Jeff Pelline's Sierra Foothills Report

A bulk soap store in the 7 Hills shopping district in Nevada City, which I wrote about in December, will open on Feb. 22.

It’s a great “green themed” business: providing low-cost bulk soap. Who needs Costco?

“We carry brands like EO Alba Natures Gate Biokleen Bronners Cali Baby and more,” according to the owner. “We will also be carrying salts and aromatherapy oils.”

Good luck SOAP!

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The Union is reporting that former Nevada City Chamber President Duane Strawser is running for city council, but there’s nothing yet in the Nevada City Advocate or Yubanet.

Did Duane give The Union the scoop first? He sits on the NC Chamber with The Union’s editor/publisher.

Yubanet and the Advocate are both hometown, Nevada City-based publications.

Sally Harris did the “right thing”: She emailed her press release to all of the media, including the blogging community, at the same time.

Any would-be politican has to recognize that the media landscape is changing – quickly, in fact. Lance Armstrong is a big Twitter user.

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We’re spending a day in Washington, D.C., on our way home, giving our son a tour of the sites.

I lived here for a winter while I went to graduate school (in 1982, when Air Florida Flight 90 crashed into the Potomac during a snowstorm). But I’ve never seen so much snow piled around.

Orange dump-trucks were all over the downtown throughout the weekend, strategically piling up snow to widen the streets for the cars to pass by.

The Mayor of D.C. is being criticized for slow response to plowing the streets from the back-to-back storms that brought record snowfall to the city.

He should have taken some pragmatic advice from President Obama.

In Chicago, everybody knows that you have to plow the streets and pick up the garbage on time to stay elected.

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Even when The Union tries to defend itself, it struggles.

“With all of the ‘Union-basing’ (sic) going on in our local Internet blogs, I feel compelled to express my appreciation and support of the newspaper,” read a letter that The Union chose to publish on Saturday (complete with the typo). “It seems like not a day goes by without some tongue-in-cheek sarcasm being directed at the paper.”

And for good reason.

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When you’re coming from the countryside, spending the last night at a European airport hotel – in London, Paris or Zurich, for example – helps prepare you for the long trip home the next morning.

Zurich has a relatively new airport hotel called “Radisson Blu.” Located in the terminal, it’s more than a place to stay.

Here’s a video of the “wine stewardesses” in the hotel lobby. They are attached to cables and retrieve a bottle of wine from a glass “wine tower” via pulley systems.

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