The Next Thing You Know She’ll Be Asking for a Regular Massage

Unreal city.

* Ah, San Diego. Where even zoo animals relax in hot tubs.

Watkins Manufacturing, the Vista-based maker of portable spas, this week donated a jumbo spa (a $6,000 value) to the San Diego Zoo for Blanca, a white tiger.

But if Blanca needs Chablis to sip while soaking, the zoo will have to provide.

* John Wainio, hardball-playing strategist for Ron Roberts’ (losing) mayoral campaign, is expected joined up with Peter Navarro for the runoff.

* The supermarket tabloid the Examiner has discovered ex-San Diegans Raquel Martinez and her 17-year-old son, Scott Robinson: “No Bull! American Mom and Son Are Stars of Mexican Arenas.”

Now based in Mexico City, they’re the world’s only mother-and-son bullfighting combo.

The paper quotes Scott’s dad (and Raquel’s ex) Bill Robinson, spokesman for the San Diego Police Department, explaining that it all began when Raquel attended a bullfight in Tijuana.

* Coals to Newcastle.

The California Welfare Fraud Investigators Assn. is holding its annual convention this week in San Diego.

* A plan by San Diego’s redoubtable Captain Sticky, a.k.a. Richard Pesta, to start a brothel to be called Fantasy Oasis in Pahrump, Nev., (west of Las Vegas) has stirred up local opposition.

The San Francisco Chronicle quotes a local Baptist preacher: “Enough is enough. I told the congregation I had to take a stand.”

The Rev. Ron Trummell, a former Nevada state trooper, is trying both to block Sticky and shut down Nye County’s six existing brothels.

Because of Sticky, there’s an anti-prostitution ordinance on the November ballot. A similar measure a few years ago lost, 2 to 1.

* Governmental efficiency.

A HomeFed Bank employee explains what it’s like now that the institution has been taken over by federal bureaucrats:

“A transaction that used to take one person’s approval now takes 12.”

Will Mission Beach Survive the Diesel?

Take note, this is “Diesel Day in Mission Beach,” by order of the Mission Beach Town Council.

The Iowa Club of San Diego is throwing a five-day party for Tim (Diesel) Maddigan, 45, legendary bartender at the Bob-O-Links bar & restaurant in Oelwein, Iowa (population 7,564; 65 miles from Cedar Rapids).

Diesel, known throughout northeast Iowa as a repository of local history and gossip, was flown out first-class and met by a limousine at Lindbergh Field.

He’s being feted by local Iowans, including dinner at the swank Mr. A’s and a gander at Over-the-Line.

It’s the brainchild of Mike Hornung, an Oelwein native turned San Diego business executive. It’s front-page news at the Oelwein Daily Register.

San Diego attorney Bob Ottilie, another Oelwein native and a co-founder of the Iowa Club, says there’ll be Diesel T-shirts for sale at Over-the-Line.

Also, a Diesel Queen, who was the 1985 Iowa Beef Queen. (You may remember the scandal when it was revealed that the ’85 beef queen was a vegetarian).

Might Diesel suffer culture shock at the fleshly Over-the-Line tournament? Not likely, Ottilie said.

Oelwein is no stranger to heavy partying.

“Oelwein has an annual smelt fry in May,” Ottilie said. “Several hundred people attend.”

Bilbray Gets Sun Up on Harbor Patrol

The politician, the dinghy and the $200 ticket.

Brian Bilbray, sailor and South Bay county supervisor, had to leave his boat and go ashore to Coronado, so he jumped in his son’s 8-foot dinghy.

As he paddled the waters of Glorietta Bay, he noticed the advance of a Harbor Patrol boat.

Ahoy there, said the Harbor Patrol officer, you’re in violation of a code that requires running lights, or at least a flashlight, at night.

But it’s not night, it’s twilight, Bilbray argued and argued. He got a ticket anyway.

This week, Bilbray got his day in court.

The ticket said 8 p.m. Bilbray produced a National Weather Bureau chart that said sunset was 7:57 p.m.

Case dismissed.

“The system does work,” Bilbray said, “every once in a while.”