Everybody’s business

Sweet ending
Cory’s Sweet Treats & Gallery, a popular breakfast and lunch spot in downtown Chico for 14 years, shut its doors this week. Owner Cory Lautin-Davis said that while she will be filling some special orders through the holidays, “I’m officially closed as a day-to-day restaurant.”

“It’s a celebration,” she said. “I’m going to move on and try a new business.” Lautin-Davis plans to open a country inn, horse facility and catering business on her 10-acre property near Meridian Road and Nord Highway. She even hopes to host outdoor concerts there.

“I’ve been planning it for a long time,” she said. “I was foolish to think that I could run Cory’s and try to do all the footwork. My mind is running amok with creativity. … My husband is excited. We feel like I’m a free bird.”

A professional chef who has owned restaurants before plans to move into the Cory’s space under a different name, Lautin-Davis said.

Open marriage
If you noticed an Enterprise-Record reporter chatting it up on the local North Valley News stations last week, you witnessed the first in an experimental partnership between channels 12 and 24 and that newspaper.

“It’s not anything formal,” said NVN News Director Scott Howard. “We’re just dipping our feet in the water.”

This type of convergence is something being tried in other parts of the country, but it does raise questions about competition and such.

E-R Reporter Ari Cohn spoke about the Humboldt Dump from NVN studios, but Howard said the E-R is in the process of setting up a room, outfitted with a camera, at the newspaper’s office. That way, when a story comes up that could benefit from a print reporter’s insight, “We can go and take a live hit,” Howard said.

He added that the arrangement need not be exclusive to the E-R.

Chico helps family
Friends have organized a unique fund-raiser for the Dow family. Chico businessman Jeff Dow lost his wife, Marie, in an October car accident in which his 11-year-old twins were badly hurt. Daniel is home, while Nicole is expected to be moved soon from Sacramento’s UC Davis Medical Center.

The family will need a wheelchair-accessible vehicle, and proceeds from two special showings of The Wizard of Oz will go toward that goal. Admission is $3 for the movie at the El Rey on Dec. 13 and 14 at 10:30 a.m. Advance tickets are available at Beach It! and the Downtown Chico Business Association. People are also invited to purchase blocks of tickets to be donated to the Boys & Girls Club and Big Brothers Big Sisters.

He cleans up nicely
I was startled to find in my Sunday Chronicle a paper towel ad announcing that the Brawny man has been retooled with a “new, softer side” (pictured).

“He’s tough and gentle,” reads the copy. That’s apparently better than the scruffy, plaid-shirted lumberjack who had graced the rolls since 1974. The new guy has slicked-back hair and is clean-shaven; in Georgia-Pacific’s words, “massively improved.” He’s also ditched his lumberjack tool, the peavey.

Maybe, in these sensitive times, the man of the “big, tough towel” tagline was too threatening. Like, he’d just take your spill and have his way with it.