them to peek at their children’s files, including absentee and tardy slips. Slips their parents may not be aware of.

Anyway, it brought to mind some of the unusual excuses that teachers hear from kids.

Former Beverly Hills High journalism instructor Gil Chesterton was told by one student that she would be late because of a power outage: The electronic gate at her house wouldn’t open, trapping her car.

Then there was the time that Frank Sinatra was very ill and one of Chesterton’s students phoned to say she couldn’t get out of her driveway because of the press mob in front of the singer’s nearby home.

Excuses Hall of Fame (cont.): Val Rodriguez, a longtime substitute teacher at Banning High, once received an absentee slip from a student who wrote in one word in the “reason” box: “Sex.”

Rodriguez also told me about a Roosevelt High student who played hooky one day in September 1945, after reading that a Pasadena prophet named Charles Long had predicted that an atomic blast would blow the planet to pieces that day.

The next day, the planet still intact, the student returned to school and explained to authorities that he stayed home “to prepare for doomsday,” specifically to watch over his pets.

“They bought it!” Rodriguez said. “No swats!” He was relieved, since he was that student.

College entries: Instructor Jay Berman still remembers the handwritten note he received from a USC student who had to miss class in order to pick up a “fiend.” Added Berman: “I was a little concerned for him.”

MiscelLAny: Local college administrators can breathe a sigh of relief that no Southern California schools made the Princeton Review’s rankings of the top-10 list of party schools in the nation. State University of New York at Albany was No. 1.

Pepperdine won for “best living accommodations” (part of which must include best ocean view). Pomona College was named the home of the “happiest students” in the nation.

Please, no jokes about the undergrads being happy that Pomona College is actually located in Claremont.

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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.