Local Women’s Club Debuts New Eyesore At Weekly Sunday Night Blowout

By Ingomar Schoenborn, Quilt Staff
DATELINE: JORDAN AVENUE

The Canoga Park First Wednesday of the Month Women’s Club officially unveiled a new billboard-sized sign advertising its nightclub venue this past Sunday, as part of its popular “F.U.C.K. the Neighborhood” series of events the club premises hosts.

The Women's Club's new sign, unveiled during last night's typical Sunday night blowout, solicits those
willing to stage similar events and ensure Canoga Park's future of ongoing pandemonium. Staff photo.

The large wooden sign was actually installed at the beginning of the summer, but the Club wanted “just the right event” to mark its official debut. Last night’s raucous free-for-all — with music so loud it simultaneously set off three separate car alarms in the club’s parking lot — seemed a perfect fit.

“We needed a new sign since the one in front of the building is as rickety and old as most of our few remaining members,” laughs Bessie Betelmeyer, 92, Official Club Chronicler of Those Darling ‘Consumer Cellular’ Commercials.

Bessie Betelmeyer, left, and Mildred "Millie" Kordas at a Women's Club event in 1997. File photo.

Indeed, the old sign, installed “Oh, God knows when,” according to 87-year-old Mildred Kordas, Secretary in Charge of Calling Now For Information On How A Reverse Mortgage Could Benefit You, has seen better days. Oft-replaced plexiglass protects the club’s logo from would-be vandals, since the sign is a popular and frequent target of local taggers. 

“It’s hard to keep on top of that, since so many of [the taggers] are themselves guests at the events that are held here,” Kordas says.

The Women's Club's venerably creaky, dry-rotting "old" sign. Photo courtesy DAИK Enterprises, LLC.

As of this writing, however, the new billboard, located on the south side of the building, is currently pristine and completely free from local gang tags or other vandalism.

That handsome new sign serves another purpose, too: Its front lawn forebear is arguably misleading as it still identifies the ramshackle building on the corner of Jordan and Valerio primarily as a women’s charitable organization, despite the widely-held view that the popular nightclub venue merely holds just enough quaint “old-lady” type functions to maintain a tenuous hold on its tax-exempt status.  The new sign acts as an oversized, highly visible mission statement of sorts, helping to educate the public more accurately about the institution's current purpose. 

Doreen Farber.
Photo: Fred Farber

But perhaps, just by being erected, the billboard has already served its most important duty: as a token means for the club to spend a meager sum from its coffers.

“I’m required to use a certain amount of the rental fees we bring in and reinvest it on maintenance, upkeep and improvements. So naturally, I pushed for a sign made from a cheap sheet of plywood,” says Club President In Charge of Neighborhood Cacophony Doreen Farber, known as much for her wonderfully dismissive manner as she is for her delightful incompetence in managing a tiny organization with a dwindling membership.

“The other members wanted better security or sound-proofing," she says, shaking her head in annoyance. "Shit, I green-light either of those things and Fred and I won’t be able to afford to go to Kauai again this fall.”

News In Brief — August 24, 2016

A brief, up-to-the-moment news 'round-up' of news in and around Canoga Park and surrounding areas that surround Canoga Park.
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Tuesday September 6th Is Picture Day
LAUSD faculty working in Canoga Park’s Early Education Center are encouraging parents of newborns, toddlers and other pre-school girls to get their daughters’ ears pierced now to give them plenty of time to heal properly in time for Picture Day on Tuesday September 6. Additionally, local tattoo parlors are reminding middle school boys as well as high school girls who have been putting off getting their back-to-school ink to come on in with their tattoo vouchers: Whether they’re looking to get the simple and classic three-dot design by the eye or on the hand — or even an elaborate tramp stamp — there’s still time to get the work done and have the scabbing clear up so that new tat looks its best in time for yearbook photos.

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New Sign At Corner Shopping Center Sets Neighborhood Abuzz
A new sign advertising the businesses on the northeast corner of Saticoy and Topanga, in Canoga Park's bustling Satipanga shopping district, has been put up, or erected, at the edge of the lot to the delight of drivers and pedestrians alike. The stately marquee, designed by Canoga Park's own Peppy Sign's & Banner's features the signature "free apostrophe" the company is well-known for. "We do offer a complimentary punctuation mark for every 50 characters purchased," says Peppy Sign's owner Jim Powell. "We decided to give it to Taco's Reyes, because frankly, we really like their taco's."

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Canoga Park Family Eschews Funeral, Memorializes Son On Back Of New SUV Instead
A local family who lost their son to the exciting and fast-paced sport of illegal street racing chose to use the decedent's life and car insurance payouts to purchase a new Ford Expedition rather than stage a traditional funeral, and then honor his memory by creating a tribute to him in Brush Script text decals on the vehicle's back windshield. Frankie "Capusta" Murcek was racing against friends along Topanga Canyon Boulevard in the early hours of July 18 when he lost control of his vehicle and careened into a telephone pole, totaling both his 2009 Nissan GT-R and his skull. In a related story, the extensive text on the back windshield may have prevented his mother, Euna Murcek, from being able to see the oncoming truck that killed her as she backed out onto Ventura Boulevard while trying to evade an insurance fraud investigator.

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Local Brewery Celebrates First Anniversary
8one8 Brewing, a local, small-batch beer manufacturing concern, or nano-brewery, celebrated its first anniversary on August 18. Specializing in exquisite craft beers, crafted exquisitely and available on-tap at a selection of local bars, pubs, taverns and Moose-centric lodges, 8one8 has the distinction, at one year of age, of being the second oldest brewery in Canoga Park (with the mantle of oldest brewery being held by local restaurant El Taco Zarigueya, whose vat of rancid horchata has been fermenting since 1991). Both local beer aficionados and local beer aficionados can help support the fledgling brewery by visiting a participating bar and magnanimously ordering a round of 8one8's delicious libations for everyone in the place, or, alternatively, purchasing a Founders Club Membership.

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Some Canoga Park Residents 'Extremely Concerned' Over Opening Of Proposed New McDonald's
A new McDonald's restaurant being built on the former site of Coco's Restaurant & Bakery at 22200 Sherman Way at Farralone Avenue, in Canoga Park's trendy Shermalone restaurant district has some residents very upset. "The sign says 'Coming Soon' but when is soon?" complained Nita Avenue resident Merl Zygmont, representing a coalition of anxious McDonald's customers-to-be at a recent emergency meeting of the Canoga Park Friendly Neighborhood Council. "I mean, we got these coupons in the mail and they expire on the 28th. And McDonald's hardly ever sends out coupons. We're extremely concerned about this situation. Just what are we supposed to do?!" Update: A spokesman for the McDonald's Corporation, when reached for comment, said that the coupons are valid at any participating McDonald's restaurant.

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Canoga Park Library Unveils Latest Free Bookmarks
The Canoga Park Branch of the Los Angeles Public Library has unveiled its latest selection of bookmarks which are available free to the public. Bookmarks — generally thin, horizontally-formatted strips of card stock featuring colorful designs, clever slogans to encourage reading or helpful information — are used as place holders when inserted between pages where a reader has temporarily stopped reading a collection of bound and printed leaves, or "book," and are available to those borrowing such materials from the library. "Please come in and take some," says Help Desk volunteer Bob Harland. "With fewer and fewer people actually reading these days and taking out books, these things have kind of taken over my work space."

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Restaurant That Sounds Vaguely Like A 1950s Science Fiction Movie Opens In Winnetka

Film-loving gastronomes have been lining up at the The Crab Planet on the Winnetka / Canoga Park border as much for the tasty food as for its cinematic name, which some have noted is reminiscent of the golden age of schlocky monster movies. “Yeah, we thought maybe it’d be like that crazy thai place on Sherman Way in North Hollywood that has all the neon signs and kitschy decor but with, like, vintage 50s monster movie posters and maybe showing classic sci-fi ‘B’ movies instead,” says bearded Canoga Park resident and podcaster Brian Rauschebart. “Turns out it’s not like that at all — it’s actually quite tastefully decorated inside — and the food was really excellent. But they should totally have a night each week where they screen ‘Attack of the Crab Monsters.’ It could totally become like a thing.” The popular new restaurant specializes in tasty cajun / seafood / thai food and is located at 7140 Desoto Avenue. As of press time, it was unknown whether or not they bought any supplies at a nearby restaurant supply warehouse that sounds vaguely like a place on Futurama, "Restaurant Planet."

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Briefly now: Do you have briefly breaking Canoga Park news?  Wrap it up reeeal nice and send it to us here so we can use it in our next wad of news briefs. By the way, 8one8 Brewing, Crab Planet, Restaurant Planet, McDonald's, and every single place at Saticoy & Topanga are all great local businesses that you should be supporting. So what in God's name are you doing still reading this? G'wan, get out of here! Go support 'em! Go support 'em before we call the cops!

Canoga Please! Those Diabetic Test Strip Signs! Also, Quick & Easy Summer Recipes!

Canoga Please! Every time I’m forced to slow down at an intersection here in Canoga Park because some jackass blows through a stop sign before I get a chance to, I have time to roll my eyes upward in annoyance — and every single time they come to rest on a telephone pole-mounted sign with an offer to buy ‘diabetic test strips!’ Who the hell has diabetic test strips to sell? Are Canoga Park residents overwhelmingly diabetic? If so, how come they have spare test strips? Why aren’t they using them? What’s going on here?  —Mabel K., sent from my phone while flying across Owensmouth at Valerio

Dear Mabel,

‘What’s going on’ here is the entrepreneurial spirit that made America — and Canoga Park! — great! Many of those who suffer from diabetes receive free testing supplies thanks to Medicare and Medicaid. But who has time to check their blood sugar levels when you’ve got to get to the local donuteria before they run out of bear claws? Therefore, our local diabetics end up with a surplus of testing supplies taking up valuable space at home — space that could be better used for storing stacks of butterscotch pudding cups from the dollar store. 

Companies like those who have invested in local telephone pole advertising space offer cold hard cash for the supplies and then sell them to people who actually are managing their diabetes but who have to pay for their supplies — yet can’t afford even the cost of the co-pays. Thanks to a bustling free market and exciting private programs like these, Canoga Park diabetics are no longer ‘victims’ as they’ve been characterized for so long in the past and are now taking control of their disease and earning extra money by making diabetes work for them! The day has come for these now-productive members of society to stand up and be counted! (Those who still have legs, anyway.)

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Canoga Please! 'Cold hard cash,' hmm? Can you suggest a recipe for a really decadent, rich dessert? Oh, let's say a delicious, sweet, gooey poundcake...and, eh, also — tell me how I can sign up for Obamacare! —Mabel K., sent from my phone, now at Valerio and Variel, and gaining speed

Dear Mabel,

Sure!  Take one pound sugar, one pound butter, one pound flou—  ...Now wait a minute...!   —Burton Cantara

Do you have a question about Canoga Park? Email it to us at CanogaPlease@gmail.com and it may be answered here. Questions may be edited for brevity or to accommodate photos we've been looking for an excuse to run. Sorry, due to the volume of mail we receive, we cannot respond to every inquiry.