Beachcombing

Our Dec. 3 whistleblowers story, “Former Patients Tell Family and Friends ‘Never Go to Community Hospital’” is a good example of what happens when the hospital spokesperson (Molina Chief of Staff Brandon Dowling) fails to return phone calls from the author (and me) while ignoring our paper in the dissemination of all information. Maybe a hospital management company should not be in the business of owning two competing media outlets.

In the letters section of this issue, Dixie Miller says it best: “The true victims are the people who used the wonderful hospital as it was before these buddies of the mayor took over [who] obviously did not have any medical know how.”

Molina’s communications incompetence is almost as pathetic as that of two local government entities: the Port of Long Beach and the Long Beach Fire Department, which have failed to send us any news releases over the past several years.

Maybe a few PR folks need to be terminated.

Radio station KNX-AM (1070) – Southern California’s only all news, weather and traffic radio station – is now also on the “frequency modulated” dial at KNX-FM (97.1) having resided on its “amplified modulated” location since 1941. This is important to anyone who anyone who does not telecommute and relies on traffic alerts every 10 minutes “on the 5s” each hour.

Owned by Philadelphia-based Audacy, KNX’s signal will be simulcast on what was FNOU-FM, also owned by Audacy. The company owns classic hits station KRTH-FM (101.1), which is my frequency of choice when KOST-FM (103.5) starts broadcasting Christmas music in what seems like July.

My journey into journalism started as a disk jockey and news reporter at WAYZ-AM/FM in Waynesboro, Penna. in the early 1960s. This continued while in the U.S. Air Force in Minot, N.D., at KCJB-AM and KXMC-TV.

Those jobs motivated me to obtain a FCC 1st Class Radio-Telephone license, which was a ticket toward a full-time job at Douglas Aircraft Company designing antennas while attending LBCC and CSULB, from which I graduated in 1970 with a bachelor’s degree in Radio/TV and Journalism.

Our favorite family restaurant, Hof’s Hut at 2147 N. Bellflower Blvd., is in the discussion stages of a remodel, but a company spokesperson on Monday stated “The timing and potential for brief closure are still being considered.”

A change of ownership sign has been hanging in the window, but that’s a formality for transferring the alcohol license and property to the grandchildren of Harold and Donna Hofman, who in 1951 founded the first Hof’s Hut in Belmont Shore. The Hofman Hospitality Group has grown to multiple locations, some of which operate as Lucille’s Smokehouse Bar-B-Que (2nd & PCH) and Saint & Second in Belmont Shore.

Every year in our Best of Long Beach contest, Hof’s Hut places first in the categories of best American restaurant, best family restaurant, best desserts and best breakfast. Lucille’s always places first in the BBQ category.

On the subject of food, I’m reminded of something I posted online five years ago and written by Calvin Trillin: “The most remarkable thing about my mother is that for 30 years she served the family nothing but leftovers. The original meal has never been found.”

And a chuckle or two: Santa’s helpers are known as subordinate clauses. He goes down the chimney because it soots him.

Happy holidays from all of us at the Beachcomber.

publisher@Beachcomber.news