Smith: The buffalo’s milk of local politics? Smith: The buffalo’s milk of local politics?

Look what popped up on the computer screen as Dr. Scott Chilcott of Bennett Valley Web-surfed instructions on how one might milk a buffalo.

He was startled by the appearance of an ad touting Ashle Crocker for Santa Rosa City Council. Naturally, Chilcott wondered if the political promo was targeted specifically at persons curious about the techniques and ramifications of attempting to harvest milk from American bison.

He came to decide that the nature of his query had no role in triggering the ad. Still, he says the online happenstance leaves him inclined to vote for Crocker if he could, which he can’t because he lives outside the city limits.

Why was the retired doc Web-searching the milking of buffalo? If you were born in Montana and your grandfather long ago ranched in Wyoming, where the bison’s the state mammal, he says, “Those kinds of questions are likely to pop into your head once in a while.”

WHO TAKES A SUITCASE to a cocktail/dinner party?

Bravo to the Active 20/30 Club of Santa Rosa for arranging a bash on Nov. 7 that ends with two couples waltzing to a private jet and flying off to a top-shelf weekend in Vegas.

It’s a win-win-win. An entire crowd will enjoy the party at the county airport’s Sonoma Jet Center, a drawing and a bidding contest will determine who boards the plane, and the money raised will provide essential dental care to kids sheltered at the Valley of the Moon Children’s Center.

The particulars are at jointhegreatescape.com.

GREENS ARE BROWN at the nearly 100-year-old Santa Rosa Golf & Country Club.

Mindful of the drought, the groundskeepers didn’t merely stop watering the fairways and greens on holes 2 through 9, they spray-killed the grass.

Former TV weatherman Brent Stromgren, now the private club’s membership czar, says the biggest change at the course since 1958 will see the current dead zone replanted with a deep-rooting grass seed mix that will reduce water use by as much as 30 percent, and fertilizer use, too. No one’s playing those holes at the moment.

Hole No. 1 is already replanted with the six-seed mix and it’s looking lush. The back nine will be reseeded next year.

Stromgren vows that golfers will find “the look, the feel and the texture” to be completely different. Wait times may stretch if duffers can’t resist rolling around on the grass.

OH, THE CARS that bedazzle the 2015 calendar, still warm from presses, of the Sebastopol Area Senior Center.

It features classic cars and the locals who love them. Services to seniors benefit from sales of the calendar, available at the center, The Legacy thrift shop, Sebastopol Hardware, Copperfield’s Books of Sebastopol, Pacific Market in Sebastopol, Forestville Pharmacy and Fircrest Market.

Flip through and swoon over Gail and Joyce Shaw’s 1936 Cord Westchester, Brad and Karin Seder’s ‘38 Plymouth, Mike and Connie Lightell’s ‘49 Mercury Eight and Joe and Sheila Aujay’s ‘62 Corvette.

Look who’s Mr. January: Photographer and Sturgeon’s steam-powered mill chief Harvey Henningsen, shown with three fine old, wheeled workhorses, one a beefy green ‘55 Dodge Power Wagon.

Chris Smith is at 707-521-5211 and chris.smith@pressdemocrat.com.