los angeles daily news

6/19/2003


Fiery romance turns into proposal
By Lisa M. Sodders
Staff Writer

Megan Porco was having a quiet lunch with her parents on the second-floor patio of Spazio restaurant in Sherman Oaks on Wednesday when a firetruck pulled into the parking lot.

The 100-foot aerial ladder extended right up to her table, and her boyfriend, Lee Castillo, a two-year veteran of the Los Angeles Fire Department, climbed up, bearing a dozen red roses.

Castillo leaped onto the balcony, and in front of startled and delighted diners, got down on one knee.

"I want to spend the rest of my life with you," he said to his astounded girlfriend. "I love you. Will you marry me?"

Porco, 23, shaking and wiping away tears of joy, said yes, and Castillo placed a half-carat princess-cut diamond ring on her finger.

"I wanted to make it special for her," said Castillo, 26, of Panorama City, who had donned his dress uniform for the occasion.

Fire Department spokesman Brian Humphrey said Wednesday was Castillo's day off, but his fellow firefighters from Station 88 were on duty and considered to be on routine patrol when they stopped briefly at the restaurant.

"In terms of his planned 30-year career as an L.A. city firefighter, this is truly a once-in-a-lifetime event," Humphrey said.
----------------------


as a hopeless romantic i think that's pretty cool.


as a tax payer, this pisses me off....they are cutting 300 Hiway patrol jobs across the state and
the county medical centers are having to cut back on emergency services.........


and i'm paying for this guy to propose with emergency equipment I paid for??????

take it out of his check.....let's see
diesel, the cost of his co-workers helpng him out......