When Robert Carr Dynes was named chancellor of the University of California, San Diego, in April 1996, he was said to be a man of humble origins. Born in Canada in 1942, the physicist who …
February 24, 2000
News & Stories
UCSD's Robert Dynes, Frances Hellman, and the San Diego Padres
View the Pacific from Emerald Vista, Crystal Cove State Park, Orange County.
On the most transparent winter days, the view from Emerald Vista Point in Orange County's Crystal Cove State Park spans more than 200 miles of Southern California coastline. Far beyond Dana Point to the southeast, …
February 24, 2000
Lessons from Cali
"My patient is Tijuana," says Dr. José Rubio Soto. "My hospital is city hall. These are the X-rays." He's peering at a computer screen filled with blobs. It's a map of the city. Tijuana looks …
February 24, 2000
Porno and the Piano Teacher
Jean Winslow, a retired elementary schoolteacher in San Diego, doesn't seem like the sort of person who would be even remotely involved with Internet pornography. Her greatest passion is music. Winslow spends time with her …
February 24, 2000
Born and Born Again
A former death-row inmate who beat an 18-year-old murder rap and ended up living as a born-again Christian in his mother's 19-foot trailer at the Mt. Helix View Estates trailer park in El Cajon has …
February 24, 2000
Bullets and Broadway
“The walking tour of downtown’s dark corners and bloody sites include the Grant Hotel. In the 1970s they were taking the old fire escape, and it fell and killed two old fellas from the Plaza Hotel.”
February 24, 2000
California, Here I Come
I froze, shut my eyes, while the steam rose. How many times had she pecked at me to drive off the beaten path, search for a restaurant, an antique shop, a flea market. “Stop!” she’d say.
February 24, 2000
You're Going to Wait 'Til You're Married to Have Sex?
“My roommate is a diehard Catholic, and she gets all ticked off, because, like, I didn’t know that you had to be part of the Church to take the bread and wine, which I always did.”
Homicidal mania
Like many people, I have a perverse relationship with my work. It’s not that I bite the hand that feeds me — though that is something writers often do — it’s more that I prefer …
February 24, 2000
What causes the "pop" when you pop your back?
Matt, you ignorant slut: I've talked to various experts about what makes the popping sound when you crack your back, and I've gotten a different definitive answer from each of them. So much for expertise …
February 24, 2000