When Mariette Parsons, RN, tells her patients she's a traveler, she says they often look puzzled. "They're, like, 'You work for a travel agency or something?'" Parsons explains that travel nurses fill assignments all over …

It's the compulsion, the need that keeps you awake until dawn. The drugs are secondary. That hole has to be filled. Somehow you were given that hole. During your childhood. The intricate latticework of behavioral …

Lunar Park by Bret Easton Ellis. Knopf, 2005; $24.95; 308 pages. FROM THE DUST JACKET: Imagine becoming a bestselling novelist, and almost immediately famous and wealthy, while still in college, and before long seeing your …

Stress is nothing more than a socially acceptable form of mental illness. -- Richard Carlson 'You've been at that for more than an hour. What's up?" David sounded more concerned than curious. I lowered the …

"In the past, people's mindset was, if people aren't having kids, how is the Reformed faith going to grow?" said Rick Roeda, the director of youth ministries at San Diego Christian Reformed Church (SDCRC). "Reformed …

Tim Curns, one half of the Dateless Losers (with Gabriel Lander), was recently flown out to New York to audition for a slot in the Blue Man franchise. "I sent in my résumé," says Tim, …

The sea cliffs at Dana Point are revered by historians as the site where Spanish vaqueros threw hides over the cliffs and down to waiting ships as described in Richard Henry Dana's Two Years Before …

My husband Patrick and I are bickering more these days. It may be the heat -- around October 1st, we both start thinking that the autumn cool should set in, and then we get blasted. …

Got an e-mail invitation to celebrate the birth date of Fong Ha's one-year-old daughter, Emily. Fong was database guy for the Sporting Box Football Contest, which had a five-year run during the mid '90s. After …

Unlike Encinitas, the Gaslamp Quarter, and La Mesa, Escondido suffers from a shocking shortage of Italian dinner houses. Judging from the Yellow Pages, there's only tiny Joe's downtown, an Olive Garden way out in the …

'I try very hard to not let bigotry eat its way into my mind," says Kayla Williams, author of Love My Rifle More Than You: Young and Female in the U.S. Army. "I was talking …

“It tasted like it was dead. And it was two years younger than ours.”

While in rural northern Georgia during the first weekend of October, I learned that Hammerfest 2005 would take place nearby. The event would include Fallbrook resident Tom Metzger performing karaoke between sets by Whitelaw, Kremator, …

Remember the Alamo? Remember the Maine? Forget both. Remember March of 2000 if you're concerned about your economic future. That month has meaning for today. It's when the stock market bubble of the 1990s peaked …

It was like a scene from War of the Worlds. On a late Sunday afternoon in spring, Donna New heard her husband calling from the deck of their hillside home in the West Muirlands area …

On the eve of the release of the Castanets' sophomore album, First Light's Freeze, Raymond Raposa seemed indifferent to the media whirlwind surrounding like-minded "neo-folk" stars Devendra Banhart, Iron and Wine, and Sufjan Stevens. "It's …

"We get to record a track at their studios," says Seth Torma of Evergreen. The cost of recording a song in L.A. this week will be covered by Napster, the singer/guitarist says. "It's all part …

Filmmakers have a hard enough time telling the truth about fictional characters fashioned out of whole cloth.

High-tech evangelist Larry Smarr, who runs UCSD's California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology, is being paid $249,200 a year, in part to promote commerce between big business and the public university. "My point is …

"If I had sold music alone, I wouldn't have been able to survive," says Elliot Leib, who cofounded Trade Roots with Renee Romano 20 years ago. Leib had a master's degree in African studies when …

"I tried for four years to get people to play with me, and I finally found them," says Andre Beller, a bassist and SDSU education major. Beller says two other musicians round out Nostalgia, an …

"He arrived at the UCSD Medical Center having lost one-third of his blood from 15 knife wounds to his head, neck, face, arms, and torso," says Lourdes Ayon Jimenez. Her brother, musician Fernando Ayon, was …

Thirty-one years ago today (10/13/74), T Rex and Blue Oyster Cult were scheduled to play Golden Hall. T Rex had just undergone personnel changes and singer Marc Bolan was in the midst of splitting with …

Heymatt: Does anyone know the history behind the lips painted on the rock going out of Lemon Grove at Lemon Grove Avenue and High street? I'm 34 years old and always remember the lips being …

Hey Matt: What makes the loudest noise? I think it's an H bomb, but my girlfriend thinks it's a big volcano. Or is it our argument about this question? Please help! -- Andy, South Park …

Thirty Years Ago Jane Fonda could in no way duplicate Jon Voight's warmth, nor does she feel the need to. Understandably, she is under pressure. Hayden has spoken to 600 groups since last June. If …

A friend of mine took me to a party in La Mesa with the understanding that I wouldn't write about it. When I grabbed a pen from the car, she said, "What are you doing? …

Thank God for Cigarettes and Alcohol I think my PC monitor is giving me headaches, especially when I am using Linux, leading to tiredness and grumpiness and all of the personality traits you all know …

“What a woman! Her brother claimed she’d been poisoned.”