Category Archives: Monterey Herald

Bookstores Going The Way Of The Dodo

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Poor variety of reading materials on dead trees limited to the shop’s selection plus high cost make bookstores going the way of record store.

Borders is leaving and there aren’t many bookstores selling new titles on the Monterey Peninsula, but the survivors aren’t leaving.

Among the surviving purveyors of books is The Works on Lighthouse Avenue in Pacific Grove. “We’re still here,” said Robert Marcum, who owns and operates the store with his wife, Leela.

Marcum said business isn’t as good as it was when he opened six years ago. He attributes that decline mostly to the recession. He won’t say business is great.

“It’s still OK,” he said.

The Marcums bought the 2,400 square-foot store, then called Bookworks, reduced the space for books to about 1,200 square feet and expanded the tea-coffeehouse portion. It’s also part gallery.

Marcum also took the very word “Book” out of the shops name. New titles can be found at Costco with a less biased selection.

Bookstores Going The Way Of The Dodo

Fire Up The Feast Week, Pt 3

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The 2011 edition of the 54-year-old city festival concluded Saturday at Lovers Point, where sugar-buzzed kids sampled each of the aforementioned attractions all day. Then they snuggled with their parents in the evening to celebrate the crowning of Queen Topaz and marvel at lantern-adorned vessels on Monterey Bay and fireworks exploding over the water.

“This was always a big thing to do when I was little, even though they didn’t have bounce houses and bubble machines in those days,” said Rick Martin, a former Monterey Peninsula resident who drove from Santa Clara to enjoy the event. “My family came every year to see the boats all lit up and the fireworks over the water. Those are great memories for me, even now, which is why I try to come back every couple of years.”

Rick has it about right. The Feast is a good time to reconnect if you have been away.

Last year’s excuse for a Feast was not what makes memories.

The entire day at the beach
Feast Of Lanterns Beach

Free live entertainment
Bryan Diamond FOL 2003

No fire of this kind. Though the free entertainment mentions other smokes

Feast Of Lanterns Smoke Smoke
Return of this kind of fire is welcome, even in the fog.
Feast Of Lanterns Fireworks 2000

Fire Up The Feast Week, Pt 3

D.A.: No Death Penalty for Jacobo Ruelas

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Now he is referred to as “A Soledad Father?” The sooner he becomes a “Soledad Prisoner” the better..

Prosecutors announced this morning they are no longer seeking the death penalty for Jacobo Ruelas, a Soledad father charged with the 1997 murder of Pacific Grove teenager Kristopher Olinger.

The brothers are charged with stabbing Olinger to death during a carjacking and robbery. The Monterey High School student’s body was found by a jogger near the Pacific Grove Recreation Trail the morning of Sept.. 19, 199

D.A.: No Death Penalty for Jacobo Ruelas

Fire Up The Feast Week, Pt 2

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Blaze Damages House

A predawn fire damaged a Pacific Grove Edwardian house Wednesday.

The fire at 305 Cypress Ave. was reported at 3:30 a.m., said Monterey Fire Division Chief David Brown.

Nine engines, two ladder trucks and a respirator support unit responded, he said. Firefighters arrived to find flames coming from the second story.

The house was unoccupied, Brown said, and no one was injured fighting the blaze.

The fire appeared to originate in the basement and worked its way up through walls to the attic, gutting the rear portion of the house and causing smoke damage.


Fire Up The Feast Week, Pt 2

Recreation Trail Robbers Arrested

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The recreation trail is always a dangerous place to be, can get robbed, assaulted or hit by a surrey.
Rec Trail Arrest

The man was walking about 10:45 p.m. near the northbound Lighthouse Avenue curve when he was attacked and robbed, police said.

The man suffered facial injuries, but declined medical aid. No suspects were found in the area.

About an hour later, a Monterey patrol officer made a traffic stop on a car in the 800 block of Del Monte Avenue. That led to the arrest of five people and discovery of stolen property from the robbery, police said.

Three of the five people were booked on charges of robbery, conspiracy and possession of stolen property, police said.

The suspects were identified as Jamarius Ballio and Chico Glover, both 18 from Seaside, and Sean Underwood, 18, of Marina.

Anjelika Ierome, 18, of Marina was booked on charges of violating probation and giving false information to police.

 

Recreation Trail Robbers Arrested

Smaller Motel Rooms For The Same High Price

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You think some of the ancient motels would work to improve the quality instead of the quantity.

Sea Breeze Motel
Dumpster Sea Breeze Motel 071216

Last week, the City Council voted unanimously to place an amendment of Measure C on the Nov. 8 ballot. It would decrease required building setbacks, allow the addition of rooms through remodels that don’t increase the “footprint” of the existing building by reducing the the ratio of rooms to square footage to one per 1,000 square feet rather than the current one per 2,500 square feet.

Smaller Motel Rooms For The Same High Price

No New Fines For Providing Alcohol To Kids In P.G.

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Would Kampe feel any different if he was ever affected by a underage intoxicated person?

Four of the council members, Alan Cohen, Robert Huitt, Rudy Fischer and Bill Kampe, took exception to a rider on the proposed new city law that would allow cost recovery “for any violation of the Pacific Grove Municipal Code.”

Kampe commented that no one spends their entire childhood to age 21 at all times in the company of an adult, including staying home, and called the original law “a lottery with a penalty instead of a prize.

No New Fines For Providing Alcohol To Kids In P.G.

New P.G. Budget Adds Hours To Library

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Liberry

The city will go into the coming year offering longer library service hours and a school resource officer will again be assigned to Pacific Grove Unified School District, she said.

The city’s fiscal 2011-12 budget provides an additional $100,000 for the library. The money allows it to stay open 34 hours per week, Garcia said, compared to the current 24 hours.

The programs were made possible by budget improvements.

New P.G. Budget Adds Hours To Library

Slowpokes Remembered

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They didn’t have girlfriends way back when — or so they claim — because every nickel and dime they earned was already promised in advanced to the true loves of their lives.

The good times returned Saturday for the aging gearheads who were among the earliest members of Monterey’s original Slowpokes Car Club, founded in 1949 by a couple of teenagers named Mike Homan and Al Bergquist.

A handful of the hot-rodding pioneers reunited at the Monterey Fairgrounds, sharing war stories with friends whom they hadn’t seen, in most cases, for 30 to 45 years, at a vintage car event organized by a Gold Coast Rods, a modern-day descendant of the Slowpokes.

The first line caught my eye “they didn’t have girlfriends or so they claimed”. One Slowpoke I knew very well had a beautiful girlfriend. Not only was she gorgeous she worked at Foster Freeze on Lighthouse ave. I would gladly help clean uncle’s ’59 Impala for a ride to see her.

59 Impala

Slowpokes Remembered

Property Owner Trying To Evict Pot Shop

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Richard Rosen, lol

After a three-day hearing, Judge Lydia Villarreal asked for written final arguments from attorneys for the MyCaregiver Cooperative and directors Jhonrico Carrnshimba and Mark Rowland.

The three are accused of contempt of court for allegedly violating an October 2010 court injunction by continuing to operate as a medical marijuana outlet on Lighthouse Avenue.

The medical marijuana co-op has appealed the earlier ruling to the state Court of Appeals. To obtain the injunction, the city said the outlet violated the city’s 2010 moratorium on medical marijuana dispensaries.

The owner of the New Monterey building also has gone to court to evict the co-op, but that case has been held in abeyance pending the outcome of the contempt-of-court case.

Richard Rosen, attorney for the co-op corporation, filed defense papers arguing that the injunction on which the contempt charges are based is, itself, a flawed city law.

Property Owner Trying To Evict Pot Shop