Rosemary Is a Pig That’s Potbellied, and Then Some

Here’s a challenge for Jenny Craig:

Rosemary is a potbellied pig so overweight she can barely support herself standing.

Her eyes are submerged in rolls of fat.

The Los Angeles Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals recently took Rosemary from a home in Culver City where she was, well, acting like a pig.

She weighed in at 170 pounds--hefty even for a potbellied pig.

The family, accused by the SPCA of overfeeding Rosemary and of violating a city ban on potbellied pigs, could no longer care for the animal and asked the organization to intervene.

“Potbellied pigs are active. They like to run around, but this one can’t even move,” said Madeline Bernstein, executive director of the Los Angeles SPCA and the Southern California Humane Society.

Now Rosemary is under the care of a veterinarian, who is examining her for possible weight-related injuries, including heart problems and bone fractures in her hind legs.

She is living at the SPCA’s shelter in Hawthorne, a fat farm of sorts, where she is on a diet featuring alfalfa sprouts.

Said Bernstein: “Someone suggested that we get her a treadmill.”

*

HUNT CLUB: When A. Thomas Hunt showed up for a hearing in Santa Monica Superior Court last week, he should have known his nemesis would be on hand.

Hunt used to practice law in Beverly Hills.

He was in court Tuesday for allegedly failing to pay a fine imposed on him because he continued lawyering after he had resigned from the State Bar of California in 1993 in the face of disciplinary charges.

The court appearance was too tempting for Howard Bennett, 65, a former Culver City schoolteacher who claims that Hunt botched a wrongful discharge suit he filed against the Culver City school district.

In a state bar disciplinary hearing involving Hunt a year ago, Bennett tried to present Hunt with what he called the Legal Skunk Hall of Fame Award. The award had to be presented in absentia ; Hunt didn’t show up for the hearing.

Bennett was at it again Tuesday.

He organized other alleged victims of Hunt and showed up at the court hearing, armed with a 35-foot-long computer printout listing people allegedly defrauded by Hunt.

Bennett tried unsuccessfully to present the list during Hunt’s hearing, but he and his cohorts vow to return to court March 21 for Hunt’s next scheduled appearance. Said Bennett: “The Hunt Club plans to be there.”

*

ALTERNATIVE CELEBRATION: Many of L.A.’s Irish and wanna-be Irish will swig Guinness on St. Patrick’s Day, but one group is organizing a different kind of celebration and it won’t be in a pub named McGinty’s or O’Brien’s.

United We Circle, an organization of pagans in Los Angeles, plans to honor Ireland’s ancient ties to pagan religions with a rally and march in West Hollywood on March 17.

It’s no coincidence that United We Circle picked the day on which many Christians honor Ireland’s patron saint, who according to legend cleared Ireland of vermin, driving its snakes into the sea.

“We want people to know there was an indigenous religion before St. Patrick,” said Shane Burras, a member of the group’s board. “We’re celebrating what happened before Christianity.”

The members of United We Circle plan to carry signs with the message: “Snakes Are Sacred.”