The Not-So-Friendly Skies:Just when we were beginning...

The Not-So-Friendly Skies:

Just when we were beginning to relax with the rapprochement between the United States and Soviet Union, the Cold War escalated between LAX and El Segundo.

The latter’s City Council this week approved the purchase of three videotape cameras to photograph jets that violate El Segundo’s airspace.

Stopped at a red light in Lakewood, attorney Stan Kelton watched in fascination as the woman driver in front of him intricately applied mascara. They missed the next light, too, at which the woman sprayed her hair. As the signal changed, she was brushing her hair furiously. As Kelton relates it: “I said to myself, ‘Who does she think she is, a beauty queen?’ ” Then he noticed her license plate, which said: MISLB90. And the name “Wendy” in the license plate frame. It was, of course, Miss Long Beach, Wendy Christensen.

L.A. City Hall practically doubles as a movie set, but it was a real-life cause when Cody Anderson rode up in a three-wheeled bicycle that resembles the space shuttle Challenger. Anderson, 34, has pedaled across the United States and hopes to bicycle around the world to raise funds for CARE and call attention to the plight of starving children.

One puzzling aspect of Southern California for newcomers is the eagerness of the police to dole out jaywalking tickets, unlike their brethren in the East. In addition, the beach cities out here are known for their fanatical enforcement of parking regulations.

With this in mind, the Second City Theater in Santa Monica is offering free admission to its “Lord of the Medflies” comedy show (Saturdays excepted) to anyone who can show proof of having been ticketed in either of these categories.

Warning: The theater has no parking.

Speaking of Medflies, no new malathion song or poem turned up for two weeks, and we were ready to announce that the infestation was officially over. Then we heard from Ismail Hernandez Jr. of East L.A., with still another variation: a Medfly rap song. Wait until Florida hears about it.

When we published the unusual cover of the Southern California Business Opportunity Guide--it features a gunman--we overlooked the fact that it also contained a prominent misspelling of the contraction you’re. Well, pardon us! Lisa Lamborn, Leigh Hess, Frances Wielin and about a dozen other eagle-eyed readers wrote to point it out. “You see a gunman,” summed up Helen Trueblood of Bakersfield. “I see a crime against the English language.” Talk about rough audiences. . . .

miscelLAny:

Of Los Angeles County’s 4,083 square miles, 46% are mountains, 43% are flatland, 6% are hilly, 3% are islands, 1 1/2% are mountain valleys, and 1/2% are marshland. Mini-malls are included in the flatland total.