A Bump on the Head

Thirty Years Ago
Local homeowners and their families know all about the prestige of living near the foot of Nautilus Street. Here is the spot where you catch the best waves — a spot out beyond the surf line that is hardly larger than a living room. Perhaps two dozen surfers, little more, can crowd together where a big wave peaks before it crumbles toward shore. And so the locals stick together, harassing the outsiders who drive in from other parts of the county, sometimes from Los Angeles and Santa Cruz, sometimes from other coastal states.
— “A BUMP ON THE HEAD COULD KILL CHRIS O’ROURKE,” Joe Applegate, August 3, 1978

Twenty-Five Years Ago
The San Diego Port District is proposing a tremendous density along the north/south corridor of Pacific Highway and Harbor Drive, all the way from Navy Field to the airport. And when it’s finally all done, we’ll have all these gleaming, mirrored-glass skyscrapers that will fry each other and the people living around them because they’re solar mirrors.
— “THE REBUILDING AND UNDOING OF DOWNTOWN SAN DIEGO,” Paul Krueger, August 4, 1983

Twenty Years Ago
Sitting in a tiny, airless cubicle, staring at a chicken sandwich. Someone just handed it to me through a sliding door, and I’ve removed the colored foil paper in which the warm food was wrapped. Very soon Jack-in-the-Box restaurants may begin selling hundreds of thousands of replicas of this sandwich throughout the western United States. And today the men and women at the San Diego headquarters for the chain have one question uppermost in their minds: Should it be prepared with a honey-mustard sauce? Or will more people like it made with the traditional mayo-onion spread?
— “THOUGHT FOR FOOD,” Jeannette De Wyze, August 4, 1988

Fifteen Years Ago
All over California, the 1960s-style mall that has defined so much of American suburban landscape over the last 30 years is undergoing a revolution. Witness the new Del Mar Plaza, which opened in May 1989. A $30 million development covering 69,000 square feet at the intersection of 15th Street and Camino Del Mar, it styles itself as a “European retail village.” Just as California’s developers once dreamed of covering the land with bloated parking lots and anonymous L-shaped concrete blobs, so now they dream of covering it with exquisite simulacra of Mediterranean villages.
— ARCHITECTURE: “NEVER USE THE ‘M’ WORD,” Lawrence Osborne, August 5, 1993

Ten Years Ago
“I stick my finger into existence — it smells of nothing. Where am I? What is this thing called the world? Who is it who has lured me into the thing, and now leaves me here? How did I come into the world? Why was I not consulted?” This quote, and many more by Kierkegaard, can be found at a personal website called “Pleasures of the Mind.”

The media rarely pay attention to personal Web pages; but in fairness, personal Web pages tend toward sophomoric humor and read like a dry curriculum vitae: “Hi, my name is Svetlana. I love my pug, my Grammie and Gramps, scripting HTML...” “Pleasures of the Mind” (members.aol.com/KatharenaE) is a personal Web page, that of Katharena Eiermann, but as the name implies, it is more cerebral than most.
— SIGHTSEER: “BOOKS THAT WOUND AND STAB,”Justin Wolff, August 6, 1998

Five Years Ago
When did he dine and whom did he dine with?

There’s never been any question as to whether and how Inzunza dines. Virtually every business day at the stroke of 12 noon, the 34-year-old councilman can be seen strolling out of his 12th-story city-council office, heading off to one of a chosen few downtown eateries and watering holes, such as Dobson’s and the Grant Grill. Two hours later, he returns. But there has always been a nagging curiosity about what goes on in between.
— “FUN WITH RALPH,” Matt Potter, July 31, 2003