OB Rag

The Widder Curry wonders whether a good night’s sleep in the offing?

By Judi Curry

Every now and then you go to a merchant in your neighborhood and you are treated like royalty. That doesn’t happen too often but when it does you almost would like to shout about it from the roof top of the closest building. I had one of those experiences today and want to share it with you.

For the past ten plus years I have been sleeping on a mattress that sags in the middle.

By Paul Krueger / Times of San Diego / January 13, 2022

Eric Rosenzweig won’t ever know if good fences really do make good neighbors. That’s because the law won’t let Eric build a 23-foot tall fence to protect his family’s privacy from the three “accessory dwelling units” that will soon loom large over his backyard.

It appears that the pandemic has lowered deaths and serious injuries at Sunset Cliffs for the second year. There was one death and 4 injuries due to human interaction with the beautifully stunning but treacherous cliffs during 2021, the second year of COVID-19.

The OB Rag has maintained a survey of deaths and serious injuries at the cliffs since 2005 and we have found an average of 5 deaths / serious injuries per year over that period of time. (Here is a link to last year’s report.)

In the early morning hours of Wednesday, the front exterior of the City Heights home of San Diego County Supervisor Nathan Fletcher and former Assemblymember Lorena Gonzalez home was engulfed in flames. Fletcher and Gonzalez were awoken by their smoke alarms after 4 am, and were able to safely evacuate with their family. No one was injured.

San Diego police officials said investigators believe the fire was suspicious due in part to the early hours of the blaze and that it began on the outside of the home.

By Tyler Faurot / Pt Loma-OB Monthly /Jan. 13, 2022

For 41 consecutive years, the shores of Ocean Beach have been the backdrop to a gargantuan pine tree, decorated and lighted to commemorate the holiday season. Historically, once the holidays came to an end, many of the trees were carried away to landfills for an unceremonious demise. In recent years, however, the holiday trees have been given new life as sought-after crafting material for local woodworkers.

The tree for the 2021 holiday season was a star pine donated from the yard of Ocean Beach resident Catrina Russel.

The Sierra Club’s Conservation Committee has unanimously endorsed sensible, environmentally-friendly revisions to the city’s Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU) code and urges the city council to maintain shade trees and other greenery on properties slated for multi-unit ADU construction.

Committee chair Peter Anderson stated:

“The Sierra Club supports housing, especially affordable housing. But we must preserve the trees that provide shade, absorb greenhouse gas and cool our city.”

The local chapter’s endorsement adds to a long list of support for changes to the ADU code championed by Neighbors For A Better San Diego (NFABSD). The City Council’s Land Use and Housing Committee debated the issue Thursday (no news from that debate is available).

(Originally posted here on Jan 15, 2018)

The day before Martin Luther King Jr., was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee on April 4, 1968, he gave his final speech, known as ‘I’ve Been to the Mountaintop’ speech. Here’s the full text.

By The Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., MEMPHIS, Tenn./ April 3, 1968

Thank you very kindly, my friends. As I listened to Ralph Abernathy and his eloquent and generous introduction and then thought about myself, I wondered who he was talking about. It’s always good to have your closest friend and associate to say something good about you. And Ralph Abernathy is the best friend that I have in the world. I’m delighted to see each of you here tonight in spite of a storm warning. You reveal that you are determined to go on anyhow.

by Sal Mineo (@snackdiego)

Hello again, OB. As faithful readers of Table Talk, I’m sure you all remember what we are about here – getting personal with those in our community keeping us well-fed and quenched. Our local food celebrities but before they get huge and have a publicist. Sometimes it’s the restaurant owner; but sometimes it’s the guy, behind the guy, behind the guy.

This is my neighbor, Max. I first met him one average OB day as I rode up the alley to the back entrance of our place, and came upon Max and his friend Talia taking some glamour shots using our fence as a backdrop (it has a cool viney thing growing on it – influencers, come check it out).

The subjects of the photographs were these utterly stunning mushrooms, which even in OB you just don’t see every day. Naturally, I said something brilliant like “what’s that?”, we got to chitter chatter and that’s when I learned I have a neighbor that cultivates these absolute specimens in his grow room right across the alley.

By Geoff Page

This post is a pitch for a really great organization called Project Wildlife. For those who don’t know about them, here is what they do, based on an actual experience I had Tuesday morning.

My wife and I were walking our dogs at Dog Beach. She noticed a bird at the waterline she called a coot. It’s a black bird, sort of medium size. This one was by itself, we didn’t see any others nearby. My wife remarked that she had seen these birds along the river but had never seen one in the surf at Dog Beach. I had to agree.

Just as we were looking at the bird, a dog went after it in the surf.

A Public Service Announcement

By A.J. Herrington / Forbes / Jan.11, 2022

Compounds in cannabis can prevent infection from the virus that causes Covid-19 by blocking its entry into cells, according to a study published this week by researchers affiliated with Oregon State University. A report on the research, “Cannabinoids Block Cellular Entry of SARS-CoV-2 and the Emerging Variants,” was published online on Monday by the Journal of Natural Products.