“For my 50th birthday, I bought myself a gutter,” quips Janet Lancaster of Clairemont. She’s talking about a rain gutter, that is — the one that Lancaster and her husband Kelly installed on their roof …

Thirty Years Ago Tribune editor Neil Morgan will put an end to a “very strange and uncomfortable” situation next week when he turns loose his protégé Tom Blair to write a column of his own. …

Raffle Fraud. On Monday, August 29, when Armando Sepulveda of Houston went to pick up the title of a 2012 Ford Mustang he’d won at a raffle at the Jim Wells County Fairgrounds the previous …

to Yüan Chēn (A.D. 810) The flower of the pear-tree gathers and turns to fruit; The swallows’ eggs have hatched into young birds. When the Seasons’ changes thus confront the mind What comfort can the …

I recall that first sniff on a warm September evening in 2008, the sight of various nimono (simmered dishes) piled into oozara ryori (large plates) lining the sleek wooden bar, the light crunch of the …

“Our grandmother, Pretty Kitty Keen, had donut places all through the Depression.”

Every family has its issues, and mine is no exception. I could tell I’d reached a new phase in my life when, at a recent family gathering (the clan collided at Heather’s place to celebrate …

Thanks to Jim Behrie who writes “Football Picks Haikus” for theawl.com. Follows are two of his NFL Week 3 haikus: At Cincinnati -2.5 San Francisco Bengals aren’t doormats The 49ers play tough But I still …

Growing up in the Midwest, in or around Chicago, I would hear the phrase “Indian Summer” annually and about this time of year. As a kid, I approved. After all, the word Indian was just …

This week, Netherlands-based Mascot Label Group launches a worldwide rerelease of Transfer’s Future Selves, SDMA winner for Best Rock Album of 2010, while Atlantic Records releases Switchfoot’s eighth studio record Vice Verses, produced by Neal …

“It’s a concept that’s been tried before, but I don’t think quite successfully.” Wayne Riker, an Encinitas guitarist and author of nine guitar-instruction books, says that his own compilation CD, Guitar Decathlon, will be different, …

Directed by Chris Aquavella, 14 mandolin players and three guitarists pluck and strum the poignant notes of “La Frisonette.” Avoiding the black-and-white depictions of Robert Johnson and Leadbelly lining the walls, I imagine sitting in …

A slice-of-life indie about a young man facing cancer, overstuffed with Seth Rogen, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Up in the Air’s Anna Kendrick as the world’s worst beginning therapist, and Anjelica Huston. Rogen looms especially large as …

October! Oktoberfest! Time for a party! Karl Strauss was my first local beer, way back when I first moved to town, so I put in a call to the brewery’s PR manager, Melody Daversa (858-273-2739, …

“I was a dark kid,” says Dane Reinhart about why he started screaming death metal at 15. “I lost my dad to cancer [when I was] 9. I wanted to be the frontman so I …

"Lightnin’ Hopkins meets Social Distortion,” is how Scottie Blinn describes his head-rush heartland music. “I call it ‘grease punk’: deeply rooted blues, with a lot of attitude that tells a good story.” Blinn first came …

Idiot Glee is 23-year-old Kentuckian James Friley, a one-man-band who surrounds himself with keyboards, effects, and a looping device. But it would be inaccurate to say that Friley is Idiot Glee, or even a gleeful …

All through the summer of 2001, the news media fueled speculation that congressman Gary Condit, who represented the San Joaquin Valley, might have been involved with the disappearance of intern Chandra Levy — especially after …

Two San Diego authors have recently written books. One tsk-tsks risk-taking and the other celebrates it. Yet you can agree with both premises. La Jolla’s Alfred Rappaport, professor emeritus at Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management, …

A new audit by the Pentagon’s Office of Inspector General has found that military brass here didn’t do enough to halt illegal life insurance sales practices on San Diego County Marine Corps bases, thereby threatening …

If nothing else, the timing is interesting. On Thursday, September 8, the great blackout of 2011 swept San Diego County and beyond. The next day, the County’s Department of General Services issued a timely “request …

"Look. Look! They took our money! Ten thousand dollars, from some. They came in with their shotguns raised. ‘Down on the ground!’ They cuffed me, hands behind my back, threw me on my face on …

Dig It! Mucho kudos to Thomas Larson and to the Reader for this comprehensive piece on babies born here to Mexican mothers (Feature Story, September 22). I don’t think I’ve seen anything in print on …

Unto thy Son say thou that I am His, And to me graceless make Him gracious. Sad Mary of Egypt lacked not of that bliss, Nor yet when sorrowful clerk Theophilus, Whose bitter sins were …

Denomination: Assembly of God Membership: 125 Pastor: Frank Wooden Age: 53 Born: Berkeley Formation: Vanguard University, Costa Mesa; Bethany Bible College, Santa Cruz. Years Ordained: 24 San Diego Reader: How long do you spend writing …