xenubarb
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed
Big Screen — Movie commentary
Blurt — Music's inside track
Booze News — San Diego spirits
Classical Music — Immortal beauty
Classifieds — Free and easy
Cover Stories — Front-page features
Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes
Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts
Feast! — Food & drink reviews
Feature Stories — Local news & stories
Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore
From the Archives — Spotlight on the past
Golden Dreams — Talk of the town
The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it
Letters — Our inbox
Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites
Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans
Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists
Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news
News Ticker — News & politics
Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated
Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna
Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated
Poetry — The old and the new
Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers
Reading — The hunt for intellectuals
Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails
San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds
SD on the QT — Almost factual news
Sheep and Goats — Places of worship
Special Issues — The best of
Street Style — San Diego streets have style
Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves
Theater — On stage in San Diego this week
Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative
Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work
Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego
Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads
Your Week — Daily event picks
U.S. Dentist Fears Patient Safety, Income Loss From Cross-Border Competition
If the choice is between going toothless or risking Mexico, clearly people are choosing the latter. I have many friends who frequent Tijuana dentists and they've been quite happy with results. Of course American dentists can't compete, but many people going to Mexico can't afford care in the United States. I have two broken molars. Every time I have my teeth cleaned (an affordable procedure here) they ask me if I've "won the lottery yet." Otherwise I will never be able to afford to fix them.— December 22, 2011 10:03 a.m.
More Police Raids, But Civic Center Remains Occupied
Indeed we do. They are not engaged, and they are not particularly fond of the Occupy climate downtown. I spoke with a lot of people from the Mission Bay neighborhood last Thursday when we occupied the Clairemont Dr. bridge for a couple of hours. There were many retired folk who turned out to this event at Mission Bay because the milieu downtown is difficult, marginally hostile, and inconvenient. The idea behind Occupy Mission Bay really wasn't to establish another soup kitchen/tent city. It was to provide an outreach to the neighborhood; to the families and elder folks who don't wish to trek downtown. And the downtown people don't like it. They have this warped perspective that is disturbing. Somehow, OMB is going to "detract from the movement" by attracting people who wouldn't go downtown to begin with. Logic fail. Somehow, the people downtown think we're being "exclusionary" by not coming downtown to hang with the homeless. By not coming downtown we're "avoiding" the homeless. Really, OSD? There are at least 1200 homeless people living in Mission Valley. We share our neighborhoods with them. We don't need to come downtown to see your homeless, OSD. Got our own, thanks. Long story short, if you don't agree with every point the comrades in charge push, you're not part of the movement. Only they call it a revolution, being entirely unfamiliar with the difference. Here's a response from one of the OSD people about OMB: "Carmen: your sense of social justice is seriously askew, and smacks of defending a lost 'white privilege' rather than struggling for justice for all." Okay, Mission Bay is mostly white and Latino, but that's beside the point. I thought we were fighting for reform, repealing bad law and forcing governmental change in fundamental ways to cut big money interests out of politics. What the hell does "white privilege" and "justice for all" have to do with it? If we don't change the big things first, all this becomes pantomime, a bunch of social activists pretending to rebel whilst alienating all the people who's peripheral involvement and contributions would be valuable to the cause as a whole. So I'm waiting for Occupy 2.0. The one without all the humorless comrades and holier than thou activists that we are going to sneak out a side door to avoid, then reform in the parking lot where we can eat bacon and talk smack.— November 20, 2011 9:33 a.m.
Coyote Hungry
People with "outdoor cats" don't really care much about their well-being. There are many hazards besides coyotes; cars, loose dogs, evil children. I have seen many birds of prey at the slough, including horned owls and red-tailed hawks. Both of these predators can and will take cats. In fact, feral cats have replaced bunnies in many urban canyons. People who let their cats roam outdoors don't know the havoc they cause for smaller wildlife. Songbirds, small reptiles and mammals (including bunnies) suffer heavy losses from the sheer numbers of outdoor and feral cats. So, if you have an outdoor cat, know that nature has a funny way of getting even for all the wildlife your kitty has slaughtered. Payback is a beeyotch. By the way, cat isn't bad in tacos, either...here, kitty kitty kitty!— June 1, 2010 4:30 p.m.
For the Shills
Recently the Scientology organization was convicted of fraud and practicing medicine in France. In the US, they are being sued by a number of individuals who spent decades working for Scientology. Coerced abortions, slave wages, human rights violations are a few of the charges. It is this behavior we object to. Everything they do is fraudulent, from their Narconon "drug detox" quackery, to the 'help wanted' sign outside their building. They are a lying, money-grubbing cult that hurts people, destroys families, savings, and sanity with their poisonous behavior. Just google 'scientology abuses.' You'll get more than you bargained for.— December 11, 2009 4:55 p.m.