The bloodstains have long since faded, courtesy of Scram, sun, and time. More than a decade ago, in the parking lot of a Vons in Santee, Christopher St. Louis, 18, lost his life in the …
June 29, 2016
News & Stories
Off-duty El Cajon cop kills beer thief in Santee
The Good Twin and the Evil Twin
This is how it all began. There was only water — there was no sky, there was no land, only nothingness. Then out of the waters rose a mist, and it became the sky. Still …
June 29, 2016
Summer records by San Diego bands
Country Rockin’ Rebels will play two release parties for Ride Rebel Ride, with an acoustic set at Rosie O’Grady’s July 1 and an electric gig at Mother’s Saloon on July 22. Levi Dean & the …
June 29, 2016
SD Fringe: Witness to Gettysburg and Ozombie bin Laden: in 3D!
Witness to Gettysburg Have you ever been to Gettysburg? Maybe it’s ghosts, or just how the winds swirl across empty fields. If you didn’t know that during the first three days of July 1863 nearly …
June 29, 2016
Blue be the sky and soft the breeze
June I gazed upon the glorious sky And the green mountains round, And thought that when I came to lie At rest within the ground, ’Twere pleasant, that in flowery June, When brooks send up …
June 29, 2016
Janey's deeper tensions
“Joel was once the director of photography on a film about a guy who had a watermelon for a head,” filmmaker Jared Callahan tells me by phone from Atlanta. Joel P. West, member of local …
June 29, 2016
A shrimp taco at the Market Hall
This was where I learned to appreciate the humble carrot. It started simply enough. I was heading along Market past that cool newish condo tower Strata, when I came across this sign: “Café Now Open.” …
June 29, 2016
Unethical S.D. politics, as usual
Two years ago, Union-Tribune publisher, developer, and Republican kingpin Douglas Manchester put $356,000 into the campaign to make Kevin Faulconer mayor, and it didn’t take long for the political investment to pay off in a …
June 29, 2016
Day of the dolphins
“Vaquita? Tastes like chicken,” quips Insect Surfers founder David Arnson, who studied marine biology before forming “Planet earth’s longest-running modern surf band” in Washington, D.C.’s mid-’70s alternative-rock scene. After we reconnect at a private Surfers/Sand …
June 29, 2016
Unforgiving Hospitals
Name: Josh Turner Age: 20 Occupation: Valet Location: Tourmaline Surf Park, PB Favorite Surf Spot: Hospitals, La Jolla Josh Turner’s introduction to surfing came by way of a Surfari Surf School class in Mission Beach …
June 29, 2016
Feminine but not feminist
Written and performed by Sylvia Milo, The Other Mozart moves chronologically through the life of Maria Anna Mozart. Nannerl and her musical abilities were oppressed by a society in which some people thought uterine bleeding …
June 29, 2016
Competitive tickling
David Farrier is a New Zealand journalist who set out to do a human interest story on the world of competitive endurance tickling videos. But the nasty and virulent resistance he encountered made him think …
June 29, 2016
Baja he-man talks to fishermen
After reading Graham Mackintosh’s Into a Desert Place about his two-year walk around the Baja coastline, I had to meet him. Smallish and pale, Scottish by blood, he was living in Lemon Grove. By the …
June 29, 2016
Lots to do at Chollas Lake Park, but...biodiversity is not high
Named for the cholla cactus found in the area, Chollas Lake Reservoir was built in 1901 to serve San Diego’s water supply. The 16-acre lake was turned over to the city’s Department of Park and …
June 29, 2016
Moshing with Methodists
The most surprising thing about last Friday’s “Mosh for Orlando” show in Chula Vista wasn’t that local punks played for free for the Pulse/Orlando victims, it’s that it was held by a church. And moshing …
June 29, 2016
Inner Fire Dragon
When I asked Dad what he thought happens to women after 40, he laughed and said, “They turn,” a term that, moments before, he’d joked was akin to milk spoiling.
June 29, 2016
Back on the road with Joe Pug
He was about to quit music three years ago, the folk singer Joe Pug claimed to anyone in the media who would listen. And, there were many. A couple of years earlier he’d ditched school …
June 29, 2016
Four stories, one tail
Writer-director Todd Solondz’s Wiener Dog follows the titular animal through four stories with four different owners: a sweetly curious boy (Keaton Nigel Cooke), a compassionate young woman (Greta Gerwig), a frustrated middle-aged man (Danny De …
June 29, 2016
Switchfoot switches gears this year
It’s easy to forget that multi-platinum alt-gospel rock act Switchfoot was an indie band from its recorded debut in 1997 all the way through 2003. The glory days came with their major-label releases such as …
June 29, 2016
Jimmy Page is in; that Huffamoose guitarist...no
Dear Hipster: Well, lookee here now! Led Zeppelin — or at least the songwriting team of Plant and Page — on trial for plagiarism. Back when Marvin Gaye’s estate sued Robin Thicke, I tried to …
June 29, 2016
San Diego’s convadium is a bald-faced lie
It is comforting to know that the presidential race is not the only wacko thing going on in this country. Voters in McKinney, Texas, have authorized spending $63 million on a new high school football …
June 29, 2016
Why does the editor of the Reader allow it?
Basic Human Need Why doesn’t Siobhan Braun tell the whole story about the sex trade in “We Need Our Hearts Broken Over This”? Why are politicians and law enforcement going after the Johns instead of …
June 29, 2016
Liberals spending
Former Democratic state assemblywoman Lori Saldaña, who has left the party and become an independent, came in third to mayor Kevin Faulconer and Democrat Ed Harris in this year’s race for San Diego mayor. The …
June 29, 2016
June 23 Crossword Contenders
Martha Awdziewicz, Clairemont, 10. L. Barling, El Cajon, 10. Evelyn Bowser, Hillcrest, 10. Dennis Butterworth, San Diego, 10. Chris Byzewski, San Diego, 10. Joseph Ciprian, Little Italy, 10. Annette Coppede, San Diego, 10. Allan Dorfman, …
June 29, 2016
June 23 Sudoku Contenders
Evil Bliss Beedle, Encinitas, 10. Gregory Chauncey, La Jolla, 10. Joseph Ciprian, Little Italy, 10. Alford Claibone, San Diego, 10. Patrick Driscoll, Santee, 10. Rafael Gaceta, San Diego, 10. Don Ganoe, San Diego, 10. Larry …
June 29, 2016