Rain Sends San Diegans Running for Umbrellas, Cocktail Sauce

What with a pension fund scandal, a mayor resigning and two councilmen being tried on corruption charges, things have seemed fishy for some time in San Diego.

And now comes word that it rained shrimp on one area of the city. Union-Tribune columnist Diane Bell talked to neighbors who “found masses of baby shrimp on the tennis courts of the Summit residential development.”

“They’re not crazy,” testified Bob Burhans, curator of the Birch Aquarium at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, who recalled a previous rainstorm of minnows.

Bell identified the probable source of the phenomenon as a wind funnel that formed over the ocean, picking up surface creatures and then dropping the unfortunates as it lost steam.

Can it be much longer before San Diego is forced to change its self-conferred title of “America’s Finest City” to “America’s Smelliest City”?

Cops chasing NASCAR? It only looked that way on a cable station that Doug Stokes was watching (see photo).

“What happened was that the race ran over and the lower graphic is for the program that should have been running at the time,” Stokes explained.

Still, I’m surprised that no one has thought of “Cops ‘n’ NASCAR” as a reality TV show.

Cigar money: Garry Short is a kind of do-gooder who has been singling out needy people owed money on the state controller’s website for unclaimed property.

Last week, he told this column about actor Brad Pitt, who has $85.87 waiting for him. (Now that Pitt’s a single guy, he can use the dough.)

Next up: the governor of California (see accompanying).

Commented Short: “Arnold campaigned for fiscal responsibility, but is he really watching every dollar?”

Such a deal: Wayne Stuart noticed that a guitar owner couldn’t seem to make up his mind whether he wanted to sell or be burglarized (see accompanying).

Ah, that carbon monoxide tang: Ken Sutton of Gardena found a place with an unusual location for a kitchen (see accompanying).

miscelLAny: Dan Fink of L.A. pointed out that in the “Happy City” rankings of Men’s Health magazine, San Diego ranks just 44th for understandable reasons (see first item).

Anaheim, obviously upset by the Angels’ addition of “Los Angeles” to the team’s name, is 81st.

Not that Long Beach and L.A. are cackling -- they’re tied at 83rd.

Fresno, by the way, is seventh and Bakersfield is 10th, proving, I guess, that climate has absolutely nothing to do with personal happiness -- unless you’re talking about a rainfall of shrimp.

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.