Columns

Winter is a delightful time for fruit. Citrus trees brighten our county with splashes of yellow and orange.

After a rain, outdoor settings smell fresher, better. The word for that smell is “petrichor.” Scents are more easily detected on cool, moist days because water molecules capture scents and “hold” them for all to smell.  Morning dew aggregates scent molecules. That’s one reason why tracking...

This Week in H’burg is a weekly column featuring photos and fun facts from local photographer Pierre Ratté. Each week we’ll feature a new photo from Ratté along with a fact about the subject matter of the photo.

Chris Markell’s career as a winemaker tells a story of the evolving Sonoma County wine business throughout the past four decades. 

100 years ago - April 7, 1921

Well, here we are a year into the recovery. I think we’re all a little nervous with these high winds. In spite of that, there’s lots of resilience and recovery going on.

As we all begin a new year of life in Sonoma County, we should look across the local landscape and also within ourselves and count our many blessings. By the luck of genetics and geography, we live in a peaceful, plentiful and free country. We happen to also live in one of America’s most beautiful and bountiful regions. For those of us with family, a job and a home, we could not possibly be more blessed. And we don’t need to look too far to see someone who could benefit from our over-abundance of good fortune.

Somewhere in the week after Nov. 3, in our country and our community, we will reach a deciding moment in our collective lives when a series of major choices will be required. The choice could be, and should be, more than turn left or right, or even just stay the course. It should be a conscious effort to build a new future or to try and claw our way back to a place we felt better regardless of the impact, or more likely find some middle ground.