Friday, April 20, 2007
Cheap or Crazy? You be the judge
Mom, I don't usually do this. Don't be alarmed.
I went on a wee road trip yesterday to my home town of Wilkesboro, NC (Where the Mountains Begin), and seeing as I left Raleigh with about a half a tank of gas, I knew I'd have to fill up on the way back, so as I drove, I scoped out the cheapest places, taking note of which exits I'd need to take in order to cash in on such bargains as $2.73 and $2.71 per gallon. Well, $2.71 was by far the cheapest, and it was only available, as far as I could tell, on exit 150.
Ok, NC geography lesson for those of you who don't live here. From west to east, it goes: Wilkesboro, Yadkinville, Winston-Salem, Greensboro, Burlington, Chapel Hill, Durham, Raleigh. It's about an hour's drive from Wilkesboro to the Greensboro side of Winston-Salem, another twenty minutes or so into Greensboro proper, 15-20 minutes from Greensboro to Burlington, and about an hour from Burlington to Raleigh (Chapel Hill and Durham are inconsequential in this story). Burlington/Elon span across exits 140-150ish, so that's where the gas was.
My gas light came on somewhere around the west side of Greensboro. A good 35 miles from the gas station where I'd planned on stopping. I toyed with the idea of stopping to get just enough gas to get me to the cheap gas, but that just seemed a bit ridiculous. Why stop twice? But I couldn't bring myself to only stop once, filling up on $2.83-per-gallon-gas, with the full knowledge that it existed just down the road for $2.71. These are drastic times, folks, and we know what drastic times require, right? Yes, I'm talking about lunacy.
Well lucky for me, Jason Jones returned my phone call from earlier right around the time I was exiting Greensboro, and he assured me that a Corolla could swing that distance after the light had come on, so with a renewed confidence, I made him stay on the phone with me until I got to exit 150 "just in case," and while he was happy to oblige, he said if I ran out of gas, he probably wouldn't come get me. Thanks, buddy. You're an awesome deacon.
I made it. I was really starting to doubt somewhere around exit 145, but I did in fact make it safely to the gas station, where I filled up my 12-gallon tank with 11.768 gallons of sweet, sweet, cheapish unleaded gasoline. I thought of it as an act of frugality. My roommate said I was crazy (and I know she meant it because she said it more than thrice). What do y'all think?
I went on a wee road trip yesterday to my home town of Wilkesboro, NC (Where the Mountains Begin), and seeing as I left Raleigh with about a half a tank of gas, I knew I'd have to fill up on the way back, so as I drove, I scoped out the cheapest places, taking note of which exits I'd need to take in order to cash in on such bargains as $2.73 and $2.71 per gallon. Well, $2.71 was by far the cheapest, and it was only available, as far as I could tell, on exit 150.
Ok, NC geography lesson for those of you who don't live here. From west to east, it goes: Wilkesboro, Yadkinville, Winston-Salem, Greensboro, Burlington, Chapel Hill, Durham, Raleigh. It's about an hour's drive from Wilkesboro to the Greensboro side of Winston-Salem, another twenty minutes or so into Greensboro proper, 15-20 minutes from Greensboro to Burlington, and about an hour from Burlington to Raleigh (Chapel Hill and Durham are inconsequential in this story). Burlington/Elon span across exits 140-150ish, so that's where the gas was.
My gas light came on somewhere around the west side of Greensboro. A good 35 miles from the gas station where I'd planned on stopping. I toyed with the idea of stopping to get just enough gas to get me to the cheap gas, but that just seemed a bit ridiculous. Why stop twice? But I couldn't bring myself to only stop once, filling up on $2.83-per-gallon-gas, with the full knowledge that it existed just down the road for $2.71. These are drastic times, folks, and we know what drastic times require, right? Yes, I'm talking about lunacy.
Well lucky for me, Jason Jones returned my phone call from earlier right around the time I was exiting Greensboro, and he assured me that a Corolla could swing that distance after the light had come on, so with a renewed confidence, I made him stay on the phone with me until I got to exit 150 "just in case," and while he was happy to oblige, he said if I ran out of gas, he probably wouldn't come get me. Thanks, buddy. You're an awesome deacon.
I made it. I was really starting to doubt somewhere around exit 145, but I did in fact make it safely to the gas station, where I filled up my 12-gallon tank with 11.768 gallons of sweet, sweet, cheapish unleaded gasoline. I thought of it as an act of frugality. My roommate said I was crazy (and I know she meant it because she said it more than thrice). What do y'all think?
5 comments:
Post a Comment
I think you are definitely my child. I'd have done exactly the same thing.
In my old car, I knew the exact mileage I could travel after the light came on: 48 miles if I wasn't in too much stop & go. :)
Apparently, in older engine models, it was bad to let your tank run down too low, but now it doesn't matter. Apparently it has something to do with that hiss we hear when opening the gas cap. There used to not be a hiss or something. Anyway, all this to say, your Corolla could probably go 40+ as well, 'cause mine was a 12-gallon Toyota Celica.
Apparently, in older engine models, it was bad to let your tank run down too low, but now it doesn't matter. Apparently it has something to do with that hiss we hear when opening the gas cap. There used to not be a hiss or something. Anyway, all this to say, your Corolla could probably go 40+ as well, 'cause mine was a 12-gallon Toyota Celica.
nah...not crazy at all...unless I'm crazy, 'cause I did the same thing. Except in my case I was looking for biodiesel (which they used to sell over by all the dealerships, but then stopped). But Woo! I found it and all was good. I got that same feeling that you did a few exits before I actually stopped though. My stomach felt like it was yelling "EEEEEEEE!!!". LOL
When I used to drive a two-lane blacktop highway from south to north GA going to and from college, I could go the full 4.5 hrs on one tank easily. But one day I decided not to fill up in my hometown before setting out because I always saw gas 10-15 cents cheaper in the other tiny towns along Hwy 15. So I wasn't used to paying attention to the gas gauge on these trips at all--in fact, I'd never even seen my gaslight come on before, I don't think (these were the days of having Mama and Daddy's gas card in my wallet at all times). So, of course, my gaslight comes on about 2 hrs into my trip, and I had no clue how far I was from the next town of Baxley--hadn't been watching the mileage signs or anything. And this is prime south GA farm country, so I knew my options were farmhouses and pickup truck drivers on the road because the cell phone reception was bad making a call home out of the question. My response was to start praying, repenting for all manner of sins from impracticality to being smart-mouthed with my Mama, and begging God to stretch the gas as far as Baxley. I laugh when I think of it now because I didn't know that a gas gauge light doesn't indicate imminent doom quite as drastically as I thought it did at the time. But, anyway, that's my story. I'm glad you made it to the cheapest gas you could find. Way to stick it to the man! :-)
Gotta love the Flying J Travel Plaza.