Category: Living

Leica by Joe WilcoxSep 17, 20205:13 pm

San Diego’s Record House Prices Baffle Me

In a pandemic-stricken economy of soaring unemployment and where small businesses fall like dominos—and more risk toppling because of California Governor Gavin “Gruesome” Newsom’s restrictive lockdown orders—you might expect the housing market to reflect real-world woes. Oddly, though, the median sale price of homes in metro San Diego is a record high of $665,000, according to data collected by Redfin. That’s a 13-percent year-over-year increase, as of Sept. 6, 2020. County-wide, according to the California Association of Realtors, median home price is $732,560, and that’s up 13 percent from August 2019.

My neighborhood, University Heights, reflects the trend—with emphasis. Searching Trulia and Zillow, the bargain-basement-priced listing is a single-bedroom, one-bath, 576-square-foot condominium in a three-story complex looking into an open courtyard. You can live there for $299,900, or $521 per square foot. If that’s too small, how about a cozy two-bed, two-bath, 726-square-foot condo for $415,000; $572 per square foot? Both places are indistinguishable from any apartment for rent; maybe not as good-looking.

Photo by Joe WilcoxSep 15, 202010:16 pm

The Cats of University Heights: Speckle

Call me surprised for finding another Alabama cat—fifty-fourth seen between boundaries Adams and Lincoln. I don’t walk down the street significantly more often than others, so the number of beasties baffles me. The ginger and I met in the parking lot of the same building where lives Mercy.

The shorthair earns nickname Speckle, for the dash of white in the center of its M-mark—as you can see from the Featured Image and companion, which I captured using iPhone XS on Sept. 8, 2020. Vitals: f/1.8, ISO 25, 1/597 sec, 26mm (film equivalent); 9:54 a.m. PDT. The other is f/2.4, ISO 16, 1/193 sec, 52mm (film equivalent); 9:55 a.m.

Photo by Joe WilcoxSep 12, 20208:21 pm

Sidewalk Gym

San Diego’s climate is ideal for almost any year-round outdoor activity, something the large number of people riding, running, or walking make obvious. Outside workouts are more common now, even though gyms have reopened following […]

Photo by Joe WilcoxSep 11, 202012:00 am

Flickr a Week 37a: ‘Aerial View of New York City, in which the World Trade Center Twin Towers is Prominent’

About a month before Sept. 11, 2001, when terrorists used hijacked commercial airliners as missiles, Carol M. Highsmith captured self-titled “Aerial View of New York City, in which the World Trade Center Twin Towers is Prominent“. According to the Library of Congress, to which she donated this photo and others from across America, Carol produced a digital image “to represent her original film transparency; some details may differ between the film and the digital images”.

The link from her name goes to the LoC page; that in the credit to Rawpixel Ltd., which posted the public domain cityscape on Dec. 9, 2018. Carol is the photographer but not the Flickr account holder from where she joins the series. Camera and other information is unknown.

Photo by Joe WilcoxSep 9, 202012:05 am

Flickr a Week 37: ‘Top of the Morning’

Some shots evoke an immediate “frak, yeah”—as is my reaction to self-titled “Top of the Morning” by Simon Ingram, which he captured on April 13, 2016. Camera information isn’t available in the metadata; that is typical […]

Photo by Joe WilcoxSep 6, 202010:37 pm

Need a Lyft?

Ahead of the SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome Coronavirus 2)—also known as COVID-19—pandemic leading to California’s statewide shutdown, electric scooters suddenly vanished from many San Diego County communities. Local governments didn’t want the things cluttering the streets. But, as life returns to some semblance of normalcy, scooters creep back onto the streets, something like cockroaches emerging from Nuclear Winter.

Still, sightings are rare enough in my neighborhood that today I was surprised to see this lone Lyft parked at Alabama and El Cajon, where sits BLVD North Park, which is located in University Heights. If you can’t build real estate in the location you want, pretense naming is your solution.

Photo by Joe WilcoxSep 5, 20203:50 pm

The Cats of University Heights: Frosty

As I write, the official temperature outside, based on GPS location, is 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 Celsius)—and aren’t we lucky: Only 94 F (34 C) inside the apartment. No sensible person in the temperate, San Diego coastal region uses an air conditioner; we live about 10-minute drive to the ocean but even this far away the sea breeze is fairly constant. Not today! Suddenly AC sure seems like a great relief.

On more pleasing Aug. 29, 2020, as my wife and I walked along New Jersey, a handsome Snowshoe Siamese strolled along a front yard. Of course, Leica Q2 was back at the flat. The Featured Image, captured using iPhone XS, would retain greater detail if taken with the camera. Vitals: f/2.4, ISO 16, 1/322 sec, 52mm (film equivalent); 9:13 a.m. PDT.

Photo by Joe WilcoxSep 1, 20208:58 pm

What Else to Do When a Regular Face Mask Won’t Fit?

I wouldn’t have guessed that cows could catch Coronavirus, too. With that snout, lethal SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome Coronavirus 2)—better known as COVID-19—spray surely should super-spread. What a menace that would be. Let us […]

Photo by Joe WilcoxAug 29, 20208:58 pm

The Cats of University Heights: Chancy

Six weeks or so ago, my wife spotted what presumably is a Russian Blue sleeping along a second-floor balcony railing in the alley between Alabama and Florida. She walked there seeking shade from the ridiculously-named BLVD North Park further along. I joined her on occasional saunters, hoping to photograph the kitty—doing so on several walk-bys, but always with the beastie back to me. Finally, on Aug. 16, 2020, we had a meeting of the eyes, so to speak, that produced the Featured Image captured using iPhone XS. Vitals: f/2.4, ISO 16, 1/355 sec, 52mm (film equivalent); 8:53 a.m. PDT.

The shorthair earns nickname Chancy for railing risk-taking and for the first sighting, which was purely by chance.

Photo by Joe WilcoxAug 28, 202010:37 pm

Give Peace a Chance to Bring Justice

This morning, while walking from the Point in San Diego’s University Heights neighborhood, I passed by a dove placidly perched on a wooden fence. The bird looked somewhat scrawny, and I wondered if even weakened—for it made no attempt to flee when I turned back with Leica Q2, stopped, manually focused, and captured the Featured Image. Surely there is a metaphor here somewhere.

Racial riots rage across swathes of the country, months after the first ones in late May 2020: Chicago, Ill., Kenosha, Wisc., Minneapolis, Minn., Portland, Ore., and Seattle, Wash. are among the cities stricken by arson and looting. Today, in D.C., on the 57th anniversary of Martin Luther King, Jr.‘s “I Have a Dream” speech, thousands of protesters rallied for racial equality and against violence during The Commitment March. Afternoon stormy weather and heavy rains dampened activities, which, more or less, came to a soggy end by early evening. Mmmm, is there another metaphor there?

Photo by Joe WilcoxAug 26, 202012:00 am

Flickr a Week 35: ‘A Yukon Quest Team’

The dog days of August demand something cooler, and we’ve got the thing with the first of two consecutive snow scenes: self-titled “A Yukon Quest Team” by Arthur T. LaBar. The 1,000-mile (1,600 km) sled […]

Photo by Joe WilcoxAug 25, 20208:01 pm

The Cats of University Heights: Cocoa, Too

With each week in 2020 lasting lifetimes—and the ongoing chaos that pandemic, politics, and protests present—we need some furry relief. Pardon me. Did I neglect to mention the racial riots? What a year. Please release some of your stress by gawking at the second Cocoa to appear in our series. The first, whom we met in April 2017 and wanders West of Park Blvd, bears some resemblance to Burglar, who lives on the East side.

I encountered the beautiful black on July 26 along Alabama—making her, gasp, the fifty-third profile for the street between boundaries Adams and Lincoln. The cat’s owner, who was working in the yard where I saw Burglar in December 2017, told me her name—after I shot the Featured Image and companion using Leica Q2.