WESTSIDERS LIVE AND DIE BY THE CODE.

Byline: Brad Dickson Local View

THERE'S a huge to-do on the tony Westside of Los Angeles. It has nothing to do with the war in Iraq, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, or the Supreme Court withholding medical marijuana from patients.

Instead this concerns something Westsiders are truly passionate about:

The 310 area code.

Due to a shortage of available numbers, state officials are pondering a plan that would create Southern California's first area-code overlay. If approved, new phone customers within the 310 area code would probably receive a new area code - 424.

Holy Humvee! This could lead to massive protests on the Westside.

In Brentwood, area code-besotted residents will be setting fire to the sweaters tied round their waists!

Angry Santa Monicans will be overturning Priuses in the middle of the street.

Hunger strikes in Westwood, with protesters force-fed liquids (iced- blended double mochas) intravenously.

Rest assured, if the Botox didn't make it a physical impossibility, people who live in the 310 area code would be scowling today.

A few 310 residents appear downright mortified. In one news story, a woman said she was ``frightened'' of altering the 310 code.

Now, there's no dearth of things to be frightened of in Los Angeles. Be frightened of freeway shootings, if you choose. Be frightened of your house sliding down a vertical canyon. Be frightened of Tom Cruise landing on you after leaping 20 feet in the air professing love for a starlet. Be frightened of driving into gigantic potholes the size of Barbara Boxer's hair.

But don't fret about a silly area code.

There. I said it.

Working up a froth over an area code is patently silly, particularly in a city teeming with so many daunting challenges.

But some Angelenos are disproportionately proud to possess a 310 prefix and the panache it reputedly signifies: wealth, glamour, luxury cars and bidding wars for 2-bedroom hovels.

A 310 phone number suggests that a person has achieved a measure of success. (Either that, or he pays $6.95 per month to have his voice mail routed through a server in Lynwood.)

In Los Angeles, you are your area code.

A professor at the University of Southern California's Annenberg School for Communication has been quoted as saying that, for Westsiders, the 310 digits carry a great deal of ``social status.''

No argument here.

Russell Crowe wouldn't be caught dead tossing a phone with 213 area code at a hotel employee. Likewise, had Pat O'Brien placed his booty calls from 818, that alone would've probably spelled career suicide.

(Speaking of celebs, if this passes, do we dial 310 or 424 when paging our friends at L.A.'s new top tourist attraction, David Geffen's backyard beach? Picture Geffen in his Armani PJs: ``Phone for Herb Turlek. Herb Turlek back here?'')

Granted, L.A. is a unique case.

I've never lived in a city where residents are more defined by their community-within-the-city. And I don't deny there are economic considerations. Take an enclave in North Hollywood, label it ``Valley Village,'' and property values shoot skyward.

Sometimes just living near a desirable neighborhood is enough to bestow value. Witness all the ads for dwellings ``Brentwood-adjacent,'' ``Malibu-adjacent,'' etc. A 310 area code can definitely make a fledgling restaurant or boutique seem attractive.

One concern among distraught Westsiders is that those in the 310 area code would be required to dial an area code before the number, plus one, equaling 11 digits, just to call within their zone. Time is money, after all. But in a city where our commutes to the supermarket can take 45 minutes, and where we stand on line upward of two hours for Disney attractions with the word ``Splash'' in the title that leave us exhausted, suicidal and soaking wet, it seems an extra second spent dialing 4 digits is relative minutiae.

While there may be economic considerations involved in choosing an area code, it's largely ego-driven. And you'd think we'd have more important things to worry about.

Like someone else getting that vanity license plate, NARCISSIST-1.