Old Town Stories
A May San Diego County County Grand Jury report accuses officials at the Metropolitan Transit System of refusing to get onboard with the city's bike-sharing program. DecoBike, launched in 2013, has been touted as a …
He thought they were joking. Even when they had him standing on a horse-drawn dray with a rope around his neck. All he’d done was go for a joyride in a rowboat. He called it …
Set above Old Town, San Diego’s forty-acre Presidio Park is a National Historic Landmark preserving the first permanent European settlement on the West Coast and the site from which exploratory missions embarked into California's interior. …
“It’s fresh, not processed, and have you ever seen a fat Japanese guy? Except for sumo wrestlers?”
Cygnet Theatre offers a “double bill” of Noël Coward’s The Vortex (1924) and Hay Fever (1925). Staging his early plays in repertory has advantages. The dark, brittle Vortex is almost a photographic negative of the …
These days Little Italy offers some of the best food in town, or at least the most photographed. The neighborhood keeps serving up hits, almost eclipsing the tried-and-true eateries that sit between its shiny new …
LuAnn Porter attempted to rally the troops on Facebook to attend the Old Town San Diego Community Planning Group meeting on Wednesday, August 12. It ended up being a small affair with six or seven …
Did Eddie spend four years in Vietnam? Or did it just seem that way?
T’is the season. Count some of the ways: NOW PLAYING: La Jolla Playhouse: Come From Away. The world premiere musical, by Irene Sankoff and David Hein, creates a comedy within a tragedy. On the morning …
Lights come up, dimly, on a dingy brown old couch with a deep sag in the middle. Close by: a laptop, a TV-tray-like table with rollers, a low slung reading lamp, and a small bookcase …
The charro and the pioneer lady set the kids into teams. “Now, don’t worry about breaking the eggs,” says the lady. “They’re made of wood. First team back with the egg still in the spoon …
Two beautifully performed shows must end their runs this Sunday. The White Snake, Old Globe Theatre. Mary Zimmerman does theatrical adaptations of literary works, among them The Odyssey, The Arabian Nights, and The Notebooks of …
“I could’ve donced all night, I could’ve donced all night” — at least half the audience at intermission, it seemed, bounced up the aisles at Cygnet Theatre singing this song, including the accent! And when …
Cygnet Theatre must close its outstanding production of Sons of the Prophet this Sunday, February 15. Stephen Karam’s comedy-drama is one of those rare plays that are, often at the same time, extremely funny and …
It’s just a room upstairs, in an old two-story house. They say when it opened, on December 1, 1868, 150 watched the Tanner Troupe perform a song and dance revue at the “Brick Building.” A …
Kahlil Gibran wrote one of the best-selling books of all time. Translated into over 40 languages, The Prophet (1923) records the poetic observations of the Lebanese mystic Almustafa on self-knowledge, good and evil, death, and …
For several years, Cygnet Theatre did a popular version of A Christmas Carol as a live, 1940s radio show — 100 years removed from the original. Sean Murray’s world premiere script returns the durable Dickens …
These shows must close this Sunday, November 2 — aka “Black Sunday,” given their high quality. The Royale, Old Globe Theatre One of the year’s best directed shows is so well done you’d think Marco …
Cygnet Theatre Shep-reps, staging True West and Fool for Love
Cygnet Theatre is running two of Sam Shepard’s plays in repertory: True West and Fool for Love. In Cygnet’s opening day/night double bill last Sunday, True West came off the stronger [to be reviewed 10/15]. …
Scoping the new-old and admiring Wisconsinite appetites at Taco Tuesday.
What do the tourists see when they come to San Diego? I wondered this as I walked around Old Town, trying to decide in which hokey Mexican spot to have lunch. Fiesta del Reyes seemed …
From the fluffy curtains to the large G hovering over the faux marble floor, everything’s an ardent pink — the signature color of Glamouresse, whose beauty products include an aerosol that protects the ozone layer …
It’s a snappy chapeau: reddish with a narrow brim and wide band. The question for Jackie, on parole after 26 months in stir for dealing drugs, is “who’s the motherf--k who owns this motherf--ker?” Jackie …
Mark Rothko and his fellow Abstract Expressionists (though they didn’t like the name) battered the Cubists to pulp. Now, as Rothko contemplates what could be his masterpiece — and the place to showcase his special …
We're a hamburger town in a hamburger country, and whether it's fast food or fine dining, most of the American-style restaurants in the city include a burger on the menu. Hell, some of the Asian …
It’s an open and shut case, according San Diego’s city auditor. The operator of Old Town’s Presidio Golf Course, owned by the city, was using it as an illegal parking lot over last year’s Cinco …
This idea for a musical sounds doomed from the start: base the story on a 100-plus-year-old play so controversial several countries banned it, which closed after one night on Broadway; talk and sing openly about …
On Monday, February 17, community dignitaries, public officials, veterans’ representatives, and members of the neighborhood gathered in Old Town for a grand-opening ceremony for the Aspire Center; Aspire is an acronym for "American Service members …
Saturday, February 15, the Save Our Heritage Organization offers two screenings of D. W. Griffith’s silent film, Ramona. Griffith based the 1910 movie on Helen Hunt Jackson’s best seller about star-crossed lovers in 1850, the …
There’s good news about Cygnet’s show: Amanda Sitton is back on a stage. She took time off — a decade, it seemed — for maternity leave. She’s in tip-top shape as Jenna, a social-mediated NYC-ite …
When you think about it, Mexican restaurants are everywhere. But South American restaurants? Not so much. Tonight, I'm wandering away from the crowds on San Diego Avenue in Old Town, heading down Twiggs in the …
The awe of nature or the snuggle of a warm snout or cute paw give us a fill of joy that we're looking for around this time of the year. For those of us without …
“Unaccompanied women smoking at the opera, that sort of thing?”
Ed feels guilty for getting a lunch so cheap at Christopher’s on Congress. “You know, that’s the biggest complaint I get,” Chris says. “People say I’m undercharging."
There are probably plays as funny, though I doubt there’s one funnier than Oscar Wilde’s “trivial comedy for serious people.” The jokes flow like ocean waves, in sets of three, with the third the capper. …
Ed visits a hero's grave in Old Town, gets distracted by the smell of Tom Yum coming from D'O Thai Cottage. C'mon, Ed!
The North County Transit District has rolled out a free new mobile ticketing app for smart phones. It appeared in the Google store in mid-July and iTunes Store in August. After downloading the app, users …
In the Heights at San Diego Rep Sam Woodhouse (director), Javier Velasco (choreographer) and at least half of San Diego – or so it would seem – have turned the San Diego Rep’s Lyceum Stage …
"It would transform the way travelers use our airport, reduce traffic congestion around [Lindbergh Field] and take advantage of the airport’s close proximity to Interstate 5 by providing access right into the airport.” That was …
Decorative candles can be carved or of the gel variety.
There is nothing worse than looking like a tourist. Out-of-towners tend to wear sensible shoes and sun hats. They’re usually pasty and constantly reapply sunblock. They like to order fish tacos coupled with oversized margaritas …
Based on a study of the bottles found during the archaeological excavation of an Old Town home built in 1857, prescription drugs accounted for much of the medications used by the Whaley family. The Whaley …
“What good is freedom if you can’t do nothing with it?”
“You see that too, right?” Lacey held her wine glass at half-mast, staring at the steps leading from the Hotel Del Coronado to the Pacific Ocean. We were outdoors at Babcock & Story, the Del’s …
The ghost comes and sits in Chanel’s husband’s chair. “I heard the chair creak. Then I looked, from ten feet away, right here by the curtain, and I saw it, the empty chair, bounce back …
Ed Bedford gets a burger at the Alamo Mexican Cafe and then hits Churchill Cigar Lounge before last call.
Presidio Hill, the “Plymouth Rock of the West” is also the “cradle of golf in San Diego.”
"Come sit here!" Southern hospitality hits San Diego. Darlene and Steven have just about finished their food, but as soon as they see me come into the courtyard, they toss out the invite. “We always …
"The usual,” she says. Kellie’s ahead of me in line. We’re standing between a bank of Canadian coffee dispensers and a Parisian street. Okay, a pretty darned convincing Parisian scene — on the wall. “I …
"Malagueña salerosa…” Krizanto sings his heart out. I chomp into my $5 dinner: ribs, carrots, broccoli, blob of mash, white-bread bun, and butter. Take a slurp of my $1 beer. Yeah, one Washington. In Old …
It may not be a scene out of Willard or an ordinary day at India’s Karni Mata Temple, but the rats are bold and plentiful at the Old Town Transit Center. Built in the early …