California Knows How To Party

I have been offline in San Diego, California, which might as well be another country. It's 75 degrees pretty much all year round and people stay home from work if it rains. You see oranges and lemons all over the place and exotic flowers growing out of cracks in the sidewalk. It is basically a paradise on earth except for the "sun tax," which means $3 cokes and $8 hamburgers everywhere, and the fact that if you didn't pump in water you'd be living in a place that looks like the above photo. Which I know because I have seen Chinatown a few times. But it houses one of the nicest places I have seen in any city on planet Earth, Balboa Park, home to art museums and botanical gardens and the San Diego Zoo and other sites, many of them free. We also ate at nice restaurants in the city's Little Italy and in La Jolla (which I found out is the same place as La Hoya), visited the Gaslamp District and the maritime museums (memorably the docked Midway Musuem) and chilled out at night at the Keating House. We went down to the Gay Pride Festival and caught Kathy Griffin's act. And yes, for loyal readers, I spent an interesting day at Comic Con. More later; until then, I am at johnoakdalton@hotmail.com.