At this award show, a Golden Gavel seems fitting

All this talk about the Golden Globes and the Oscars and the writers’ strike has obscured that there’s an award show for courtroom cases -- at least in print. It’s California Lawyer magazine’s annual “Legal Follies” issue.

Some cases celebrated by the publication:

* Actor Perry Caravello asked for $10.5 million in damages in L.A. Superior Court from a comic “who allegedly tricked him into putting his penis into a mousetrap during a radio show appearance.”

* A court ordered a nun to pay a Redlands woman $3.2 million in damages “from a hit and run accident.” (This was a driving, not flying, nun.)

* After leaving jail, a 59-year-old man with numerous “peeping related” arrests sued the San Rafael, Calif., Police Department “for the return of his vast pornography collection, which his attorney valued at as much as $25,000.”

Don’t know why the “Legal Follies” haven’t been made into a TV show by now.

Word imperfect

Shelby Adams noticed that a pavement painter at a condo in Rancho Santa Margarita might have been working a bit too FAST (see photo).

Pavement problems (cont.)

Adams’ photo reminded me of some other bad spelling cases I’ve come across, including a right-turn directive that was wrong and a warning of something “aheda” (was that meant for a street in Italy?) (see photo).

A little jailhouse humor

You may have read that the most recent bail bonds company used by O.J. Simpson was You Ring, We Spring. The company obviously adheres to the industry’s proud tradition of catchy names and slogans. Here are some others (which I know none of you are personally familiar with):

* “Kiss Jail Goodbye” (Lipstick Bail Bonds)

* “We’re Ugly but We’re Honest” (Herbert Bail Bonds)

* “We Have the Key to Any Jail” (Junior’s Bail Bonds)

* “Don’t Go to Bed With a Price on Your Head” (Deep Water Bail Bonds)

And, my favorite slogan:

* “Call Now. Because Your Mama Wants You Home” (Bad Boys Bail Bonds)

Double threat

A resident wrote to the Palisadian-Post to nominate, for “this year’s official Palisades Village Idiot,” a young man who was seen smoking a cigarette on a no-smoking canyon trail while walking far behind his unleashed pit bull.

A hunk, a hunk

of burning lead

Linda Swain of Brea wondered why a warning attached to her Elvis cup implied that only Californians need to worry about the lead in the paint (see photo).

“Is there some magical transformation that happens once we cross the state border that renders the cup safe?” she asked.

The lead interacting with clean air, perhaps?

MiscelLAny

Readers of one suburban newspaper might have been momentarily startled to see, next to a Page One headline that said, “Richardson bows out of campaign,” a headline that said, “Hillary dies.”

In smaller print, the newspaper identified the latter as mountain-climber Sir Edmund Hillary.

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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