Getting a Local Fix for Musical Cravings

A friend, who also happens to be a colleague, has so voracious an appetite for chocolate ice cream that she has practically built a life around its consumption. That doesn’t mean she eats it every day--it’s fattening, and in gluttonous quantities, unhealthy. So she has an elaborate system for controlling, moderating, planning and, ultimately, dealing with the consequences of her intake.

In the mornings she takes a three-mile run. Several nights a week, she works out with weights. During the week she quells the demon cravings with low-fat frozen yogurt. A work week of rigorous exercise, abstinence and substitution earns her the reward: two pints of high-fat, premium, gourmet chocolate ice cream--the real thing--to be consumed over the weekend.

This is an obsession that makes Madame Curie’s work with radium seem shallow and insincere.

My husband has a similar thing for music. His collection of CDs is large enough to qualify for its own ZIP Code. But having a city block’s worth of CDs isn’t enough. Compilation tapes must be made on which the music of several CDs is blended to make interesting or bizarre musical stews, which in turn are copied and sent to obsessed friends in other cities. When he works at home, he has tunes coming out of a CD player in his office, while other music blasts from a source in the living room. (Of course, if there is a game being played anywhere on the planet, all TVs are also on--but mercifully muted.)

This weekend, the musically obsessed will be rewarded with their own festival. The Strummin’ n’ Struttin’ Two-Day Musical Extravaganza comes to Ventura on Saturday and Sunday with about 40 bands, more than half of them local players. (See Bill Locey’s story on Page 38.)

Those preoccupied with thoughts of dinner might want to visit Ventura Harbor Village on Saturday to check out great buys on fresh fish at the new Fisherman’s Market. (See Leo Smith’s Tidbits column on Page 46.)

The ice cream people will have to seek refuge and solace in the privacy of their own freezers.