Happy New Year everyone!

In honor of the year that was, I thought I'd make a count down of the top three nightlife columns of 2011, in terms of public interest and popularity:

No. 3: Guide to Cinco De Mayo (and other nightlife Guides)

The third-most read "Out & About" nightlife column last year was the May 5 Guide to Cinco De Mayo preview column. In fact, all of the "Guide" columns, in which I try to list all the big events during big holiday weekends (ie, Halloween, Pride, etc ...), did very well in 2011, so that's a tradition I'll definitely keep up here as we head into in 2012.

No. 2: Drag queens gone wild at La Fuente

The second-biggest nightlife column of 2011 was the March 10 column, which included (among other things) the viral video of the latest drag queen brawl at La Fuente. Yes, it was only the latest ... if you recall, there were prior incidents as well: a video taped at La Fuente in October of 2010 ... AND in September 2010. Let’s hope we DO NOT see more of this in 2012:

No. 1: Midnight Marathon towing madness

But far and away the biggest nightlife story of 2011 (i.e., with the most number of "hits") was my June 10 column about the massive midnight towing operation which afflicted Hillcrest (and other areas throughout San Diego) on the Saturday eve of the annual San Diego Rock and Roll Marathon.

This was the second year in a row SDPD (and yes, I have discovered it was an SDPD official who made this call ... not anyone at the Marathon expressing particular preparation needs) decided to impose a 12:01 am "No Parking" time along the route the night before the marathon. So once again, a huge fleet of tow trucks (and meter maids) swept through a busy gay nightlife district, towing (and ticketing) scores of cars belonging to Saturday nightclub-goers, 99% of which would have obviously moved away under their own motor power had the no parking time been reasonably rolled back a couple hours until after the clubs closed at 2 am. In other words, similar to the similarly situated AIDS Walk San Diego early morning street event, which this year posted signs advertising a 4 am no parking time along the same stretch of street, and went off without a hitch.

I understand at least one local community organization is now engaged in this issue, so look for further updates on this story (hopefully with a happy ending) in 2012.

Photography stats for 2011

2011 was another banner year for us at SDPIX. I, along with fellow photographers Sam Ramirez, Cali Griebel and Josh Rice, shot (and edited) a grand total of 23,997 photos at 333 separate events.

This compares favorably with 2010, in which we took 21,703 photos at 399 events. And I fully expect us to be just as busy, if not busier, in 2012.

This week's events

As might be expected after New Years, we have a relatively quiet week ahead of us, event-wise. I'd say your best bets for going out this week would be the Wet contest at Bourbon Street with Tori Heart on Thursday, BearNight at Numbers with DJ Jon Williams and DJ Will Z this Saturday, "The Birdcage" Dinner Theater at the Range on Tuesday, and the start of Eden's weeklong first anniversary celebration this Wednesday.

Last week's events

Check out SDPIX for the almost final album of 2011: The Sam Cuevas fundraiser at the Lincoln Room downtown. By next week the photos from the final album should be posted, that of the massive NYE Massive Party at Rich's (over 500 photos!). Happy viewing!