Possible future use for Qualcomm Stadium: ball pit.

Dear Hipster:

I am not a huge football fan. I will probably watch the Thanksgiving game, but only if someone else puts it on, and then only if I’m not already sleeping off my tryptophan coma in another room. Nevertheless, I couldn’t help but notice the traffic jam caused by last weekend’s Oakland game, and it got me thinking, what will we do with Qualcomm Stadium if the Chargers leave town?? Knowing how creative you hipsters are with repurposing otherwise useless junk, I leave it in your capable, DIY hands to brainstorm the ultimate answer.

— Henry, Kensington

OMG. The ultimate answer!? Such responsibility! I feel like I need to consult with my hipster peers on this one, so I’ll be accepting applications through Thanksgiving for future members of the Hipster Qualcomm Reclamation Board (or the HQRB for short, and there will be six associate members, with yours truly acting as a first-among-equals chairman and seventh vote to avoid unseemly ties). Readers are encouraged to please send a personal statement (at least one complete sentence, and not to exceed 300 words) detailing your commitment to hipster values; along with a headshot or suitable Instagram photo of your legs on a beach, a sunset, cliffside yoga session, or really anything else that gives me a sense of how genuine you are.

Applications can be emailed directly to [email protected], otherwise calligraphed on paper made from not less than 80% reclaimed cotton fiber and sent to the San Diego Reader offices by bicycle messenger.

Even without a suitable committee to help me flesh out ideas, the possibilities for an unused Qualcomm are endless, especially after the Aztecs’ contract to play there expires in 2018.

Perhaps the most obvious plan of action would be constructing a 250m, Olympic-caliber velodrome within the Colosseumesque husk of the football stadium. That way, Tuesday Night Racing at the velodrome in Morley Field — ostensibly the most hipster-friendly spectator sport in town — could transcend its 200-person viewing limit. I see no obstacles to 70,000-strong crowds other than an entrenched bias against hipster sports.

Then again, how easy would it be to fill the stadium with multi-colored plastic balls? All right, it probably wouldn’t be that easy, but still…. The Guinness record for “world’s biggest ball pit” is, as far as I know, still held by a Chinese company who built a 15,000-square-foot ball pit in an ice arena. A regulation NFL football field is roughly 57,000 square feet, so clinching the record shouldn’t be a big deal. The rest of the stadium could be converted into luxury hotels, with their attendant slides down into the ball pit, for vacationers seeking a stress-reducing frolic in the new world’s biggest ball pit at the San Diego Hipsterdome.

Craft brewing hall of fame? Urban lumberjack center? A tiny, miniaturized Portland where San Diego’s hipster community (the non-hip will also be tolerated) can gather and experience Pacific NW life without having to actually “pull a Chargers” and move away from San Diego?

I could go on, but if I tip my hand too soon, Mission Valley’s notorious anti-hipster NIMBY brigade (which I’m sure exists) will be able to muster its stalwart defenses. The complete HQRB can curry favor with certain city-hall dignitaries, but only if we’re not thwarted before we begin.