Not-so-happy-returns: Century City financial adviser Ken Berk...

Not-so-happy-returns: Century City financial adviser Ken Berk finds that the business world is even more specialized than he figured.

One of Berk’s clients, who had changed addresses, received a notice from Franklin Funds advising him that a letter sent to the old residence had been returned. The Franklin officer who sent the notice listed her title as:

Return Mail Specialist.

What about all the time he spends at McDonald’s?As a music instructor at L.A. City College, David Pozzi is used to hearing all manner of excuses from students who haven’t practiced, from “the dog ate my music” to “the dog ate my clarinet.”

But the most memorable excuse Pozzi has ever heard came recently from a rusty tenor sax player at the Ritz-Carlton in Pasadena who said he hadn’t had time to stay sharp “because of all the campaigning I’ve been doing.”

But Bill Clinton was impressed with Pozzi, who also plays the sax. Pozzi has been selected to perform in a group at inauguration ceremonies tonight at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

List of the Day: L.A. undergoes its own political transition later this year, but it will be difficult to forget outgoing Mayor Bradley, if only because his name has been attached to so many sites.

They include (but are not limited to) the Bradley International Terminal (LAX), Bradley Stadium (Birmingham High), Bradley Senior Citizens Center (Watts), Bradley Hall (20th Street Elementary School) and the (currently dry) Bradley Fountain (Otani Hotel).

Some previous mayors whose names are on public display (though to a lesser extent):

- Sam Yorty (1961-73), Yorty Hall, (L.A. Convention Center).

- Fletcher Bowron (1938-53), Bowron Square (L.A. City Mall).

- Prudent Beaudry (1874-76), Beaudry Avenue, as well as Beaudry’s restaurant in the Bonaventure Hotel (downtown L.A.).

- William Workman (1886-88), Workman Street (Los Angeles).

- Benjamin Wilson (1851-52), Mt. Wilson.

Mystery of the Day: For anyone who has ever wondered where the Jolly Old Elf’s helpers spend the off-season, Brent Sverdloff found the answer in Pasadena.

You never know when you’re going to be sacked: With all the fuss about ratings and competition from David Letterman and Arsenio Hall, Debbie Burkhart wonders whether the host of “The Tonight Show” may have taken a day job as a supermarket clerk in the Santa Clarita Valley.

Every Return Mail Specialist can sympathize: Postal officials complain that the current fad among owners of Elvis stamps is to mail them to nonexistent addresses, so that the letters will be kicked back with the oldie-but-goodie stamp mark:

“Return to Sender.”

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Among the newspaper racks outside the Visitor’s Center at the Hearst Castle in San Simeon sits this relic: an L.A. Herald-Examiner stand (empty).