Nauseated Coyotes and Other Gut-Wrenching Topics

What do Internet porn, the Anaheim Angels, baloney sandwiches and UFOs have in common?

Nothing, but now that I have your attention . . .

* To protect its residents’ pets, Villa Park will try as bait a chemical compound that makes coyotes vomit. Hmm. I’m trying to decide which would be the more unwelcome sight on my patio--a coyote or a coyote’s vomit.

* As a local fixture, Sheriff Brad Gates is rivaled only by Saddleback Mountain. Not that he’s needed it, but Gates has had enough political organization over the last two decades to thwart all challengers. All of a sudden, though, the scenario for 1998 has begun percolating. Gates’ top assistant has been named in a sexual-harassment suit, and the same complainant says Gates has made inappropriate, sexually oriented remarks. That’s an issue that could raise the profile of the ’98 race, and it comes at a time that Gates finally has credible opposition.

* It drives me nuts not knowing how many of the inmates who write to me and say they’re innocent really are.

* I saw “Ulee’s Gold” last week, and it was eerie how a few camera angles made Peter Fonda look so much like his father.

* Speaking of which, is Jane Fonda having trouble getting parts?

* A friend stumbled over this nugget about the IBM machine that beat Garry Kasparov in chess. The machine has also been used to compile research data, such as the previously unknown fact that “when men buy diapers, they also buy beer.” An IBM official said, “Maybe that tells you, you should locate the diapers near the beer.”

* Reading the obituary of former Times newsman Don Smith reminded a colleague that he once considered showing a dying co-worker (and close friend) the obit that was going to appear in the paper when he died. Why not, he thought. Why shouldn’t we get a chance to read what people are going to say about us? Still, he couldn’t bring himself to do it.

* ADD COYOTE: The Villa Park experience with coyotes reminds me of a poem from a woman in San Clemente. She was writing about bobcats, but coyotes everywhere will appreciate it:

“They use my land for their abodes/

Bulldoze canyons to build toll roads/

Create airports for sonic jets/

So, I go down and eat their pets.”

* So Dist. Atty. Mike Capizzi got $30 million from Merrill Lynch, huh? No Orange County official has gotten that much money for the county from the Wall Street firm since, well, Bob Citron.

* The jury hung in the trial of Rhonda Carmony, who was accused of petition-gathering violations in the state Assembly race that Scott Baugh won in 1995. As a taxpayer, I’d nix retrying a case like this. The D.A. made his point in exposing the shenanigans that went on to get Baugh elected, but the potatoes in this case aren’t big enough to warrant another prosecution.

* Does a hung jury mean that Doris Allen, the pariah assemblywoman ousted by the same folks who engineered Baugh’s election, is only smiling and not laughing?

* If women’s professional basketball succeeds, I’ll be forced to admit I’m out of touch with my fellow countrymen. Every game I’ve tried to watch reminds me of my junior-varsity experience, with too many clumsy passes, awkward dribbling and scrambles for loose balls. Besides, does the American sports fan really want to watch a 7 1/2-foot-tall woman who can barely run?

* Are they still planning free burgers to try and entice people to hop on the San Joaquin Hills toll road? Doesn’t it seem that if a road were truly needed that people would have found it? Can there be such a thing as a road that relieves traffic that no one knows about? I suppose it’s possible, but the more likely scenario is that developers drastically oversold the road.

* And while I still have to admit I love the view from the toll road and enjoy the convenience, sheesh, what an ugly strip of highway it is.

* The soon-to-be-available CD-ROM identifying local molesters opens up whole new possibilities for whiling away the afternoon. Exactly how does it work: Do you get suspicious about the guy next door and go down to the police station and see if his name pops up on the computer?

* Strange to see how things change. One of the coolest photos of my father, I always thought, was of him holding a cigarette. When he was a small-town school superintendent, he’d sneak down into the boiler room and light up. I’m guessing he would have supported the clamp-down on the tobacco industry, had he not died at 70 of heart disease after smoking for 35 years.

Dana Parsons’ column appears Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Readers may reach Parsons by writing to him at The Times Orange County Edition, 1375 Sunflower Ave., Costa Mesa, CA 92626, or calling (714) 966-7821.