“I couldn’t believe it,” says the veteran San Diego lifeguard. “A kid shouted, ‘Hey, look!’ And I saw two of them with their parents, and I suddenly realized, oh my God. On a day like …

“The script was written based on the high school scene in coastal North County San Diego,” says Fabulous Rudies singer Tom Voris, music director for the upcoming film Punk Rock High School. “It’s based on …

A mural at the San Elijo Retail Center in Cardiff-by-the-Sea has gone away. Local artist Kevin Anderson completed the four-by-seven-foot painting a year ago at the request of Commercial Facilities, Inc. The company manages the …

As last week’s losing ballot propositions went down to the wire, the list of political losers began to mount. Among them, San Diego district attorney Bonnie Dumanis, who showed up on a list of those …

Other casualties of the Election Day massacre may include the KPBS public broadcasting operation, owned and operated by San Diego State University. The bad budget news couldn’t come at a worse time. Hurting from previous …

Rich Grosch, a staffer with Democratic assemblyman Marty Block, says he reimbursed the Viejas Indian tribe for the $37.11 in food and drink he consumed with Block and other staff members at the tribe’s restaurant, …

The Surfrider Foundation and Sierra Club are out with their environmental rankings of California Coastal Commission members, and San Diego city councilman Ben Hueso shows up near the bottom, at 10 out of 12, with …

A recent picture of the band Propagandhi shows four guys, a few of them approaching middle age, who look more about golf or office jobs than flat-out aggressive rock and roll. Founded in Manitoba in …

St. Vincent is the nom de rock of one Annie Clark, a young singer-songwriter shredder who has done time backing Sufjan Stevens and the Polyphonic Spree. When I first heard Marry Me, St. Vincent’s debut …

In junior high, Kelly Dalton started writing songs and playing in bands and then began gigging, touring, and recording in his teens and 20s. “In the late ’90s I was in a punk band called …

With two blockbusters in a single week — Terminator Salvation, alias T4, and Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian — the summer sequels would appear to have leaped over the prequels. (Siding with, …

‘Remember when all you needed was a coat hanger you could slide over the window?” asked Patrick as he stared into our locked car at his keys dangling in the ignition. “You’d loop it down, …

Thirty Years AgoTwo years ago, small businessmen and poor Mexican-American homeowners in downtown Escondido led a campaign against the razing of portions of downtown for a shopping center to be developed by Ernest Hahn. On …

On May 29 and 30, the Casbah will host the Ché Underground Reunion, a gathering of bands and fans who frequented UCSD’s student-run co-op Ché Café in the early ’80s. Organized by the online community …

Last year, math-rock trio Swim Party sent a few of their songs and a brief bio to producers at Fuel TV’s action sports show, The Daily Habit. About six months later, a producer from the …

Joey Harris and the Mentals are promoting their new ten-track self-titled album with a June 14 release show at Brick by Brick. “Mojo Nixon and Paul and Caren Kamanski will be joining us onstage,” says …

Cleaning out the disc bin on my desk, the Sendak-like pen-and-ink critters on Da Bears’ Classics/Cobra caught my eye. The collection was recorded from 2006 through ought eight. Better late than never, eh? And never …

What are you reading? “Because of Romek, by David Faber. It’s a Holocaust memoir. David Faber is a Holocaust survivor, and he lives in San Diego. Essentially, it’s about how his brother Romek saved him. …

The quiet, shady interior of El Prieto Canyon seems impossibly remote given its stone’s-throw proximity to the edge of an Altadena subdivision. Majestic live oaks flank the canyon’s stream, casting dense pools of shade. A …

“Service?” asked the smiling man at the entrance to the AMC Theatres in the Otay Ranch Town Center. I was a little surprised — it’s 10 in the morning — but he had reason to …

This is Saturday night, May 23, my birthday. I am celebrating at Jikojim, a Soto Zen retreat center in the Santa Cruz Mountains. The center has a Zendo (meditation hall), a dorm, a residents’ building, …

How to explain what I was doing in Escondido as parking-lot cop on a Friday night in May for “Cruisin’ Grand: Pre-’74 American Hot Rods, Customs, Classics, Vintage & Muscle Cars.” Since I was 15, …

On May 15, 1972, Democratic presidential candidate George Wallace had toned down his vein-bulging, racist views and began to rise in the opinion polls. He gave a speech at a shopping center in Laurel, Maryland. …

Up here near the 94 College exit, a blue 1966 Valiant sits parked between a Frazee’s and a Weight Watchers place. Only one man in this town has a sky-blue ’66 Valiant: my buddy Rod, …

As the economic climate has turned even the well employed into the “working worried,” people accustomed to eating most dinners out are cooking at home — despite the long hours and killer commutes that initially …

Artist: MutantspaceboySong: “Lost in Time” (from the CD Mutantspaceboy)Heard By: Rob Scheuch, Mission HillsI thought it was very different. It was mostly synthesizers. It started out really slow and then progressively picked up and got …

Dear Matthew Alice: When you give somebody mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, you’re blowing air out of your mouth into their lungs. I always thought that when we blew out air, there was no more oxygen in it …

A New Ubu I enjoyed your cover story of May 21 on Zirk Ubu by Thomas Lux (“Bless This Crew of Visionaries”) but was somewhat disappointed that he didn’t recognize the literary allusion in the …

I love my father as the stars — he’s a bright shining example and a happy twinkling in my heart. — Adabella Radici Dad sat on my red couch, his left hand clutching his right. …

What began as a local backcountry struggle over San Diego Gas & Electric’s proposed Sunrise Powerlink is now a national issue, one that opponents of the project hope will challenge a key energy strategy of …