So the other day I was motoring around and about, running on fumes as a fella will in these dark days, when the Subaru’s low-fuel light blinked on.
Huh, I thought. You don’t say. Well, I have errands to run, I don’t believe in the Low-Fuel Fairy, and I don’t give my money to Big Oil until I have to. F’chrissakes, Herself just poured $60 of go-juice into her Honda CR-V. That oughta hold the greasy sonsabitches for a while.
A glance at the trip meter told me I’d squeezed 318 miles out of that tank, which is not bad for a 2005 Forester with more than 159K on the odometer. Bound to be a few more miles in there, I thought. So the Subie and I soldiered on.
Errands complete and homeward bound the trip meter was showing 325 miles and I reconsidered my position. No point in pushing my luck and maybe pushing this bucket of bolts back to El Rancho Pendejo, I thought. It’s all uphill from here and this old mechanical burro needs her hay.
So I pulled into the next gas station, fed my credit card to the pump, and got the party started.
Now, I don’t gas up often because I don’t drive that much anymore. The Duck! City drivers have sucked all the happy out of motoring for me. Imagine a bumper-cars circuit looping through a shooting range with a wet bar in an insane asylum. So in the long stretches between fillups I tend to forget that buying a tank of gas has become a multimedia experience.
As the pump sprang to hideous life its TV screen started screaming something about “FATTY MEAT STICKS! Made with GRASS-FED BEEF AND PORK!” and how I have to get one RIGHT NOW!”
Uh … isn’t that what’s happening right now? I thought as my tab ticked steadily upward to $56.98.
Remember the old quip about the price of a lift? “Ass, gas, or grass?” It’s true; nobody rides for free. But I didn’t expect to pay my freight by doing a threesome with Speedway and Fatty.
I suppose the asshole in me should be snickering about high fuel prices, since I’ve long said that the only way to get Americans out of their Chevy Exurbans and Ford class urban aircraft carriers is with European prices.
Thankfully, like you, I don’t drive much any more.
Oh, I forgot the link.
https://labikes.blogspot.com/2012/02/get-ready-for-2008-revisited-5-bucks.html
PO’G: Glad you filled up despite the cost. As the old aviation adage goes: “There’s nothing more useless than the runway behind you, the altitude above you, and the fuel left in the truck” (or fuel left on the ground). Better safe than sorry, eh?
Wouldn’t want the Subie to bonk 3 miles from the garage. Our Corolla is 3 1/2 years old and has 17 K miles on it. At this rate it will last much longer than me.
We have to reduce then eliminate greenhouse gasses, especially CO2. So, keep gas at $5 a gallon by taxing the shit out of it and spend the proceeds making bike lanes and multi-use paths separated from the roads and streets.
I just got back from Naples, Italy, where gas is €2.24 a litre. That works out to more than $8.50US. They were saying prices have near doubled since numb nuts attacked Iran. He’s not very popular over there.