3 night 4 day Sierra's trip suggestions?

The easiest, closest hike with great views would be the Cottonwood Lakes area. I think your permit would be for Cottonwood Lakes or Cottonwood Pass. Check out some maps and Trip Reports for that area. But I’d caution that that area is very popular and that is Labor Day weekend. A permit might be competitive.

Rae Lakes area out of Onion Valley is a great trip. you could take 2 days to get there and 2 days back, or take one hard day to get there and spend the extra time exploring a bit. Onion Valley is fairly easy to get permits out of also.

Onion Valley is out of Independence and takes about 6 hours from San Diego.

From Onion Valley to Rae Lakes, you go over 2 passes, so if you are not in good shape you may want to take 2 days to get there.

I’ll call the local ranger station, but has anyone gone over Glen Pass recently? How are conditions?

I’m worried about snow as we don’t have micro-spikes and our footwear is really more of trail-running type.

There is snow on both sides of Glen Pass, but it shouldn’t require micro spikes if you pay attention to foot placement and go slow.  There are a couple of places on the north side where people have worn a use trail directly up from one switchback to another to avoid the snow, resulting in short(30-50 foot) scrambles.  Other than that it is smooth sailing.  Low down on the north side you will come to a stream that requires a wet feet crossing in you choose to cross it where it intersects the trail.  A better option is to follow the stream ~100 meters upstream to a small lake and cross there where the stream breaks into two channels.  Both can be jumped.

Thank you for the information!

A pleasure, Yuri.