The Balboa Park Task Force met March 15 in the Santa Fe Room of the Balboa Park Club to discuss the future of Balboa Park with regards to fundraising management and governance. All 17 volunteer …
March 17, 2010
Blog Entries
- Sempra Gives the Boot to 90 Employees
6 comments
- A Treatise On A KIss/Poetic Prose
2 comments
- San Diego has a dramatic gopher
3 comments
News & Stories
Clear as Mud
Southern Exposure
At around 2:00 p.m. on March 14, a man in a hospital gown was stopped by sheriff‘s deputies at the corner of Santa Fe Drive and San Elijo Avenue. Two deputies talked with the man …
March 17, 2010
Shakin' All Over
While No Bunny's Tower Bar stop pulled some bodies from opener and second act Bare Wires and So Cow, once the Baths hit the stage it was getting crowded. For Thee Oh Sees about 40 …
March 17, 2010
No Megaphones in Rome
Boyscout opened with two drummers, two guitars. Informed by San Diego's unique brand of hardcore and guitarist Lain Weck's roots (Marasol, Fever Sleeves) in odd-time noodling, the set was an energetic experiment in dueling strings …
March 17, 2010
New Direction for Old Town
National City residents crammed into council chambers on Tuesday, March 16, for a meeting of the city council. An additional 40 residents sat in a lobby to watch the meeting on a large flat-screen TV. …
March 17, 2010
Tapas on Tokyo Time
An izakaya is the Japanese equivalent of a tapas bar or gastropub — a place where salarymen flock after work to snack on a variety of small dishes (or some big comforting ones) for a …
March 17, 2010
My Life in France
What are you reading? “I just finished My Life in France, by Julia Child and her great nephew Alex Prud’homme. She told him all her stories, and he put it together.” What did you like …
March 17, 2010
Upper Hot Spring Canyon
Silent, except for the gentle gurgle of water over stone, upper Hot Spring Canyon is an easy-to-reach hideaway in the Santa Ana Mountains, not very far from a pair of Cleveland National Forest campgrounds. Those …
March 17, 2010
Snack Time
I read the NCAA is thinking about changing its postseason basketball tournament to a 96-team format and mutter to self, “The Rapacious Evil that is the NCAA.” Said Rapacious Evil has a working monopoly on …
March 17, 2010
Calvary Lutheran Church
A child’s magic-marker drawing of the Prodigal Son graced the bulletin cover for Sunday’s service at Calvary Lutheran: a hungry man sitting in a muddy pigsty. “And he would have gladly filled his stomach with …
March 17, 2010
Back in the Day
“The band started in 1980, but I didn’t join until February 1981,” says Social Spit singer Cliff Cunningham. “The singer just couldn’t remember the lyrics, so I got in. My first show was at the …
March 17, 2010
Sonic Colonic
Thursday 18Miami’s mad-rappin’ Clarence Reid, aka Blowfly, rolls up on Radio Room. The 64-year-old is the self-described original nasty rapper and claims to have written and recorded the first rap song ever, “Rapp Dirty”: “This …
March 17, 2010
Around and About
In between films at the San Diego Latino Film Festival, I can spare but passing glances at the world outside. And with the NCAA basketball tournament added this Thursday to the ongoing festival, we can’t …
March 17, 2010
I Venture Out Alone
All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, and Jack I have become — or Jill, as it were. So I do what any sane, self-preserving person would do. I bolt. Yes, in …
March 17, 2010
Ticket to Tel Aviv
Democratic congressman Bob Filner spent a week in Israel last month courtesy of a tax-exempt group run by J Street, an advocacy organization that casts itself as a liberal alternative to the American Israel Public …
March 17, 2010
The Bodhran
My mother hails from Ireland, and my paternal great-grandparents are also from the old sod. I like to flaunt my pure bloodlines at my hubby, who has a beautiful mix of ancestry: a little Irish …
March 17, 2010
Spam Wins
“This is what, again?” asks Carla. Her fingers rustle suspiciously through the pile of fried smelt sitting stiff, gold, and cold next to the crispy, deep-fried chicken skins and the pot of vinegar. “These,” I …
March 17, 2010
Stephen Stills
It’s a safe bet to assume that nobody plays air guitar to old Stephen Stills records. Better known to the masses as one of the voices of Crosby, Stills & Nash, it might come as …
March 17, 2010
The Last DJ
Gary Beck has a certain way about him. He is the midday disc jockey at KSDS, the City College radio station otherwise known as Jazz 88.3, and his demeanor takes me back to 1971 to …
March 17, 2010
Brown money
Some powerful San Diego law firms lined up last week to contribute to Democratic state attorney general Jerry Brown’s bid for governor. Seltzer Caplan McMahon Vitek, one of the city’s best-connected legal and lobbying outfits, …
March 17, 2010
Yonder Lies It
Looking for Herb Every Christmas Eve, my family gets together at my mother’s house in a Tijuana middle-class suburb near the old Caliente Racetrack to have tamales, turkey, and liters of calientitos (Mexican Christmas punch). …
March 17, 2010
Miracle on 32nd Street
Thirty-Five Years AgoI saw the Miracle today, the one, that is, at the Israelite Church of God in Christ on 32nd and L Street. I’m not usually one for miracles...the usual stuff like bleeding statues …
March 17, 2010
40-Year-Old Version
Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter. — Mark Twain I positioned the necklace on the table — novelty beads flaunting the number “40” with a glittery …
March 17, 2010
Two poems by Ginger Andrews
O That Summer my sister and I both wound up back in Coos Bay, basket cases, lonely as hell. She was recovering from drugs and alcohol, I was newly divorced, a Sunday School teacher with …
March 17, 2010
Big Brother will be watching
The City of San Diego has cooked up a plan to build an elaborate video spying operation around Mission Bay and Ocean Beach. According to a request for proposal issued March 5, the City wants …
March 17, 2010
Roosevelt, Noise Gate, and Scatter Brain and Acid Atheist
Artist: RooseveltSong: “Miracles and City Lights” (from sdreader.com/mp3)Heard by: Matt Silengo, North ParkI thought it had a really good sound to it. I couldn’t really make out the lyrics to know exactly what was being …
March 17, 2010
Hip-Hop Hard Time
“Young Mass is booked at the City of Las Vegas Detention Center for a domestic issue and for giving false info to the police,” says 40oz Chris at Massterpiece Entertainment. The local hip-hop artist — …
March 17, 2010
3again
“3against1 split in 2008, after playing for seven years,” says guitarist Arnaud Lemaire. “Each member was personally evolving, whether it was a need to make some money, planning for marriage, or bringing a child into …
March 17, 2010
Pink Army Invasion
On March 15, one day after receiving Child Actor Recognition Awards at Universal Studios, San Diego electro-pop “tweenie” boppers Pink Army marched into Sonikwire Studios in Irvine to record what will be the first track …
March 17, 2010
Pierced Arrows
Whatever happened to the musicians in all those obscure ’60s garage rock bands documented on Nuggets? Some of them went on to bigger and better bands, but most didn’t. Some of them got drafted and …
March 17, 2010
Africans, Asians, Hispanics...and Hipsters: Changes in City Heights
From the Killing Fields to the Noodle House When Mark Lau was ten years old, he couldn’t add one plus one. On the day he began the fourth grade at Adams Elementary School in City …
March 17, 2010
Scott Kessler works with FBI investigating Marco Li Mandri
On or about October 17, 2008, Police Chief William Lansdowne was summoned to the office of an irate Mayor Jerry Sanders. The mayor wanted to know how a criminal investigative report coauthored by one of …
March 17, 2010
San Diego Unified charges all kinds of illegal fees
On January 11, 43 students, parents, and school staff gathered inside the media center at Junipero Serra High School in Tierrasanta for the monthly meeting of the School Site Council. The council sat in the …
March 17, 2010
Heaven on Earth: Gimmelwald, Switzerland
After traveling around Europe for three months, the one place I keep telling myself I need to return to is Gimmelwald, Switzerland. Located high in the Swiss Alps, this town of approximately 130 residents is …
March 17, 2010