Petrol prices a perspective

[David Knapp <D.Knapp@domain.elided>]

I had the good fortune to take a holiday last year and visit some
friends in New Orleans for a couple of weeks.  We hired a car for a few
days, when we didn't have use of our friend truck.  When I picked the
car up, a Pontiac Fire something or another, the girl who done the pre
checks i.e. dents, fuel, mileage etc. told me not to worry about how
much fuel it came back with as it was empty.  When I turned the car on
to drive away the fuel gauge went to full, lucky me I thought, all I can
say is the girl doing the checks was blond!!.  Anyway I had the car
booked for 3 days and was determined to take it back with an empty tank
so there was I hammering the car around without a care for the fuel
consumption.  On the last day of hire we went to a place that didn't
look to far away.  Well not far in the states is a bit different to not
far in the UK and we started to get low on fuel.  I decided to put a bit
of petrol in, just to make sure we did not come to a halt, but was still
determined to take the thing back empty.

I pulled in to a convenient petrol station to put "a drop" of petrol in.
 I thought, without thinking as they say, $5.00 US that's about =A33.50
GBP, which was the approximate cost of a UK gallon, so there I stood and
after trying to work out how the pumps worked, pre pay for your fuel a
new one on me, I put my $5.00 worth in.  When I turned the ignition on I
thought B*llocks (which is an UK word but you can guess I suspect) as
the gauge jumped up to 3/4 full.  What I hadn't realised that the $1.00
price that I saw was per gallon and not per litre as I had thought.

I think this puts the problem of US gas price argument into perspective.
 If you had to pay the price we have to pay in the UK for fuel you would
have something to moan about I have to pay the equivalent of  about
$75.00 to fill the tank in my 164 which would be under $20.00 in the US
by my reckoning.

Regards

David
91 164 Lusso
79 Sud TI

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