Joetopia

I appreciate the county Health Commission jumping on the cause of Nipomo Mesa folks who get to breathe sand particles thanks to off-roaders on the Oceano Dunes.
But the panel’s action smacks a bit of unhelpful bandwagoning, the kind of recommendation that lets them be on the record without really offering much in the way of [...]

Here’s the weird thing about the account of that business class at Cal Poly taught by Kinko’s founder and mega-donor Paul Orfalea, besides the catering and the hand-picked class roster and the back-room dealing and the Geography 101 quizzes and the catering … Did I mention the catering?
Oh yeah.
The weird — or weirdest — thing [...]

I don’t know whether to write about this next subject or simply shake my head in disbelief.
Check out this post at craiglist.
I hesitate because this could just be someone’s inane idea of a joke. But let’s assume it’s not, because it’s more fun that way.
If it is a joke, it’s just dumb. But if it’s [...]

Religious zealots need to chill, part I: Is it just me, or did the story about the Arizona pair who got jail time for beating up a SLO man leave you puzzled?
First off, I don’t know how the victim, Philip Hauser, goes from just walking home from a party at 4 a.m. to engaging a [...]

Bob Cuddy’s story about Los Osos developer Jeff Edwards rabble-rousing for a sale of the Oceano Airport brings to mind a few choice phrases:
Piece of work.
Lot of nerve.
Who the hell does he think he is, anyway?

I especially liked Bob’s bit of concise psychoanalysis as to the curious motives of the protagonist in this story:
“… He [...]

Anyone watching the Closing Ceremonies on Sunday was surely shocked when 860-plus hours of NBC Olympic coverage came to an abrupt and wholly unceremonious end at 10:30 so that the Peacrock could play piggyback and plug a crappy new series.
The show was “The Marriage Ref,” Jerry Seinfeld’s weird hybrid production that’s half stand-up comedy, half [...]

I’m not a hockey fan, but that was a game for the ages today between the USA and Canada.
And in the grand scheme of things, as nice as it would have been to get gold for the red, white and blue, this win means more to our neighbors up north.
What better way for Canada to [...]

I have had it up to here with Carpenters Local 150, the careless union based in Camarillo that has been littering our streets with their ugly, inflammatory banners and do-nothing workers.
This is the group that unwisely took on a beloved local ice cream shop over construction hiring it had no control over, urging people to [...]

I was having a chat the other day with Richardo, a colleague at work who hails from Georgia and I’m pretty sure once lived on a plantation.
Besides being a long-suffering Atlanta Braves fan and the butt of many South-bashing jokes, Richardo is also a charter member of the Tribune’s America’s Sweetheart Committee, which has the [...]

I have a healthy dislike for the college Greek system.
And by “healthy dislike” I mean I hate it, in the way I hate any club whose primary purpose is to give its needy members an artificial sense of security/confidence/recklessness while restricting their overall personal growth by siphoning them out from the general population into a [...]