Are you a bit curious as to what Cuba is really like, now that we Americans can get there more easily since the U.S. embargo has been somewhat lifted? Having been to Cuba "illegally" a …
North America
Cuba, at last
In search of a party and Star Wars relics
when I glanced over the Facebook event page advertising a Star Wars cosplay convention in the dunes outside of Yuma, I automatically assumed it would be a party. I pictured spacetini-sipping Slave Leias and inebriated …
Alpha King brings home a whale
Former local brewer and reigning Brewpub Brewer of the Year Kirk McHale made a return visit to San Diego last week, and he brought some award-winning beer with him. While beer enthusiasts prepared to queue …
February 8, 2016
Road-trip Washington State's national parks
I paused on the winding Hall of Mosses Trail in Olympic National Park's verdant Hoh Rainforest. Gazing at the oddly shaped trees that seemed concocted out of an imagination meshing Tolkien and Tim Burton, I …
January 28, 2016
To be Mexican
Reina's Story North County's sex slaves. In April 2001, 15-year-old Reina was leaving her home in Tenancingo, a high-plateau town west of Mexico City. She was happier than she’d been in a while, traveling north …
January 24, 2016
Peso falls at the same time as Chapo
“We need to find another news story for people to get distracted; we call it la caja China (Chinese box).” That’s a translated line from a Mexican movie that came out in 2014 named La …
January 14, 2016
Quartzsite: Arizona's rock city
What do you get when you cross one million snowbirds and desert rats, and add blocks of swap-meet junk? You get Quartzsite, AZ, in January. Starting in the fall, tens of thousands of bargain hunters …
Mark Twain speaks again in St. Louis
St. Louis's aldermen voted yesterday (December 18) by 17-10 to build a billion-dollar-plus stadium to keep the Rams in the city. But the football team's owner, Stan Kroenke, has never shown any interest in keeping …
December 19, 2015
Nuvasive's eastward expansion
San Diego–based NuVasive, maker of spinal surgery devices, revealed Thursday that it has selected a site in West Carrollton, Ohio, in the Dayton area, for a manufacturing facility. NuVasive will move almost 100 jobs from …
December 13, 2015
New Orleans and its food museums: a foodie pilgrimage
Banned for ninety-five years in the United States until 2007, absinthe has garnered almost a century’s worth of mystique as a drink responsible for festive delusions. But such mystique is no match for the knowledge …
December 10, 2015
Mexico: Five or so years ago
Smugglersville “The cops mess with us. The thieves mess with us. Everybody messes with us.” I was hobbling back from the store with a liter of milk, when I saw three young men sitting on …
December 5, 2015
San Diegans crash in Mammoth Lakes
On December 3, San Diego residents Jerry Black, along with his passenger Larry Gallego, crashed in Black’s Piper Mirage airplane into a field at Mammoth Yosemite Airport (seven miles from Mammoth Lakes). According to police …
December 4, 2015
Philadelphia in the rain
You can plan as much as you like for a trip, but you can’t plan the weather. That doesn’t mean you won’t still have lots of fun! It was raining buckets on my head for …
November 27, 2015
San Diegan’s Maui blowout takes on the Bee
The word Maui has been a longtime stain on the reputation of the California legislature, according to critics of a San Diego–based nonprofit that gets little attention in the local paper but lots of ink …
November 19, 2015
Exploring Virgin Gorda's Baths
Framing the aquamarine Caribbean along a pristine, white sandy beach, the British Virgin Islands' Baths invariably evoke a jaw-dropping reaction from those visiting this feat of Mother Nature. Located on the island of Virgin Gorda, …
November 14, 2015