COMMENTS & CURIOSITIES:

“This is a test, this is a test. If this were an actual emergency, you’d be on your own, bud.”

You might be hearing those words, some of them anyway, from the city of Newport Beach on May 22. That’s the day they’re going to test a number of siren and PA systems at the Balboa Pier from 10 a.m. to noon. Why?

It’s the tsunami thing. When it comes to tidal waves and in-laws, nobody likes surprises. The city wants to see how well various siren and alarm systems work and how far away they can be heard when something really unpleasant is about to happen individually.

The city advises people who live or work near the pier to stay inside and keep their pets inside during the tests. That sounds loud. It all seems a little low-tech to me, but it’s very nostalgic for those of us who know who Kitty Carlisle was and what quiz show she was on. (“To Tell the Truth.”)

Ever since World War II, little towns and big cities have had warning sirens of one type or another. In those days, they were part of the massive Civil Defense system, which included everything from neighborhood wardens and blackout shades during the war, to fallout shelters and Geiger counters by the time Ike was in the White House.

By the mid-’50s, every American was 100%, no-doubt-about-it convinced that a swarm of Soviet missiles was about to come zooming over the Arctic circle and vaporize all sorts of things, not the least of which was us.

It wasn’t a question of if, but only when. One Sunday evening, the “Ed Sullivan Show” ran scenes of buildings and trees in the path of atomic blast at a nuclear test site. I saw that when I was 8 and didn’t sleep until I was 10. It’s hard for people who didn’t grow up in those days to grasp how nuts this all was.

Then there the “duck and cover” drills — another wonder of the atomic age. “When the siren sounds or you see the white flash, get under your desk immediately, tuck your head down and cover up tight with both arms.”

It would be years before they bothered telling us that if you ever actually saw the white flash, there would be nothing left of you to remember seeing it.

There was even a classroom training film called “Duck and Cover,” which has become a cult classic on the Internet and is painfully funny 50 years later, with an upbeat narrator who assures you that an atomic bomb is scary but just get under that desk fast enough and you’ll be fine.

Once everyone figured out that surviving a nuclear blast would take something more than school desks and lunch tables, fallout shelters were born. In addition to fallout shelters in the basements of commercial buildings, some people built their very own personalized bomb shelters in their backyards, some of which are still around today.

If there was a yellow and black Civil Defense shield on a building, and the letters “CD” inside a triangle inside a circle that meant there was some kind of shelter inside.

When you heard the sirens, you were supposed to boogie to the nearest building with a CD sign on it, hoping against hope of course that there was a school desk inside with no one under it.

At the height of all this, I put together an entire plan that made perfect sense to a grade-school mind. As with most aspects of my life, food was the primary concern.

As if being stuck in a bomb shelter with a bunch of grown ups you didn’t know wasn’t bad enough, I wasn’t about to climb in there with nothing but canned apples and Ritz crackers to live on for 18 months.

One day, I noticed a Civil Defense sign on a telephone company building on 233rd Street that was right next to the Lexington Avenue El and, more importantly, just steps away from Sorrento’s Pizza and Marino’s Bakery.

Even in a nuclear attack, I reasoned, one of the two would survive. They’d have to. Whenever I heard a siren test, which was once a month in my neighborhood, I would calculate how far I was from 233rd Street and how long it would take me to get there.

My plan also allowed for fallout, which the nuns were scaring us with even worse than the blast damage. If you could run from the phone company to Sorrento’s or Marino’s and hold your breath the whole way, the fallout would be a breeze.

I tested it a few times, and the results were way beyond my expectations. Marino’s was so close you could run there from the phone company, grab a couple of cannoli and make it back without ever taking a breath. Sweet. Bring it on, Ivan.

I think that’s everything — sirens and tsunamis, nuclear weapons and cannoli. It’s the circle of life. If you’re near the Balboa Pier on May 22 and you hear sirens, stay calm; if you are a mother, have the best Mother’s Day ever; if you’re not, your day will come, hopefully. I gotta go.

PETER BUFFA is a former Costa Mesa mayor. His column runs Sundays. He may be reached at ptrb4@aol.com.