Got on the train a meat-eater; got off the train a vegan.
January 29, 2014
News & Stories
San Diego vegans happiest with each other
Tribal tuba
American kids don’t just pick up the clarinet or tuba like Mexican youth do. Dario Velasco, 20, is a student at Southwestern College who plays in Estrella de Pacifico, one of a handful of local …
January 29, 2014
Behold Oscar's shorts
Another Oscar season, another opportunity to wonder aloud why it is that, in this age of supposedly dwindling attention spans, there has not been an explosion of interest in the short-film form. Tired of formulaic …
January 29, 2014
You stay strange, San Diego
Marcelo Radulovich and Enrique ‘Bugs’ Gonzalez made a record, Nohayquepreocuparsepornada, “a bit of rock, noise, quirky pop, funk, drone, no-time-signature ambience, shades of jazz, acoustic and electric, all wrapped up and served as songs, with surreal stories and observations as lyrics, in English and Spanish.”
January 29, 2014
The Answer Man: 25 years of facts ... mostly
All the greatest questions and answers from Matthew Alice’s Straight from The Hip column which ran for over 25 years in the San Diego Reader.
January 29, 2014
The Commons Bar's Skinny Scorpion
The owner of The Commons Bar, Jake Pescatello, does more than deliver the rent and sign the paychecks of his employees. Starting in his father’s modest East Coast restaurant empire as a dishwasher and busboy, …
January 29, 2014
City attorney sued regarding private emails
The battle with San Diego city attorney Jan Goldsmith over public records requests is heating up. Yesterday, Cory Briggs, attorney for watchdog group San Diegans for Open Government, filed a lawsuit against the city and …
January 29, 2014
Banter and start a band
While the rest of the country braces for the next ice age, San Diegans take lackadaisical bike rides to neighborhood brew pubs to catch a buzz with a few friends under the burning winter sun. …
January 29, 2014
Marine rescue
Shocks of Mighty, the rock-steady band Michael Thompson formed, turns 20 this year. Trumpet player/singer Thompson’s allegiance to the proto-ska sounds created in Jamaica in the early ’60s wasn’t what his other bandmates wanted six …
January 29, 2014
Sausage-wise
I sit here shivering. Ends of fingers white, no blood. Only my hands are warm. And that’s because I’ve got them wrapped around a toasty-warm glass of, uh, beer. No kidding! I was just as …
January 29, 2014
Builders paying for cops' Faulconer campaign
A well-financed campaign on behalf of Republican city councilman Kevin Faulconer for mayor that is being waged by the San Diego Police Officers Association has been bankrolled not by the cops themselves, but by a …
January 29, 2014
Lower Santa Ysabel trail to Boden Canyon
The Lower Santa Ysabel Trail, now reserved for hikers and equestrians, takes you beside a lush riparian forest of towering sycamores, willows cottonwoods, and spreading oaks, draped with native grape vines as it travels beside …
January 29, 2014
Meet the Dishcrawl Ambassador
On a Tuesday evening in late September, Lindsay Marks stands in the center of a group of people at Spike Africa’s Fresh Fish Grill and Bar on Broadway. She wears a cheek-stretcher of a smile …
January 29, 2014
Tucked away in Mission Hills
Current Owner: Deborah Szekely Listing Price: $1,945,000 Beds: 5 | Baths: 5 This week’s property is hidden in Mission Hills, tucked away along a dead-end street and shielded by a wall of towering bamboo interrupted …
January 29, 2014
When skin touches skin
I stretched my arm out across the bed, but when my hand felt only fabric, a pang of panic gripped me. I cast about in the darkness, a sense of desperation rising in my chest, …
January 29, 2014
San Diego's top spots for picnics
“The park offers a bird’s-eye view of downtown skyscrapers, planes lifting off from the airport, Mission Bay, the ocean...”
January 29, 2014
Pepsi conceals carcinogens, charges San Diegan
The soft drinks Pepsi, Diet Pepsi, and Pepsi One contain excessive amounts of a carcinogen, methylimidazole (4-MeI), and parent company Pepsico is keeping that secret, according to a lawsuit filed January 23 in federal court. …
January 29, 2014
Missive in a bottle
Nice Legs is the title of a collection of short stories published by guitarist Jack Beddows and a songwriter-producer named Larry Zeiger. Each of the stories, they tell the Reader, was inspired by the drinking …
January 29, 2014
La Mesa considers ban on e-cigarette sales
Facing the growing popularity of electronic cigarettes, the City of La Mesa on Tuesday, January 28, took up a consideration to ban their sale within city limits at the behest of mayor Art Madrid. "We …
January 29, 2014
Political blind dates
A lot has been written about special interests getting in bed with the state legislature, figuratively speaking. Now a group of prominent women Democrats from San Diego has raised the bar with a “speed dating” …
January 29, 2014
Jordan Belfort – wolf on Wall Street? No, scumbag
Tony Elgindy, back living in San Diego area after a long spell in prison, helped finger the Wolf of Wall Street, who got off easy for egregious crimes.
January 29, 2014
Brick Bye Brick?
Could Saturday be the last show at Brick by Brick? On Tuesday afternoon rumors started circulating that the venerable Bay Park nightspot was rescheduling some of its shows booked for February. Tuesday evening Brick by …
January 29, 2014
Like Hedgecock, unlike son
In January 1986, a month after quitting as San Diego mayor following his conviction in a campaign money laundering scandal, Roger Hedgecock was asked by the Evening Tribune his pick to win that year’s Super …
January 29, 2014
Letters to the editor (and to the writers and to the people of San Diego)
Half His Drive I just finished your cover story about Theo Tucker. If someone in America’s Finest City doesn’t grab this promising young man and offer him a full-time position at a living wage, you …
January 29, 2014
The Penitent
I had a little Sorrow, Born of a little Sin, I found a room all damp with gloom And shut us all within; And, “Little Sorrow, weep,” said I, “And, Little Sin, pray God to …
January 29, 2014
Ibn Taymiya
God — praises to Him — is not His own creature, and not a part of His creation or an attribute of it. He is the Praised and Exalted, set apart in His holy Existence, …
January 29, 2014