Name Puts City in Odd Company

Anaheim shouldn’t feel it has lost any luster, even with its Angels trying to add “Los Angeles” to the team’s name. After all, Anaheim has a prominent place in the new book “The Largest U.S. Cities Named After a Food, and Other Mind-Boggling Geography Lists from Around the World.”

Listen to this: Anaheim is the sixth most populous city in the nation to have a name that is unduplicated anywhere else in the world, author Brandt Maxwell says.

And what honorable company it is for the burg to be mentioned along with such worthies as Lubbock, Texas; Shreveport, La.; and Fort Worth, Texas.

Whoops: Well, there is a catch in the above item. Maxwell put an asterisk next to Anaheim’s name, explaining in small print that there is an Annaheim in Saskatchewan, Canada. Anaheim just can’t seem to enjoy its fame alone.

But here’s an unrivaled OC city: In the book’s list of “largest U.S. cities named after a food,” Orange (pop. 128,821) is No. 1 with Citrus Heights (85,071) No. 2 and Apple Valley (54,239) at No. 5. Not that the Angels plan to leave Anaheim and move there to take advantage of the commercial possibilities of Orange’s name.

Talk about wacky geography! Kit Hope of Garden Grove saw a store ad that fell into the unclear-on-the-concept category. It carried a disclaimer that said: “Rebates may vary by state including Alaska, Hawaii, Puerto Rico and Canada.” Wonder what they think of that in Annaheim, Saskatchewan?

Welcome to the Only in L.A. Dog Show: Today’s winning entries (see accompanying) include:

* A sign for contortionist canines, which Mary De Camp of L.A. snapped.

* A battlefield sign that was probably placed there some time after the battle was fought, submitted by Deloris St. John of Laguna Niguel.

* In the golden oldie department, a bathing notice of a few years ago to dogs at a show at Cal State Long Beach, taken by your author.

* And, directions on a dog toy that prompted Charlotte Sale of Placentia to comment: “It’s probably a good thing dogs can’t read. This would just confuse them. Or, maybe this is the way dogs read.”

miscelLAny: Venice Beach will host the GoldenPalace.com World Grilled Cheese-Eating Championship on Feb. 15, an event that will include a display of a grilled cheese sandwich that some think bears a likeness of the Virgin Mary. The latter, which will not be consumed, was purchased from a Florida resident for $28,000 by GoldenPalace, an online casino.

Participants will include Sonya Thomas of Alexandria, Va., the No. 1-ranked eater in America, whose records include 11 pounds of cheesecake gulped down in nine minutes. She weighs 105 pounds.