Month: July 2012

Recently, I had the great pleasure of visiting a Buddhist monastery to do a walking meditation on a luminous summer morning. It was a beautiful experience but what struck me afterward was how quickly even many of those bent on being here now reached for their cell phones to check their text messages or play Angry Birds. As charmingly ironic as this is, it is also a perfect manifestation of what most ails us. We just can’t stop working/amusing ourselves to death.

Not too long after my encounter with the texting Buddhists, I came upon an illustrative article in the Travel section of the New York Times entitled “Call Waiting: ‘It’s Me, Vacation’: Can’t Let Go? Eight Rules for Getting the Most Out of Your Time Off” by Matt Richtel. Richtel’s article starts with the story of a failed vacation that left him “exhausted, defeated, and irritable” rather than refreshed and at peace. He then turns to the wisdom of neuroscientists, behavior experts, and business executives to learn that “letting go” is something you have to “practice on a daily basis.”

From San Diego Free Press

For those of an apocalyptic bent, the beginning of the final half of 2012 was near perfect.

True, the walls didn’t all come tumbling down, though those retaining the spent nuclear fuel pool atop Fukushima Unit 4 were bulging. But the signs seemed to be everywhere, from the eastern shores of Japan to the west coast of California.

The most widely reported such event was the July 1 restart of a Japanese commercial nuclear power reactor at the Ohi nuclear plant. Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda pushed for this restart, despite a massive protest in front of his office in Tokyo only days before. Digital Journal reported that 200,000 protested there on June 29

Please Join the Celebration
For the new location of

The Green Store

Open House on Saturday July 14th
from 1 p.m. to 6 p.m.
4843B Voltaire St, Ocean Beach

The Green Store on Voltaire Street has been OB’s quintessential center of green, ecology and environmental awareness for decades now. Operated by Colleen Dietzel – she and Kip Krueger originally opened it – and several energetic volunteers, the Green Store has for 23 years been providing peace, social justice and environmental information to the community of Ocean Beach and San Diego in general.

Come inside for the Celebration Schedule of music and speakers …

After going to the beach during the summer in OB for fifty years, I have never seen such a dramatic display of dolphin drama as a pod demonstrated yesterday – July 10th – just beyond the breaker line in South OB.

I was sitting with two friends waiting for the wind to die down, for the waves to get less choppy, and for the conditions in general to get better. We were sitting next to a firepit just north of Tower Two when all of a sudden my friends yelled out. What?

Dolphins jumping! Right there – right beyond the breakers!

Well, kiddies, looks like the Starbucks in OB has closed and moved on. There’s a sign in one of the windows that announces that OB Kabob will be moving into the storefront at the corner of Newport Avenue and Bacon Street.

Nope. Not yet. Sorry. It’s Seth’s Chop Shop that is being remodeled and will be the site of the new OB Kabob.

Assembly District 76 Small Business of the Year: OB PEOPLE’S ORGANIC FOOD MARKET

Each year the California Small Business Association partners with the California State Assembly to host California Small Business Day. An annual tradition since 2000, each Assemblymember chooses a small business in their district to honor the contributions that small business makes to California.

This year Ocean Beach People’s Organic Food Market was chosen as the 76th Assembly District’s Small Business of the Year. Serving the community since 1972, People’s is unique in that they are San Diego’s only customer-owned grocery store. People’s members manage their co-op through a democratic process, holding quarterly meetings to make the major decisions.

Seven-and-a-half hour City Council marathon ends in 6-1 vote in favor of Balboa Park overhaul.

by Andy Cohen

The most controversial decision in the San Diego City Council since the Chargers ticket guarantee …. Go inside for more ….

Point Loman Incensed by Vote

By John P. Falchi

It was good to have spent Monday downtown on one of the hottest issues of our time, the preservation of the historic integrity of Balboa Park. . Go inside for more ….

Todd Gloria sells his soul

No surprise Todd Gloria voted in favor of the developer-backed Jacobs Balboa Park plan. Especially after … Go inside for more ….

Democrats Emerald, Alvarez and Gloria Join Republicans Against Lone Hold-out Lightner for the Plaza de Panama Plan

By Katie Orr and Claire Trageser / KPBS / July 9, 2012

SAN DIEGO — The San Diego City Council voted 6-1 to approve the Plaza de Panama plan for Balboa Park, one of the options to get cars out of the center of the park.

City Councilwoman Sherri Lightner voted against the plan and City Councilman Tony Young was absent from the meeting. The remaining six councilmembers voted for it.

At the spur of a moment my neighbor called and asked if I wanted to share a meal with him. After a 30 second deliberation I said yes. But…it was Wednesday in Ocean Beach – Farmer’s Market Day – so we decided to leave our neighborhood and venture onto Sports Arena for a dinner at “Chili’s.”

We were greeted by the receptionist who saw us coming and she went over to assist us in opening the heavy doors. (Did we really look that feeble or does she do that for everyone?) She sat us at a table; told us the name of our waitperson – Gail – and within seconds Gail was there to take our drink order.

After a flurry of anxiety that Mitt Romney was surging it appears that the Obama campaign has righted the ship, leading handily in a recent Bloomberg poll and by narrower margins in other polls. More importantly, Obama appears to be doing quite well in most of the battleground states as his campaign hits Romney hard as the “outsourcer in chief.” Certainly, it doesn’t hurt Team Obama to be running against a guy who at times seems to be trying to mimic the cartoon capitalist in the board game Monopoly.

The bottom line is that Romney is a laughably terrible candidate, …

By Norma Damashek / NumbersRunner

I don’t know how the City Council hearing on the Balboa Park/Jacobs bypass bridge, scheduled for Monday afternoon, will end up.

I don’t know how many people will show up to support the Jacobs plan and how many will be there to condemn it.

I don’t know what the final vote will be if, indeed, there is a final vote. But this I do know. We’re getting exactly what we should expect to get when private business is brought in to solve a public problem.

We have just learned yesterday, that one of greatest friends of Ocean Beach has passed. Mike Berrill – who lived for decades with his wife Sue and daughter Amanda on Saratoga Avenue in Casa Berrill – had been in poor health recently. We are deeply saddened for the Berrill family and for Ocean Beach.

Mike Berrill was one of the original founders of that quirky – but oh-so-OB group – the Ocean Beach Geriatric Surf Club– also known by its much longer, original handle, the Ocean Beach Geriatric Surf Club Precision Marching Surfboard Drill Team and Gidget Patrol.