A Fast Start
 A long-cherished
dream of the professors of the Italian department at UCLA — a cultural
magazine named the Italian Quarterly — recently came true. As any
proud authors, the profs were keenly interested in its reception. Would
it be a hit or a miss? And so, on publication day they hovered about a
bookstore near the campus to see how the 20 copies planted there were
going.
To their pleased amazement all 20 were quickly snapped up.
And
then the truth hit. It seemed some prof had assigned a class to
translate into English some work by Machiavelli, which by pure chance
the authors had included in Vol. 1, No. 1.
::
A SKUNK
occasionally skulks through the Sierra Vista section where Bob Will
lives and Bob is careful not to excite it. But the other day he saw
four baby skunks near a storm drain outlet and because his children are
inquisitive about wildlife he phoned the Animal Regulation Department
for advice.
He was referred to the North Side office where a
lady told him, "We have an individual who traps skunks." She took his
name and phone number. And then she added, "But don't call us, he'll
call you!" To Bob, who works in Hollywood, it was the ultimate switch.
::
THE BOSS
He is always right,
I am always wrong.
If I keep this in mind,
We always get along.
-PEARL KELL
::
LEE BELSER'S series of articles on the problems faced by released criminals has brought some curious reactions.
One
man phoned her and said he was a "perfect rehabilitated ex-con,"
happily married to a girl of Japanese descent. Another said he needed
rehabilitating badly and asked where he could find an "understanding"
woman. Another felt Lee had slighted hisalma matter, the Vacaville men's prison. "It's just as plush as Corona," he said proudly, "and I think you should have given it more space."
::
THE "Save for Ball" campaign is rapidly becoming ubiquitous. This is the madness devised by playful friends of Doarwell
Ball, a pressman, of printing the phrases on walls, buildings, vacant
store fronts and tall girders, mostly in the Civic Center. The running
gag grew out of Ball's habit of salvaging scraps of wood and other
materials by printing the phrase on them. Well, IvanNemo reports that a
portable Chic Sale installed by construction company on a project in
San Fernando Valley now has the sign, "Save for Ball" on it.
::
THREE YEARS AGO Janet Salter gave a party with nearly 100 guests for her polite, intelligent black cocker spaniel Windy, in honor of his 13th birthday. Next week she planned another for his 16th
birthday. But Windy's poor old heart couldn't hold out for it. He died
Sunday. In terms of human life she estimates he was about 112 years
old. possibly the oldest pooch in town.
::
IT SEEMS
to be spring, all right. Samuel Anderson spotted this ad, in a girlish
handwriting, among those posted on the "customer service" bulletin
board of a Long Beach market: "Cute boy wanted. Short, 7th grade, dark hair, blue eyes." And her phone number.
::
AT RANDOM — Inasmuch as all sorts of weird proposals for solving the water problem are echoing against the woodwork Ernie Maxwell of Idyllwild
has another — how about towing icebergs here from the Antarctic …
There's a scene in "A Hole in the Head" in which the sheriff comes to
evict Frank Sinatra from his debt-ridden Miami Beach Hotel. Frank
smooth talks him with, "Hello, sheriff, how's everything at Dodge
City?" A poke at westerns … Not many people know that L.A. has a
Madison Ave., too, near Beverly Blvd, and Virgil. But charcoal gray
clothes are not required garb … The gang in a downtown office has not
only a win pool on the Indianapolis race but a death pool. You pick the
name of the driver you think might get killed. They call it a ghoul
pool.
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