Everybody’s business

Kohl blooded
People have been asking me if Kohl’s is coming to Chico, as if I haven’t mentioned it multiple times in this column already, gosh! (Did you know Trader Joe’s is here and Krispy Kreme left? Pay attention, people.)

The Kohl’s and accompanying storefronts planned near the Chico Mall are moving along, with the latest update put before the city’s Architectural Review Board (ARB) on Nov. 30.

The Springfield Village Shopping Center, proposed by Dean Kassebaum of Chico, will take a 11.63-acre site near Logan’s Roadhouse, adjacent Highway 99, a residential neighborhood and Teichert Ponds, and add a 81,800-square-foot Kohl’s department store plus 42,700 square feet of additional shop space broken into two storefronts attached to Kohl’s plus three additional “pads.” There will also be an 8,100-square-foot mezzanine. (My dictionary defines mezzanine as “a low-ceilinged story between two main stories.” It was also a deck on The Love Boat.)

The designs for the other storefronts have signs on them that I’m pretty sure are just placeholder names: “Oranges,” “Pizza Place,” “Café Olé,” “Lucky,” “Erika’s,” “Rugs & Things” and such.

In accordance with ARB concerns, the front of Kohl’s will face Springfield Drive, restaurants and other noisy uses will be farther from the residences and the planned wood fences will be replaced in the design with masonry fences. The ARB also requested “an identifiable architectural style, unique to the site, and not a canned or replicated prototype.”

That last one is an admirable goal; kudos to the board for going against the big-box grain. Good luck making it happen, though.

Don’t try this at home
Someone from Big Teaze Toys must’ve heard I’m the one around here who covers stories relating to personal massagers.

They sent me a package with a cute plastic penguin and a plastic fish, called “I Rub My Penguin” ($34.99) and “I Rub My Fishie,” ($19.99) respectively. The products, which the company says make great gifts, are follow-ups to the wildly successful “I Rub My Duckie.”

Each animal comes with a decorative suction-cupped tray so one may conveniently massage his or herself in the bath. The multi-speed vibrating massager can be used to ease tension in the back, neck and shoulders along with any trouble spots at the joints or, as the package demonstrates, along the edge of one’s hand.

Oh, and the feet. It would be really soothing on the feet.

Must be Santa
I’d like to give a shout out to Touch of Class, the florist on The Esplanade, for providing the community with a jolly old elf who in the Angel household is known as “less-germs Santa.”

Sure, he’s a little scruffy and his beard lacks that spray-on white sheen of your garden-variety department store Santa. But that just adds to his charm. Plus, I think he must be the real Santa, because he has a policy against holding your child if he’s screaming in terror. Hey, Mom might be willing to terrorize Junior for the good of the scrapbook, but at least Mr. Claus is looking out for him.

Best thing: He’s an equal-opportunity Santa, with all the free pictures you can snap.