Let the Best Suds Win, Not (Gasp) Go Down Drain

Beer wars in San Diego?

After several decades of not having a single local brewery-eatery, San Diego will soon have two: the Karl Strauss’ Old Columbia Brewery & Grill downtown and Brewski, which will be part of the Mission Brewery shopping complex in Loma Portal.

Old Columbia is set to open Feb. 2 and Brewski won’t be ready until October, but the competition (none dare call it feuding) has already begun.

Four grim-faced agents from the state Department of Alcohol Beverage Control visited Brewski late last week. As quick as you could say “untaxed and unlicensed production of alcohol for commercial purposes,” they poured all 400 gallons of Mission Red ESB (Extra Special Bitter) down the drain.

Brewski principal Mike Foote, a developer, is in the process of applying for a brewery license. He says he thought he had the go-ahead to make a limited amount of beer for beer shows and promotional events.

And what gave the ABC agents the idea to arrive unannounced at Brewski? Could it have been an inquiry made earlier in the week by Old Columbia co-owner Chris Cramer about whether Brewski’s license will carry the same restrictions (no dancing, no entertainment) as Old Columbia’s?

After the agents departed, Foote had occasion to contact Cramer to ask him these and other questions. The two share a passion for the brewing art but are otherwise quite dissimilar.

Cramer, 27, is MBA (Stanford). Foote, 42, is NFL (Rams and Redskins). Still, the discussion reportedly was amicable. Both sides say they have the same motto: Let the best suds prevail.

“I never dreamed that asking a few questions about the Brewski license would result in this,” Cramer said.

“It sure took the wind out of our sails,” Foote said. “We were already to start making T-shirts. But we’ll be back.”

Of Bengals and Opera

The Peking Opera, which gives three performances this week at the San Diego Civic Theatre, played earlier in the tour at the Pikes Peak Center in Colorado Springs, Colo., not normally a hotbed of ancient Oriental art forms.

The critic for the local Gazette-Telegraph decided to grab his Super Bowl-entranced

readers with a homey comparison between Chinese opera and pro football.

“In both art forms, highly trained performers in bizarre, colorful costumes appear, often with names taken from the animal kingdom--Monkeys, Bears, Dogs, Bengals, Buffaloes, Snakes. They perform time-honored ritualistic acts filled with passion, larceny, wry fatalism, violence and sometimes inexplicable motivations. The audience . . . laughs, applauds or weeps.”

True, but there’s one difference: In Chinese opera, Bengals do not blow a lead with 34 seconds remaining. Maybe that’s where the wry fatalism comes in.

Some Miserly Thoughts

The Escondido Times-Advocate has criticized the proposed name of San Diego Martin Luther King Convention Center as a “laborious moniker” and said it probably won’t allow the name in its news columns, even if adopted by the Board of Port Commissioners.

Conscientious objection to civic name changes is not new to the Times-Advocate. It also abhors San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium, renamed for the late sports editor of a rival newspaper.

“To save newsprint, the Times-Advocate refers to the stadium as San Diego Stadium,” said a recent editorial. “The same dedication to efficiency and common sense would probably prevail if the new convention center name survives.”

A rough calculation: 50 omissions of King’s name in stories about the convention center, during the course of maybe five years, would save enough ink and space for three paragraphs.