VOTE BY MAIL: It’s easy. It’s free....

VOTE BY MAIL: It’s easy. It’s free. And it’s the biggest fad in politics. County election officials predict that up to one-third of voters who participate in Tuesday’s election will cast their ballots by mail (B1). . . . Just who are these voters? Some live in remote areas without polling places. Some are too busy to make it to the polls on Election Day. And 53% of them are Republicans. “For this election,” says county Clerk Richard D. Dean, the absentee vote “is going to be pretty conservative.”

RITE OF SPRING: Gasoline prices are going up, thanks to hikes in the cost of crude oil, tight supplies and the high price of making cleaner-burning fuels (D1). . . . Rock Long, who owns a Chevron service station in Oak View, agrees that all those factors figure into the cost of gas, but points out that prices always go up this time of year, just in time for the summer driving season. They’ll come back down in August, he predicts. . . . Long has had to raise prices by 6 cents in the last couple of weeks.

ROLL ‘EM: Ventura was quite the happening place this week, with Nicholas Cage filming at the old Sacred Heart Church in east Ventura, Annie Potts taping at Ventura City Hall and Sandra Bullock wrapping up a movie in the Pierpont area. . . . Cage, who is up for an Academy Award for his role as an alcoholic in “Leaving Las Vegas,” looks slightly less scruffy in this movie, said Kathy Bowman of the city of Ventura, although the scene Friday seemed to depict Cage robbing a church.

SCENIC SITES: The Sacred Heart site, at Wells and Darling roads in east Ventura, is the third-most-popular for film crews, Bowman said, after the pier and Ventura City Hall. . . . The pier is especially popular for car commercials, Bowman said. A recent Oldsmobile ad showed a car racing down the pier from the ocean toward land.