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I on San Diego

OLD TOWN BUST: The recent news that Delaware North was folding the tent after three years as operator of the Old Town State Park concessions was surprising only in how long it took. The outtatown hospitality company never gained a foothold in the park, and revenues had been dropping dramatically since its politically controversial takeaway from concessionaire Diane Powers. According to the state, Powers’ Bazaar del Mundo concessions generated some $23 million in her last year of operations in the park; Delaware generated just $7.5 million last year. The tentative awarding of a new contract to restaurateur Chuck Ross was the bigger surprise. Ross, owner of South Bay Fish & Grill in Chula Vista, isn’t exactly a household name in Old Town. Meanwhile, insiders say Powers never considered returning as operator. “Delaware North talked to her months ago about taking it back,” says a longtime associate. “She didn’t want it. Diane never goes backward.”

SO THEY SAY: Usually, it’s some honor to make one of the Forbes lists. Not for Chula Vista. The South Bay city has the unhappy distinction of being listed first by Forbes among “America’s 10 Most Boring Cities” — topping such garden spots as Bakersfield; Gilbert, Arizona; and Hialeah, Florida. Says Forbes: “Chula Vista, the midway point between San Diego and Tijuana, Mexico, rarely makes national news. But when it does, it’s often in stories about the region’s border tensions. How many people even knew Chula Vista was one of the country’s 100 largest cities?”

SO I HEAR: Now comes Fortune magazine to share its own negative spin. Forecasting the 2009 real estate market, the magazine picks the “10 Worst Real Estate Markets in the Nation for 2009.” Eight of the 10 are in California. San Diego wins “honors” as seventh worst — with a projected valuation loss of 21.1 percent. (Los Angeles tops the list.) ... Former San Diego Union-Tribune investigative reporter Caitlin Rother, who’s moved up to successful author, has a fourth book due next month (from Kensington/Pinnacle). Body Parts is a true-life psychological profile of Wayne Adam Ford, described by Rother as a “serial killer with a conscience.” After murdering four women and scattering body parts around California and Las Vegas, she says, he turned himself in to keep himself from killing others. A regular Boy Scout ... San Diego attorney Gary Aguirre is back in the news, along with the beleaguered SEC and new evidence of wrongdoing in the Pequot hedge fund case. In 2001, Aguirre, then a lawyer with the SEC, was pursuing a separate facet of the Pequot case and was fired — for political reasons, he said — when he refused to back off.

SMILE: It’s called the butterfly effect: When a butterfly flaps its wings somewhere halfway across the world, it sets off a chain reaction that can change the world. Now that old bromide may have found a scientific basis. Researchers at UCSD and Harvard posit that happiness isn’t self-made. You can catch it, like the flu. Only no runny nose. They say your good mood could have a third-degree reach — infecting someone who can infect someone else you’ve never even met with the happiness bug.

THE WANDERING I: Opening night for Walking with Dinosaurs at the Sports Arena included the paleontologist narrator explaining how many years it had been since dinosaurs roamed the Earth. “That’s not just B.C.,” he said, “that’s BSC — Before San Diego Chargers.” The pre-playoff crowd roared its approval ... Latest economic casualty: The Westgate Hotel, one of the city’s finest, has jettisoned fine dining, closing its Le Fontainebleau for lunch and dinner after 35 years. (It will still serve Sunday brunch.) Henceforth, the hotel will have just one eatery, formerly the more casual Le Grand Café, now the Westgate Room ... Israel Gaither, the first African-American national commander of the Salvation Army, comes in February 27 for a tribute luncheon at The Grand Del Mar. With him: his wife of 42 years, Eva, national president of the SA’s Women’s Ministries . . . Police and residents say the spread of the beach booze ban to Pacific Beach and Mission Beach is working. Lots mellower these days. But then there’s always somebody out to beat the system. During recent warm spells, some veteran sun-worshippers took to ferrying their beer and cocktails out beyond the surf line on rafts, surfboards and boogie boards for a quick alcohol fix.

GAME OFF: An off-duty cop was watching football with his girlfriend in a South Bay pizza joint when he was verbally assaulted by a fellow he’d once arrested. After sharp words, that seemed to be the end of it, until the cop and his date left the place. The bad guy was waiting outside with a box-cutter. The assailant went to jail, and the cop, badly cut up, went to the emergency room, accompanied by his girlfriend. That might have been the end of it, too. But as an ER doctor finished sewing the officer up, a second woman arrived on the scene. The cop, apparently, had forgotten to tell his wife about the girlfriend, and vice versa. Conveniently, the doctor was still standing by.

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