The Price of Gas and Cigarettes...

I've finally acknowledged that I'm well on my way to becoming an opinionated old fart. I've always been opinionated and admitted it - it's the "old fart" part I've come to terms with. I know I'm on my way, 'cause now I've taken to regaling my kids and younger acquaintances with stories of "how it used to be".

Echoing back from the dim, distant past (circa 1973), I can still hear my dad bitching about gas prices - "If it ever gets to a dollar a gallon, I'm gonna quit drivin'!". My Uncle often threatened the same, adding that he'd quit smoking if cigarettes ever got to a dollar a pack (both still drive. I think my Uncle may have quit smoking - but more likely because he's on oxygen now, because he didn't quit when coffin nails hit 5 cents apiece). At that time gas was 40 to 45 cents a gallon, and cigarettes were 50 cents a pack. Quite a difference from the oft-reported 10-a-gallon/15-a-pack of their younger days.

My kids know that I used to get a dollar a day for lunch money from my mom. 'Cause they've also heard (too many times) how I used to stop every morning on my way to school for a gallon of gas (50 cents by then) and a pack of smokes (still only 50 cents, but we could get generics for 40 plus tax).

Ahhh. The good old days... When a dollar a day could get you to and from school (or the lake, or a buddy's house, or wherever you went when you were supposed to be at school) and feed your budding addiction to nicotine.

Not so anymore.

I don't smoke anymore (worse - I "dip"), so I'm not real up on the price of cowboy killers, but I'm wholly dependent on my gas guzzling van. Last summer when gas hit $2.50 a gallon I discovered that it was fast approaching the time when I literally could not afford to drive back and forth to work every day. Unless I quit dipping, of course. Soon after the point became moot as the price of petrol went over $3.50. Most recently, I went home to Colorado for a visit. I flew instead of driving because it was cheaper! And gas prices were still rising.

WTF!?!?

I continued to tell myself that it couldn't go on. Even if the price remained the same, it couldn't possibly go any higher. I was wrong.

But, I believe in "the system". I know that the vendor will charge whatever the customer will pay - and I felt confident that others besides myself had begun car-pooling, or taking the bus or whatever (the fact that it now was taking only 40 minutes to get to work instead of 45 lends creedence to my supposition: 5 minutes time saved = fewer dumbasses clogging the roads).

Finally I was vindicated - the market could bear no more. I was not suprised to see the costs level off and drop. I wasn't surprised when the price fell a little more. But now I'm a bit baffled by the falling price of dead dinosaurs.

Last week I needed gas but was short on funds and I was SEETHING: I wanted some of that CHEAP GAS dammit - before the price goes back up! I finally topped off at $2.11/gallon. The next day the same station was selling for $2.09. *&^%$%^$@^%$*&%1!

This is all destined to be a story related to grandchildren - how the price of gas fell so much that people could afford to drive again!

My new mantra is it couldn't possibly go any lower. I sure hope I'm wrong. Who knows - maybe I'll be able to afford to start smoking again?