Homeless plans for Thanksgiving On a warm autumn afternoon, a homeless man lies against a wall on First Avenue just south of Ash Street. He's sharing a bottle of cheap vodka with an older homeless …

No drive-through in my drivewayThe fast-food vendor that owns Kentucky Fried Chicken, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell is concocting a new recipe for San Diego's Golden Hill community. Tricon Global Restaurants Inc. proposes to rebuild …

Huero walks On July 2, 1988, at 2:30 a.m., Rudolpho “Nene” Rios was shot twice in the head while he was in the 2000 block of National Avenue, at Chicano Park. He died two days …

Don't be surprised if UCSD School of Medicine turns you down Maria Lofftus, manager of the admissions office at the UCSD School of Medicine, had just finished explaining to an irate father why his son's …

A bump on the head could kill Chris O'Rourke Here at Windansea Beach in La Jolla, surfers prefer the Vespa motor scooter for solo transportation. This is a low, fat motorcycle that you'd be crazy …

The 200% Americanization of Aleksandr Gibalevich “For Russians there are three symbols in San Diego,” he continues. “Avocados, tequila, and beaches. For us the avocado symbolizes home; tequila is our symbol of relaxation; the beaches …

Editor: The following feature stories appeared in the interior pages of the Reader in the 1970s and 1980s and have just been converted to digital form. Seaport Village is a Walt-Disney solution Seaport Village is …

One tough cop "A homosexual murder, I remember that real clear. I was the first person there. They gave him an enema with Clorox, really fouled him up pretty good. Split his body open, his …

The blood upon his hands “It was a dull, outdated play, but when Mark walked on stage, it came alive. He filled the theater with his presence.” Ehrenfreund congratulated Mark on his performance and continued …

Return flight There were men, several uniformed men, screaming, waving guns, ordering everyone to freeze. Somehow they had managed to sneak onto the airfield, then had leaped out and clambered up the entry ramp, weapons …

The town that San Diego would like to forget “San Ysidro’s dead,’’ says an Hispanic banker whose branch is on San Ysidro Boulevard, within sniffing distance of a McDonald’s, a donut shop, the Main Attraction, …

Udo was gone Along Stuart Mesa Road near Cook Crossing and Vandergrift, he joined two other riders, Steven Scharf and John Edwards, both riding at the same pace. They chatted a bit, and as the …

Arts and crafts and controversy "In the beginning, when the group was smaller and more homogeneous, it was possible to have a unanimous vote on a new member, but now, with the active membership numbering …

The ultimate fun hog has bailed Windansea people say Seth became a local legend not due to his surfing skills, not like Van Artsdalen, but from the NOT WHEN THE SURF'S UP sign painted on …

Used car dealings When my septuagenarian mother (who knows nothing about automobiles) observed that the floor of the trunk was cracked, that the body had been repainted with two tones of non-matching red, that the …

A Long Shelf Life Valverde unburdens a perspiring white-haired man loaded from waist to double chin with titles about World War II. He says to Valverde, I'm just kinda reminiscing about my war.” Waiting in …

Moo Twilight Feed he buys directly from farmers in the Imperial Valley. Because he trucks it himself, it costs around $80 per ton for sudan grass, $100 for alfalfa. But with a herd of 200 …

Where the Bikes Are I noticed one guy playing pool using a broom as a cue. He looked as if he might have been an extra in a movie with a title like Chainsaw Rapists …

The Lost Roads of San Diego In 1944, the land between Midway Drive and Sports Arena Boulevard (then Frontier Street) became combed with the short streets of a wartime housing project. After the war, transients …

Tunaville Times Crew members, nearly three-quarters of whom were Portuguese, addressed each other in the idioms of their native villages while they laid the huge black purse seine nets on the docks. Nautical designers and …

Thought for Food Bob Peterson (husband to Mayor Maureen O’Connor) opened his first Jack-in-the-Box restaurant at 63rd Street and El Cajon Boulevard in 1951. Peterson had expanded his chain to include 350 units by the …

White On White John put San Diego in the national news. During a taping of Geraldo Rivera’s talk show in New York, Metzger called Roy Innis, chairman of the Congress of Racial Equality, an “Uncle …

Arms and the Men: Shooting for Happiness These were good men, overzealous to a fault, maybe, but not killers. Hell, Rudy is of Samoan descent. Wil is a liberal Communist activist actor. It was the …

The Forgotten War Conversations with men who never forgot I do not recall putting my foot on Korean soil for the first time. I only remember the cold rain, and running, and others running with …

The Forgotten War I do not recall putting my foot on Korean soil for the first time. I only remember the cold rain, and running, and others running with me. By David Burge, June 20, …

Tiny Island Court has 31 short-timers Bayside Walk listed 121 rentals spread out between 15 blocks, with 50 rentals on just two blocks. Mission Boulevard listed 81 rentals on 17 blocks. It then dropped to …

19 townhomes at 32nd and C instead of park The largest undeveloped parcel in Golden Hill, once considered by the Greater Golden Hill Planning Committee as a top choice for a neighborhood park, is now …

Till death do us part For so long, she wanted so badly to talk about her relationship with Daniel Broderick. Betty Broderick wanted to tell the their divorce and the awful injustice she felt she …

The spirit of Steve Ponchetti It has forever been the custom of the Diegueño Indians to bury their dead twice: once at death, and then once again a year later. And so it was that …

The ideal hipster Thanksgiving As I’ve pointed out before, no holiday lacks the potential for a hipster makeover. Thanksgiving is no exception. Not only is it nestled comfortably between epic Halloween costumes and ugly-Christmas-sweater parties, …

From Spanish rancho to hard-core Marines In 1942, the Ninth Marine Division marched in and took over what had been the Santa Margarita y Las Flores Ranch. The Second World War had begun and the …

How Garson came to write for the Reader: When I stumbled into a small piano bar in Bankers Hill called the Caliph, a steady stream of after-hours nocturnal characters drew me to them as they …

Editor: The following feature stories appeared in the interior pages of the Reader in the 1970s and 1980s and have just been converted to digital form. Meditations while riding San Diego Transit “Yes, these people …

Sandy and a girlfriend had gone into a liquor store, robbed the clerk, They locked the clerk in a walk-in cooler. Sandy started feeling bad about the guy. She went back and let him out.

The following audition material won a stand-up comic/philosopher a paid gig at the Green Peak Restaurant and Comedy Club in East Dorset, Vermont, last September: • Revelation! God is androgynous — but chauvinistic! • Here’s …

She always sleeps with her clothes on. Today she wakes up in jeans, a Mickey Mouse sweatshirt that covers layers of T-shirts, three finger rings, and six earrings. She doesn’t remember ever having had a …

San Diego’s tuna fleet then numbered 200 and accounted for eighty percent of the world’s catch. Nearly half the vessels were owned by Portuguese dynasties that had been living in Point Loma for several generations.

By the time the defense rested its case on February 8, the mood in the hallway had become more intimate. People exchanged business cards and passed out breath mints, and raffle tickets were sold for the Cara Knott Foundation

Last March 16, Marshall could no longer tolerate sharing a dingy nine-by-eleven-foot room with someone who talked nonstop about the CIA and who woke him intermittently during the night searching for bullet holes. “Living with …

Hey, Foxy Jaws, where’s a flop stop? We be makin’ three tracks in the sand an' we gotta get offa the licorice stick.” When a dozen CBers tell Daddy Longlegs where to park, No Show’s …

Among the famous and the celebrated who have turned up there are Pete Seeger. Quentin Crisp, Holly Near, David Ogden Stiers, and locals Russ T. Nailz and Larry Himmel.

When Janice Patterson cruises San Diego boulevards dressed in her blue fox jacket, she notices faces. If she sees a face she likes, her bejeweled fingers signal the other driver to roll down a window. …

This year there have been half a dozen wakes at Windansea, locals say, for guys who bailed before the big four-oh. More than a hundred mourners gathered at the one for Seth Johnson, on a …

How San Diegans get TVs, stereos, cameras, trips, and loads of other junk for practically nothing.

“It became Dogpatch in 1956 or 1957. The owner at that time had about 400 poodles out in the back. It looked like a patch of dogs, so she changed the name from Canyon City Cafe to Dogpatch.”

It is September on an airless Sunday morning with the mercury registering a dripping ninety-eight degrees at eleven o’clock. Adams Avenue is virtually empty except for the few hundred patrons outside the Ken Cinema. The …

Last May a former El Cajon elementary school teacher placed an ad In the Personals section of the San Diego Union that read: “Lipolysis. If you have had this done, please call me,” and she …

There’s a tension in the bus as it draws nearer to California Gold. Linda takes the bus microphone and further stimulates the crowd. “Is everyone feelin’ lucky tonight?” she yells. “Yes!” they yell back.

One of the early and sure signs of the Southern California transformation of Zen was that Joko and Yuin were no longer bald. Yuin was first to let her hair grow to the two-finger length …

People say that once you discover Ventura Place, you keep coming back. Some say it's because this street across from Belmont Park in Mission Beach has the most beautiful sunsets in the world. Others think …