Rob Thorsen Trio: Live
Robert Bush 8:15 p.m., May 19
I couldn't help it. As I walked by what used to be my favorite bar I had to peer through the window and see the abomination. I could not even recognize it anymore, my old home away from home. "Goddamnit", I sighed to my date. "This used to be my favorite place, and now its just going to be another sh-tty yuppie bar."
"The Office" as it's now called, used to be "Scolari's Office" on 30th in between University and Lincoln. A great place to see underground bands, get the f-ck out of the house, have good times with friends, and have drinks without draining your wallet. Sure it had it's downsides. It smelled funny, the PA was often half working, and there were various scumbags around from time to time. Nothing out of the ordinary for an actual dive bar. But I had some of my best times there, met most of my close friends there, and saw alot of good bands there. It felt like a community.
Now its cheap drinks are replaced with 5 dollar wells, no cover charge replaced with a cover charge, dark comforting atmosphere replaced with trendy bullsh-t lights and what have you. Even a f-cking velvet rope outside.
As I walked with my date towards Lincoln and my soon to be stolen truck I looked down 30th street. La Boheme, the ultimate "f-ck you" to people who loved their neighborhood just as it was 5 years ago. Yoga studio, restaurant, dance studio, restaurant, beer snob bar, SUV's, lifted bro trucks, BMWs. In the distance the sh-thole that was Aztec Bowl now nestled against a Starbucks.
"I remember when everyone called that Donut shop "Hooker Donuts", because all the tranny hookers would lurk late at night around the back waiting for Johns." I tell my date. "You could go in there wasted at 2:30am and get a pink crueller and a coffee and watch the trannies come out of the shadows like vampires. It was amazing."
She laughs and says, "Sounds like fun."
"Yeah" I sigh, "They don't stay open late anymore."
Comments
smuggg Sept. 6, 2008 @ 7:29 p.m.
adamcrisis - I was born and raised in North Park. I was there during the sixties when it was a thriving business and shopping center. This continued through most of the seventies until the neighborhood changed for the worse and the business ditrict became home to dive bars, thrift stores, 99 cent stores, storefront churches etc. The business district was on life support, landlords and business owners alike were letting their properties fall into a state of complete disrepair.It was during this time that sthole dive bars like scolaris catered to drunken, coke sniffing scum bags (i.e.scenesters, junkies, punks). I say good riddance to f*ed up places like Scolari's and welcome La Boheme, welcome Starbucks, welcome restautants. The new North Park does not want your broke ass around here anyway. If you still feel the need impress your date and hang out with trannies or get a hooker or buy some dope just stay on University and head east past the 805.
adamcrisis Sept. 8, 2008 @ 5:34 a.m.
I hope nothing but good things for you.
adamcrisis Sept. 7, 2008 @ 3:24 a.m.
That's all well and good for you. But if you want that tame bland cut-out, looks like everywhere else vibe...maybe head north to Mira Mesa. The suburbs always welcome stale boring people who can get excited about all you can eat ribs at Applebees and a new Trader Joes opening up sometime soon in that new strip mall that looks like every other one on the block.
Those "coke sniffing hipsters and punks" are what unfortunantely brought enough of the "cool factor" to North Park to make it a spot for opportunistic developers to combine with greedy landlords to develop North Park into the yuppie condo s***hole that it is today.
Im far from broke (but I welcome your shallow classism), and my date was from out of town so I was telling her about the neighborhood I still like to live in despite its recent shortcomings.
Heres a toast to hopefully your future foreclosure and 6 bucks a gallon chief!
smuggg Sept. 7, 2008 @ 3:39 p.m.
Wow dude 3:24am, now wipe your nose and read carefully. I am one of those "greedy landlords" that hung on through the hard times and now are getting the rents and the tenants that warrant my investment. By all means please bring your brand of coolness (scene kids, coke heads, skinny jean punks, gang bangers) to the east so that the property I own there can yuppify and I can acheive more prosperity and pay $6 a gallon gas. Besides if I did not patronize Applebees or Trader Jo's you and your buddies would be out of work. Now, just to set the record straight I haven't even come close to foreclosure ( its hard to foreclose when there is no mortgage) but I have evicted a few of your kind that can't pay the rent or follow the rules.
GrimNoumenon Nov. 24, 2008 @ 9:10 p.m.
Wow. Nice vibe here. Great to be here in San Diego.
Is north park really that bad now? I'm thinking of moving into an apartment and can't really wrap my head around these non existent problems you two are stumbling awkwardly over. Sell me on this area god d@mnit! Why north park? Surely there are other interesting things to do than argue over establishments? If I seriously wanted to live around that s*** I wouldn't have moved out of DC.
smuggg Nov. 27, 2008 @ 8:33 a.m.
North Park is a great place to live! My point to adamcrisis is lets not look backward to the way North Park was but embrace the place it has become.
jmumbles Dec. 28, 2008 @ 5:38 p.m.
No need to travel east on University. There are plenty of hookers right there on El Cajon blvd. Sometimes they stop and have a latte at Starbucks also. Hookers that are catered to by guys just like the landlord. America is beautiful place. Where alchoholics can have their fill and jump back into their BMWS to look down on "drug addicts" and hookers. The guy in the beemer just dropped a wad on his date and wont get laid she has somebody for that some chick named Maria. Look at the AC lounge and all it yuppie glorious they tried to deny me for a dress code once, even though I had collered shirt and some shiny shoes on. I get in the place only to discover people weraing T Shirts, no class at all. Isnt anybodt that drinks alcohol considered a low life drug addict?
smuggg Jan. 18, 2009 @ 10:43 p.m.
Please try to link nouns and verbs in proper order to make a sentence or just put down the pipe jmumbles
adamcrisis Feb. 6, 2009 @ 5:53 p.m.
GrimN,
It all depends on what you want out of a community you live in. Obviously you're reading two varied opinions here. Drive around and make up your mind. But to me the people and business' in the neighborhood make it what it is.
I bitch and moan, but I still live here. They're going to have to throw in a few more KFC's and Yuppie beer bars before I leave.
stevo420 June 18, 2009 @ 3:46 p.m.
Progress...Can't live with it....Can't live without it...
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