"Don't let them cover it up until I get there!" came the excited message, loud and clear.

    He was referring to the procedure in refuse disposal.  After being dumped and spread, it is compacted, covered with about two feet of earth and watered.

    Sanitation people everywhere, including assistant chief engineer F.R. Bowerman of the Beverly Blvd. office, were alerted to the crisis.  Presumably pins were stuck in maps, as in wartime.

    From the address and time of pick up the truck was identified.  It was determined that it was en route to or had arrived at Landfill No.1, the dump site off Pacific Coast Highway near Crenshaw Blvd.

    But before the desperate search for the shoe and the $5,000 could get under way a second call came through.  The gist of it was "Never mind."

     The mystery has never been solved.  Best guess is that somewhere in Redondo Beach there is a man even more absent-minded than I am.

        A MAN WITH a wonderful sense of humor died recently and his family's grief was overwhelming.  But little by little his greatest legacy, a puckish attitude toward life, was restored to them.

    His son, going over his affairs, discovered he'd arranged an eye examination and phoned the doctor to cancel it.  He identified himself and said, "My father had an appointment for tomorrow and I wanted to tell you that he has passed away."  There was an uneasy silence on the other end and the son plunged irresistibly on, "I guess, uh, he won't be able to make it."  He thinks his father would have enjoyed it.
   

    FENDER POLISHER
As a rule, this family bus
Is fondly claimed by
    five of us,
But now it needs a wash
    and shine
And it is mine, mine , mine
    –all mine.
        GUY MULLEN

    WHEN YOU STOP to think of it, there's something elusively enchanting about the name, House Subcommittee on Legislative Oversight, which has been turning up the quiz show and payola scandals.
   
It is not only a lively departure from the usual committee names — Ways and Means, Rivers and Harbors, Foreign Affairs — but it carries the sly implication that members are digging into matters that occurred while their colleagues' backs were turned or while they had misplaced their glasses.

    Some coffee break philosophers I know think such lively nomenclature should be encouraged and have suggested names for similar committees.  To name a few: Committee on Missile Muscle, Committee to Separate the Demigods From the Demagogues, Committee on Blame-Placing, Committee to Discourage Platitudes and Irrelevance in Political Speeches.  The possibilities are endless.

    AN L.A. businessman is baffled by a recent nightmare experience in Las Vegas.  He and several friends attending a convention were having a drink in a leading spa when the floorman came over and said to him, "You've got no right coming in here, Tom, you'll have to leave." 
   
The businessman thought it was a joke perpetrated by his pals and he sat back and smiled.  The floorman summoned two large henchmen and the businessman, realizing it was not a joke, reached for his wallet to identify himself.  He never got the chance.  The two burly fellows grabbed him and propelled him into the street.

    It was the most authentic bum's rush he ever saw or felt.  But he keeps wondering who Tom is.  His name is Clarence.

    MISCELLANY — Odd thing about newscaster fluffing a line is that they sometimes feel the fluff coming but are powerless.  Frank Goss of CBS was describing Ike's "globe-girdling tour" the other day and he couldn't help it, he said "gurgling" . . . North Young doesn't think our rocket failures belong on the front page but back in the vital statistics — in the obituary column.