MEDIA MONDAY: LA JOLLA NOSES IN THE AIR (with good reason.)

An editor must live on the block

PILLAR TO POST—Weekly roundup of media items with a local focus.

LATEST POOP.

Making conversation at dinner with Leslie and Gary Meads, I asked what’s hot in local dining?   Immediately Leslie curled her nose.  “I know what’s not hot and that’s the smell coming from the La Jolla shoreline.  It is so bad it’s chasing people away from restaurants located on the water.  It is really, really bad.”

No sooner said, than the next morning reporter Lisa Halverstadt  in the Voice of San Diego penned  “What’s the Big Stink About La Jolla Cove?”  Here’s the poop, according to Lisa: “…Years ago, La Jolla residents and tourists frequented the bluffs that surround the cove but the rocky areas have since been fenced off. Cormorants, seagulls and seals have taken over, leaving behind piles of feces.

“A lack of oxygen exposure or recent rain has allowed the stench to fester, and it’s done just that for months. Dry, hot conditions over the summer made it even worse. On some days, the stench travels nearly a mile from the cove…”

For the entire VOSD article link: http://www.voiceofsandiego.org/community/article_3cdaca12-2dcd-11e2-b5c2-0019bb2963f4.html

Hmmmm.  Maybe the recent rain will help.  Maybe our Fire Department might like to hold a practice drill and hose down the area.

WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

James's Discover S.America

Ron James visiting distant relative 

Peripatetic journalist Mary Hellman James and food/wine guy and web pioneer Ron James left town by air after Turkey day for 4 days in Rome.  They’re always going someplace fun. Next they hopped on a liner in Rome, where reports had them stopping by the Rock of Gibraltar, where Ron couldn’t resist monkeying around. 

Thanks to NASA satellites we tracked their route, which took them by ship to South America. The couple just checked in from beaches near Buzios, Brazil, then Rio and Sao Paolo.  They’re home now.  Can’t wait to read all about it soon

on Ron’s popular food and wine blog: http://sandiegowineanddine.com/

GOOD INTERVIEW. 

Bastiaan Bouma hates it when people ask him what is his favorite building. “My favorite building is a building designed by a local architect and that the client is happy,” the new executive director and CEO of the San Diego chapter The American Institute of Architects told San Diego Home/Garden Lifestyles Editor Janice Kleinscmidt during his visit to the magazine last week.

Dutch via Canada, Bastiaan Bouma is dynamic and determined to bring out the best in San Diego architecture for the world (and locals) to appreciate.   www.aiasandiego.org  The past decade had Bastiaan in Chicago at an executive post with the Chicago Architecture Foundation.

SPEAKING OF CHICAGO. 

Phyllis Schwartz

Phyllis Schwartz is back in town after resigning as VP/news director at Fox’s WFLD in Chicago.  She was quoted in the windy city press: “…This was an extremely difficult decision to make but I have decided to be with my family in California.”  Phyllis is a SDSU grad (’77) and worked in news locally at NBC 7/39 and KFMB-TV. 

WRITER ON FIRE: Caitlan Rother

Reporter turned successful crime writer Cailan Rother is working on a new book on convicted murderers Nanette Packard and Eric Napolski, who were recently convicted of killing her live-in lover back in 1994.  There’s no doubt, Caitlan will produce another best seller from this cold, cold case as she is currently hard at it. 

Caitlan Rother

Rother recently facebooked “…Now at 114,357 words. Getting closer to finishing the trial section in the Nanette Packard/Eric Naposki book. It's been grueling -- two trials, with many of the same witnesses. Trying not to repeat information but keep all the drama. Question: When the defense loses, how much do you really want to know about their case?”

Meanwhile her most recent in-book-stores-now “Lost Girls” (Pinnacle, Paper. $6.95), continues to do extremely well.  The LA Times recently reviewed the book about a San Diego county murderer, who killed two young women in Escondido.

"Lost Girls" by veteran journalist and true-crime writer Caitlin Rother is a deeply reported, dispassionately written attempt to determine what created that monster and predator. It is a cautionary tale and a horror story, done superbly by a writer who knows how to burrow into a complex case without becoming captive to her sources,” said LA Times reporter Tony Perry.

HOLIDAY PHOTO.

The photo at the top has made its way around the Internet. Works today to poke some holiday cheer at those crusty editors in every writer's life.