Steak night at the remodeled Pyrennes Cafe, more on the Hell's Angels in Bakersfield and remembering the late CBS newsman Bob Simon

 * … HELL'S ANGELS: I recently posted some pictures on my online blog of the day in 1965 when the Hell's Angels roared into town, triggering this response from Ron Derbyshire. "As an avid Harley rider here in Kern County I have attended a couple of rides put on by the Bakersfield and Ventura

chapters of the Hell's Angels. The ride in Ventura was a benefit for the parents of a local high school boy who was paralyzed in a tragic football accident. The ride here in Bakersfield was a benefit to help under priviledged kids at Easter time. They collected around 600 Easter baskets to distribute." Good form, indeed.

* … FOODIE BEST BET: There are few things I enjoy more than dining at one of our locally owned Basque restaurants that boast communal seating, a standard menu and set up (cabbage soup, beans and a salad). Noriega Hotel has always been high on my list but you can add the recently remodeled Pyrennes Cafe to the list. Co-owners Rod and Julie Crawford have done a remarkable job restoring Pyrennes, and as one person at my table said, looking around the noisy and crowded room, "This is really the best of Bakersfield."

* … OVERHEARD: A woman is sharing her pet peeve of the day. "It's crazy when the GET bus stops in the middle of the block and folks are dashing across the street trying to catch it," she said. "I just saw an elderly man on 34th Street near Chester nearly get clipped."

 * … SPOTTED: On Twitter was this post: "(the late CBS newsman) Bob Simon led the kind of life that Brian Williams could only lie about."

 * … SCAMS: Caroline O. Reid has a system to handle all those annoying calls from fake IRS agents and other salespeople. "I believe I have shut them down a bit by answering the phone, 'Who is this and what do you want?' The callers are so shocked they hang up. Of course, you need Caller ID. Last night the unknown caller said, 'Have a little respect.' My response was not pretty. It was 8:30 p.m., I had company, we were watching a TV program. Very very annoying. I just reenlisted on the “Do Not Call' list but it apparently didn’t help. For people who have friends and family who might call from overseas, often the caller ID shows 'Out of Area.' Ask them to immediately say, 'Mom, it’s me.'”

 * … GOLF: This memory of the old miniature golf course on Mount Vernon comes from Dennis Franey. "In the early 1960s my classmates in elementary school would have their birthday parties there. The name was Golfland and it was located next to Paola's (Bowling) College Lanes."

 * … MEMORIES: Stephen A. Montgomery said he was watching a Huell Howser episode on the history and restoration of the Hollywood sign when it triggered a memory about a similar sign promoting real estate development in the then-bare hills of College Avenue near the intersection of Camino Sierra. The sign read 'HILLCREST' to promote postwar development in the area. Sometime around 1950 they turned out the lights and not long after the sign was gone," he said.

Will NBC anchor Brian Williams survive the firestorm over his inflated memory about what happened a decade ago? And some more walks down memory lane about old Bakersfield

* … ANCHOR: NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams, caught in a lie about being on a

helicopter that came under fire in Iraq a decade ago, is off the air for now as the network conducts an internal investigation. And now comes word that Williams may have exaggerated his reporting from Hurricane Katrina, where he recounted seeing bodies floating down the street outside his French Quarter hotel. The problem: the French Quarter was never flooded during Katrina. Williams has been pilliored on social media, prompting this thought from the New York Times' Maureen Dowd: "Social media — the genre that helped make the TV evening news irrelevant by showing us that we don’t need someone to tell us every night what happened that day — was gutting the institution further. Although Williams’s determination to wrap himself in others’ valor is indefensible, it seems almost redundant to gnaw on his bones, given the fact that the Internet has already taken down a much larger target: the long-ingrained automatic impulse to turn on the TV when news happens."

* … ACHIEVER: Kudos to Victoria Cody, a 2009 graduate of Garces Memorial High School and a recent graduate from the University of Southern California. The English major was appointed young alumni counsel at USC and she also serves as the vice president of the local alumni chapter.

 * … HONOR FLIGHT: The folks who run the Kern County Honor Flights are looking for World War II veterans for a spring trip to Washington, D.C. If you know a deserving veteran, call (661) 204-9680.

 * … SERVICE: Helen Venosdel wrote to give a big shout out to some great customer service over at Rosedale Automotive. "We have dealt with Julie and Bruce at Rosedale Automotive for years, and they are not only professionals, but very compassionate people," she wrote. "We brought my sister's car up from LA because we wanted to help her with smog compliance. They spent two days on phone calls and then yesterday morning examining the vehicle. When we determined the extensive repairs needed to smog it were not worth it, Bruce and Julie did not charge us for all their time and effort. I am grateful to deal with such amazing people at a superior business!"

 * … GOLF: Yet another reader recalls the old miniature golf courses. Said Irene Randolph: "I recall Harvey Richey's miniature golf course on Oak Street that adjoined Young's Market back parking lot.  Part of it became Whitney-Biggar general contractors, part of the back was Blue Chips Stamps. Today Barnett Superior Tire,  California Keyboards, and Panda Palace occupied the former miniature golf course."

 * … MEMORIES: Today's walk down memory lane comes from reader David Clark. "I love your blog about memory lane and wanted to add one more. When I was in elementary school in the 1960s there was a county dump at the southeast corner of Highway 65 and James Road. I lived in Oildale and a boy down the street from me had some pet pigeons. One day his mother decided the pigeons were too messy and told us to put them in a box and she drove us out to the dump to let them go. There was a large flock of pigeons that lived at the dump so we thought they would like it there. We let them go at the dump and drove directly home; we lived on DeVore Street so it didn’t take very long to get home.  By the time we got back the pigeons were already back at his house. I guess that is why they are called homing pigeons."

 * … MORE MEMORIES: And finally, Rebecca Wyatt submitted this thought from her father, Rudy C. Wyatt. "My dad was a student at Bakersfield High School when his art teacher, Mrs. Emerson, commissioned him to prepare identification signs for the holes on this miniature golf course (on Brundage and Oak streest). Mr. Battastoni, the owner of the golf course, had a contest to name the holes. My Dad entered the name, 'Triple Whammy' the tri-level hole, the most difficult hole in the course; he won a season pass and had many pleasant memories on summer nights at the golf course. My dad recalled another hole that looked like a volcano named 'The Stromboli.'"