Hell, just do what I do...pull up to Mobil...wave your speed pass...grab the "Premium" and fill er up...dont look back. Dont look at the price, you cant change it anyway.

And before you DO bitch about the price of gas - per gallon

• make sure you dont have any beer
• dont buy wine either for that matter, that is much more than $2.50 a gallon and cant get you anywhere
• I think you can do your laundry on a rock in the river with Lye...last I checked Tide HE is about $14.00 a gallon.
• Cough Medicine and stuff like that - hell I think NyQuil is like $80.00 a gallon....

And I love my cars...especially when I am going fast enough to burn at a rate of 8-10 MPG...fun fun fun. That is on ME, and if someone thinks I should go bankrupt cause I enjoy my cars that do burn gas...that is just dumb...and another thing you all who are complaining need to remember - gas tax, much like tax on smokes and booze fund a large part of many areas local govt services...

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What if the Hokey Pokey is what it is all about?

there's no talking to him--it's like a brick wall. clearly a person who doesn't understand anything, and more than likely is not a home owner, have a family, or real expenses, etc. the type of person who wants condoms and tampons to be free to the public, yet bitches when taxes take half his income, and then bitches again yet again (about the neglect of society) when he sees the media harping about homeless people not having any opportunities to better themselves, only to turn around and bitch one last time that taxes are robbing him blind.

Perhaps we'll realize that simply being able to eat - something not enjoyed by many people in the world - is more important than driving a Hummer. We take everything for granted, and we turn into a bunch of whiny little crybabies when the possibility of it all disappearing presents itself. Our priorities are very odd.

How did Max Bialystock put it? "That's the way, Rudolfo! When you got it flaunt it, baby!!! Flaunt it!!!" Something like that.

More power (literally) to you, I guess.

I don't know about you guys out there, but for lightweights like me a gallon of wine goes a heckuva lot farther than a gallon of gasoline.

That reminds me. I need to go raid the liposuction clinic tonight.....

I just bought a scooter to avoid the high gas prices. It's supposed to get 85 mpg. Plus, it's fun to ride around town.

Looking for women?

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What if the Hokey Pokey is what it is all about?

Dumbest why? Because we're soon going to be painfully (and financially) aware of the impact our consumption has on the rest of the world, as well as our personal lives? We've made our bed...

You've got it backwards. You really live in a small world don't you. It's not our consumption impacting the rest of the world. It's the rest of the world's consumption impacting us. Remember we're importers of oil. Ever heard of China? or the Indian Sub-Continent? Those are your fastest growing consumers.

If we had to rely on our own supply of oil, gasoline would be in the triple digits!

Talk about a small world... Who is the number one consumer of energy on this planet, by a large margin? Pollution? They may be growing fast, but they've got a long ways to go. And what's worse, they are growing quickly in order to be more like us, with our rediculous consumption habits... Not a good sign.

Lehmkuhler

that's really awesome. i hope you enjoy it. when someone does something like this it says that you take action instead of bitching about it--it's a good thing. i hope Tom and all other good LBS start selling the dickens out of more bikes for more commuters, etc.

hahaha. You're funny. That's why I'll kill you last.

Read (or watch) "Fight Club" and get back to me.

I spent 1995 travelling around the world. Much of it in SE Asia, India, Nepal and East Africa. During that time, I came up with a list of challenges for typical North Americans on things that we DO take for granted:

- Cashing a cheque( An all day operation in India)

- Driving to work(a 2 - 3 hour combo walk/bus ride ONE WAY for many in Nairoibi, Kenya)

- Vacation( Well, most of the working world does not get a vacation they work 6 -7 days/week)

- Waiting for the bus(typical 2 hour wait in Vietnam)

- Going to the doctor( You first have to FIND a doctor in Tanzania!)

- Applying for a visa( a one week wait in Bangkok)

- Finding a phone( In some places in Nepal, it's a 4 - 5 day walk to the nearest phone)

Just some examples of what the REAL world is like.

My suggestion - send your typical smug, middle-class North American, who thinks life is tough, on this list of challenges. Perhaps they would come back, with a better sense of how good they have it.

Fleck

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

you're right, we should all start living at paper street soap company, get rid of all our material possessions, and rid ourselves of anything that owns us. Maybe we could even start a revolution while were at it...like project mayhem ;)

"No one talks about Fight Club!"

Amen, and thank you.

"they are growing quickly in order to be more like us, with our rediculous consumption habits... Not a good sign"

That is the scary prospect. Imagine, India and China( 2 Billion+ pop.) consuming energy at the rate we do in the west. They are headed in that direction and with few of the environmental controls that we have in place right now.

Fleck

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

"there's no talking to him--it's like a brick wall. clearly a person who doesn't understand anything, and more than likely is not a home owner, have a family, or real expenses, etc. the type of person who wants condoms and tampons to be free to the public, yet bitches when taxes take half his income, and then bitches again yet again (about the neglect of society) when he sees the media harping about homeless people not having any opportunities to better themselves, only to turn around and bitch one last time that taxes are robbing him blind. "

I don't get this attitude at all. Just because someone doesn't agree with you, then they don't understand anything at all? There are many people in this world who do believe that gas prices are too low. We North Americans are over-consuming energy to the point where our environment is being threatened. When you consider the future of the earth, the short-term US economy is low on my list. Many, many countries in this world are getting by with 50-100% higher gas prices than in North America. Why can't we start paying for the *real* cost of that energy. It's only when gas prices go up that alternative energy sources are seriously studied.

I completely agree with jhendric and I'm a home owner, have a family and have real expenses. The difference is that I expect to pay for what I use even if it means that broccoli will cost $3/head.

Dawn

I'm with jhendric on this one...

Most of you have probably never heard of Nikola Tesla. He planted a great seed of peace and prosperity for humanity about 100 years ago. As I believe the world is currently accelerating, so do I believe his greatest wish will prevail. An energy crisis is just what we need for some serious funding to be spent on his grandest of ideas. Fossil fuels are quite an archaic means of energy production when we are surrounded by a nearly infinite amount of energy all around us. We will tap into the "very wheelwork of nature" before I'm dead, I'm sure of it.

I should have added, that the realities that I mentioned do not apply to a handfull of people living in remore areas( that's the truth for them as well), those are the realties for 100's of millions of people.

So, if you are stuck in traffic lamenting the fact that you are held up for 10 minutes on your drive to work. Think of the woman who lives on the outskirts of Nairobi who must rise before dawn to walk 10K to the bus stop and then ride the bus for an hour to the market where she works. At the end of the day she reverses this arriving home after sunset.

Fleck

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

"It's not our consumption impacting the rest of the world. It's the rest of the world's consumption impacting us."

Typical American attitude... It's not our fault. It's someone else's. No wonder personal injury litigation is such a profitable business. We as a nation have no concept of personal responsibility.

Heaven forbid anyone else (China, India...) be able to consider and attempt to live the mass-consumption lifestyle we enjoy. I mean, who do they think they are?

Last night, my family did a bunch of things totally anathema to Americans, and New Jersey residents in particular:

1. We voted in the school elections.
2. We voted to increase property taxes to fund education.
3. We didn't drive to the polling location (I ran, my 7 year old rode her bike, and my wife rode my mountain bike with the 2 year old in the trailer).

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"Go yell at an M&M"

And, depending on where you are, bike shops (and spare parts) are in short supply as well....

My wife's suburban took $78 to fill it up on Sunday. She goes through about a tank of gas a week. BTW that was the cheap gas!

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Um....how is she my problem? I know...soon as the Jackson trial is over we will get little Mikey to start another "We are the world" and we can maybe do another "Hands Across America"...only around the whole plantet....I will order the rosey colored glasses for say....18 billion people?

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What if the Hokey Pokey is what it is all about?

You're assumptions couldn't be more incorrect. My wife and I own a very modest house. We own (yes, own) our cars, we have no consumer debt, and we have hefty savings and retirement accounts. Oh yeah, and we're 30 years old.

But I clearly don't understand anything.

Yep.

I'm sure kittycat is right. Increasing energy prices will really screw with the global economy. Where I disagree, is in whether or not that is a bad thing. Sure, it will suck for a while, maybe beyond my lifetime. The status quo will be thrown out the window. Lifestyles will be changed in a big way...

And maybe after a nice "correction" like that, the people of the world will have a damn reality check and start to realize that we cannot consume like we have in the past. The status quo lifestyle, especially in America, is environmental suicide.

While inflammatory, I believe jhendric was trying to say that no reforms will take place until our society/economy is FORCED to do so. The only way to force anybody to do anything, especially in this country, is to hit them in the bank account. Education won't work, hasn't worked. Weakly enforced public policy won't work, hasn't worked... Etc...

At some point, there will be some serious hell to pay for the consumptive lifestyles that we've developed over the last 50? years...

Lehmkuhler

"While inflammatory, I believe jhendric was trying to say that no reforms will take place until our society/economy is FORCED to do so. The only way to force anybody to do anything, especially in this country, is to hit them in the bank account."

Well said. Thank you.