San Diego Weekend

Some thoughts from a recent that Jodi and I took to San Diego.

• Little Italy- This charming community often gets overlooked by visitors who are so set on seeing Coronado and the Gas Lamp district. We found that this area had the perfect blend of ambiance and activity and wasn't quite as crowded as the aforementioned attractions. Plus the area is home to some excellent dining. We ate at The Trattoria Fantastica and I was treated to one of my new favorite dishes, the Pollo Valdostana. The dish is cooked in a brandy sauce that gives the dish an exceptional creamy and buttery taste.
  
• Halloween- We spent the evening as observers in the Little Italy district. There was a definite sense of community there that I feel that we miss living in the suburbs. All of the restaurants participated, dressed up, and passed out candy to the myriad kids and parents who paraded up and down the street. We sat in the square and watched as parents interacted with each other and with their kids. A big part of me really wishes that every neighborhood could engender a sense community like we felt there. That will always be one of the big reasons why I have a hard time living in the suburbs; we prefer to burrow into our own homes and abstain from meaningful interaction with neighbors.
• Balboa Park- This is another gem that gets forgotten in the rush to visit Sea World. The parks, museums, restaurants, gardens and architecture make it worth at least a full day. The park is a perfect activity to counter the frenetic pace of many of the San Diego attractions. We spent most of the time casually strolling through gardens, enjoying art, and soaking in the weather.
• Proposition 8- Our visit coincided with the intense climax to the furor created by Prop 8. We saw the debate from both sides. We first observed the response from a more liberal San Diego community. Whether you disagree or not the opposition equated marriage rights for gays with the Civil Rights movement. Later in the week we visited friends and family in Orange County and Temucula. The atmosphere was still very charged but very different. Out in the suburbs the sentiment was very much in favor of the prop. We drove by several large groups, mostly families, who were holding up signs and placards. Jodi's sister-in-law has been very involved in the measure and the amount of effort that she has put into this is staggering. She was fielding phone calls well into the evening and was even mentioned in the LA Times. We passed a similar measure in Arizona but it didn't generate a hundredth of the attention and division that it caused in California. This is a very difficult topic, just ask Steve Young, and I am sure that it will continue to be fought in the months and years to come.
• All in all we agreed that San Diego is one of those perfect cities, no surprise there. It isn't too big that it suffocates and intimidates you. But it offers all of the culture and ammenities that you would expect in a big city. Apart from the cost of living it is the leader of our pantheon of great cities that includes: Salt Lake, Denver, Austin, Portland, and Phoenix.