To its fans, the world of professional baseball is a dreamland where grown-ups can live out their childhood fantasies, tracking batting averages and swapping stories about heroic home runs. Behind the curtain is a more …

Nobody expected anything big to be decided at last Tuesday's electric-power summit. The California Public Utilities Utilities Commision (PUC) had called for the roundtable at the Al Bahr Shrine Temple auditorium on Kearny Mesa Road. …

The sister of Hall of Fame running back Franco Harris has filed suit against the San Diego Chargers, alleging that the team fired her "as a result of racial discrimination and harassment," a San Diego …

"I made 473 drawings on one assignment in Vietnam. February and March of 1967, in Dong Ha in the DMZ. Sometimes I could use art to shield myself from what was going on around me. …

"It started in 1991 and peaked in ’94. We identified two major mail-theft gangs in ’95, and by ’98 every blue collection box in the four-county area, 7500 of them, had a new locking mechanism.”

Adults are just degenerated youths with driver’s licenses, credit cards, academic degrees, and degrees of bad habits. They do come in handy, however, when you need to borrow money or jump-start your car.

Hike across Death Valley’s salt pan to the lowest spot in the Western Hemisphere. Death Valley’s salt pan was inundated by 2 feet of runoff from the surrounding mountains during the wet winter of 2005.

Dear Matthew Alice: I work in Mission Valley, and I spend a lot of time waiting at red lights on top of the bridge that crosses Interstate 8 at Mission Center Road and Auto Circle. …

Dear Matt: Why do letters to complete strangers commonly begin with a seemingly intimate term of endearment like "dear"? Are there other terms in current use in the English language for written salutations? Do other …

Simply shooting oneself, jumping off a bridge, hanging, etc., doesn't count.

Are San Diego County Health Services failing to stop the spread of HIV? Dr. Cary Savitch thinks so. And it's not just San Diego. "You're looking at the biggest public-health blunder of our lifetime," he …

If animals could talk, they, too, might express opinions about recent changes at the San Diego Humane Society and Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA), which investigates complaints of abuse and serves …

Did San Diego utility giant Sempra Corp. pay $410,000 in bribes to a Mexican company in order to expedite construction of a natural gas pipeline it wanted to build from San Diego to Rosarito? So …

Gary Sassaman is elusive. The 43-year-old enjoys his work as a news graphic designer for KUSI-TV; he also has good friends and likes to spend time with them. But like many artists, he seems best …

The highest and lowest tides of the year 2000 occur today, Thursday, January 20. Why today? There are three primary reasons. First, the moon has reached full phase. At this position (and at new moon, …

You go away to college, and you have a certain percentage of friends who don’t go. Well, within the first year and a half, you have nothing in common. You’re going to class full-time, they’re working at McDonald’s.”

“Honey, honey, don’t run! Please, honey, stay there!” The girl strains forward and yells from the back seat of the patrol car. But as the officer door-knocks, Honey bails through the living room window into …

BUDD, THE PRESIDENT OF OUR MEDICAL GROUP, TOLD ME A FEW WEEKS AGO, “IT IS MY GOAL NEVER TO BECOME AN INTERESTING PATIENT.” I hadn’t seen Sheryl in 19 months when she showed up for …

I walked to Bob’s house at 5:00. Bob had his coat in his hand when he greeted me. Bob's hair was still wet from the shower, and the smell of his aftershave made my eyes water in the dry mountain air.

My husband Patrick is a meat-and-potatoes guy. He orders his steak rare when dining out, and a dinner is thought impotent without a slab of meat at its core. One can imagine his surprise the …

For Matthew Alice: Flax seed is supposed to be a good source of plant estrogen. Is there any such thing as plant testosterone? (Er...not that I need any extra, of course.) -- Kennedy Gammage, Vista …

Dear Matthew Alice: Occasionally while walking about, I may spy a penny or other small coin lying there on the ground. Certainly no one objects if I reach down, retrieve the wayward copper (or silver), …

Matt: What's the skinny on clean-shaven prisoners? Since they take away shoestrings and belts from them to prevent hanging, I would assume they don't issue razor blades. So how come so many prisoners are clean …

"Peak-baggers" by the thousands earn personal satisfaction by climbing notable high points throughout California. No such interest is directed toward the state's low points — except maybe the attention given to the lowest spot in …

A cockroach looking down toward the empty end of a cereal box — that’s my sense of the bare stage of the San Diego Civic Theatre viewed from the first row. No trace is left …

La Jolla's Neal Blue, who with brother Linden owns General Atomics, the big defense contractor on Torrey Pines Mesa, is ruffling the bucolic atmosphere of scenic Telluride, Colorado. Blue's San Miguel Valley Corp., which owns …

Yet another Navy SEAL impostor has been unmasked, and this time the case is going before a judge. Raymond E. Aucker, 46, a former school superintendent in Panther Valley, Pennsylvania, was charged last week in …

Next Thursday evening, January 20, the full moon launches itself over the eastern horizon near the time of sunset, 5 p.m. By 6:30, however, a ghostly pallor starts spreading across the ascending moon. A denser …

I held the spoon to Johnny’s lips. He opened his mouth for a moment, then closed his lips tight. Sticky purple suspension flowed down Johnny’s chin and into the folds of his neck. “Oh, Johnny,” I complained.

Say "millennium" real fast as many times as you can before you puke. For me, I can't get past the first pronunciation of the word. I'm not sure why that is. It's a perfectly functional …

Last Thursday, January 6, Victor Ontiveros arrived on Kettner Boulevard and disappeared into a two-story '60s-era building. When he came out, a couple of Macintosh computers in his arms, he was $3000 richer, with a …

An affiliate of the controversial San Diego-based diet-drug company Metabolife -- already California's sixth-largest donor of soft money to national political campaigns -- has written a $25,000 check to a committee set up to benefit …

I am your typical liberal — skeptical, cynical, a little grossed out by Columbus Day. Maybe I’m a little to the left of most liberals, because I’m young and because I owe credit card companies …

In the predawn stillness of December 25, 1899, an earthquake awoke most of the 17,700 residents of the city of San Diego. When it ended, people estimated that the undulations had lasted 12 seconds. Eastern …

"Roam-O-Rama" marches into the new millennium with a new focus: San Diego County and beyond. During the seven-year tenure of this column in the San Diego Reader, I've recommended nearly 300 outdoor activities and adventures …

I looked down at Lucy while Rebecca wrote out Lucy’s request. “What if Santa can’t get Prince of Egypt guys?” I asked. “What else might you want?” “Nuffing,” Lucy answered and carried her book back to the living room.

When Charles Harrington Elster contemplates the task of building a new library in downtown San Diego, the Greek myth of Sisyphus comes to mind. For his crimes of murder, gossip, and greed, Sisyphus was condemned …

Long-haul, big-rig truck drivers who flow into San Diego consider the area one of the least friendly in the country, mainly because of the absence of full-service truck stops. Not long ago Dan and Terry …

As San Diego's homicide rate soars, police department critics are zeroing in on the department's abysmal "clearance" percentage -- the rate at which murders are solved. According to FBI statistics, the 1998 national clearance rate …

My first car was a lemon. It was given to me as a gift by my best friend, and it was a good-looking car. A 1974 Volvo 242 DL sedan, dark blue, inside and out. …

Dear Matthew Alice: A friend of mine swears that Sylvester Stallone appeared in a movie with Ingrid Bergman. Apparently he made it before he became "Rocky." Of course my friend doesn't know any other details, …

Matthew: 1. About 15 years ago, I read a newspaper story about a professor of dentistry at Buffalo University who had invented a mouth rinse that not only arrested decay but actually healed and invigorated …

Matt: My dad told me a story about how President Jimmy Carter was attacked by a rabbit. I own one, and I don't think rabbits would attack anybody. Is this story true? My dad said …