Pedestrian Guilty of Call Blocking

At a crosswalk in Santa Monica, Manny Gutierrez of Studio City saw the pedestrian walk signal flash “and the man in front of me walked into the crosswalk without looking. He was tapped lightly (no harm done) by a still-moving vehicle. The driver leaned out of the window and begged forgiveness, saying ever so apologetically, ‘I was busy making a phone call.’ ”

I’m surprised the driver didn’t yell at the pedestrian for interrupting his conversation.

*

DUELING SIGNS DEPT.: John Klein of Agoura Hills spotted a juxtaposition of signs in a restaurant that raised the question: “But do you have to have reservations?”

And Al Schinnerer of Huntington Beach found some misdirections on a street corner in Signal Hill (see photos).

*

UNUSUAL MURALS: Sharon Bishop noticed that a couple of previously sad-looking tree stumps in Eagle Rock are suddenly smiling (see photo).

*

WHEN IT WAS REALLY ADVENTURELAND: “In America,” Susan Sontag’s new novel, was inspired by the emigration to America of celebrated Polish actress Helena Modjeska, who settled in a Utopian commune near Anaheim in 1876.

In Sontag’s novel, actress Maryna Zalezowska and her companions reacted to 19th century Anaheim thusly: “No landscape, not even the swampy jungle of the Isthmus of Panama, had struck any of them as this awesomely strange.”

The weather seemed to consist of “only two seasons here: a hot dry summer, followed by a long temperate spring called winter.”

It’s so quiet that they could hear the “sound of their own footfalls. Pausing, they could hear the hiss of skinny desert-colored creatures. . . .”

There were bigger creatures, too. Hence, one of the first queries from their new neighbors: “They ask how many guns we have.”

Zalezowska’s son stationed himself on the porch, where he practiced “answering the coyote’s howl.”

Today, in not-so-wild Anaheim, of course, kids need little practice answering the greetings of Goofy.

*

THEATER-IN-A-HURRY: “In America” also contains a passage from famed tragedian Edwin Booth (the brother of Lincoln’s assassin) in which I detected the Easterner’s typical disdain for cultural efforts on the West Coast.

“I remember a theater manager in California, when I was very young,” Booth says, “whose idea of conducting a rehearsal was to keep calling out to the company: ‘Hurry up! This don’t run smooth. More ginger! More ginger! Don’t wait for cues!’ ”

*

LOWRIDER: In Paramount, L.A. County sheriff’s deputies were handcuffing a man accused of domestic violence when he broke free and started to run. Alas, his trousers dropped and he tripped. Yes, it was one of the rare times that a suspect was actually caught with his pants down.

miscelLAny:

I read on Don Barrett’s laradio.com Web site that the radio personality Mr. KABC is miffed because The Times, on seven occasions, has revealed his real name (which he never uses on the air).

I am one of the offenders. But, you have to understand that when Mr. KABC worked at a previous station in town, he called himself Mr. KFI. And, I have to confess, I thought that was his real name, gullible columnist that I am. So when he became Mr. KABC I became suspicious and did some investigating. I found out he was really Marc Germain (that makes eight!).

*

Steve Harvey can be reached at (800) LATIMES, Ext. 77083, by fax at (213) 237-4712, by mail at Metro, L.A. Times, Times Mirror Square, L.A. 90053 and by e-mail at steve.harvey@latimes.com.