ASHLAND, Ore. — Lenny Goldberg swears he’s not anti-hippie. He and his wife “used to be total hippies,” selling black lights and lava lamps out of their record store. They “were part organizers of the harmonic convergence in this town.”
It’s just that he and Diana can’t stand patchouli oil, an accouterment of the counterculture in the 1960s used in perfumes and remarkable for its pungency. And the Goldbergs are cat people.
Hence the sign at their Ashland music store: “Dog Free Zone, Patchouli Free Zone.”
But on April 1, somebody anointed the carpet with the noisome oil, and the next day the store reeked.
The security film showed a shopper in a long dress and a sweat shirt who appeared to be spilling a substance out of a container onto the carpet.
“It really, really smelled,” Goldberg said.
He said he’d gotten a call the day before objecting to the sign, and it seemed somebody was putting oil on the store’s door at night.
The police were called. The press was informed. A story appeared in the Ashland Daily Tidings newspaper, which chronicles the town known for counterculture veterans, New Agers, tourists and the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. Goldberg’s store, by the way: CD or Not CD.
“The charge could qualify as criminal mischief if the cost to shampoo the carpet exceeds $100,” officer Bob Smith said.
The publicity apparently got to the patchouli pourer, who called Goldberg to say it was an April Fool’s joke.
“I said, ‘It’s not very funny,’ ” Goldberg said, “And she told me I didn’t have a sense of humor.”
He says the woman suggested she pay for a carpet cleaning. He gets the impression she doesn’t have much money and says he’d be satisfied if she just promises to keep her patchouli to herself.
“It’s all over except the odor,” he told the Daily Tidings last week. “It’ll be over soon enough. It gets less every day.”
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