Ever wondered how the price of our precious gasoline gets where it is? This fascinating article from The Consumerist lays it all out:
Btw, The Consumerist is a great site about all things consumer-related, it’s amazing what the big companies are up to.
Third times the charm! Hooked up with someone this afternoon and Carrie is booked in for 7.15am next Tuesday. Except that this is not good…. Monday is a bank holiday so I’ll be in Brawley Tuesday morning and thats a 2.5 hr drive. Oops, I’ll see if I can get through to change it to Weds.
Others don’t seem to have the problems booking that I do but in my experience it’s always difficult. I’ve tried the online scheduling too and never had any response from that either. Ah well, it’s the only game in town for me so I just put my head down, blog my frustration and keep trying.
Time to get some maintenance work done on Carrie. How many calls will it take before I can make an appointment?
Call 2: Called Brecht MINI, chose #3 from the menu for the service desk, rang and rang and then went to voicemail.
I have never gotten a call back in this instance so I hung up. Hmm.. did worse than call 1, will try again this afternoon.
Time to get some maintenance work done on Carrie. How many calls will it take before I can make an appointment?
Call 1: Got through to the service reception, transferred to someone who would make the booking, rang and rang, went to voicemail.
I have never gotten a call back in this instance so I hung up.
It really bothers me that I have great trouble parallel parking the Cooper Convertible. My dad is a great parallel parker (as most drivers in the UK have to be or they would never be able to park anywhere), and I have a memory that I wasn’t so bad myself back in the day. In fact I’m pretty sure I did fine with my ‘02 MCS. But more than half the time with the cabriolet it is a disaster, and I can’t stand it.
Last night there was a space opposite my apartment but I could tell I was going to have trouble. Sure enough, after a couple of tries I said ’sod it’ and parked about a block away. As if my own embarrassment wasn’t enough when I came back down there was a Ford Explorer in the space. I maybe need to find some time and work out strategies for dealing with the poor visibility otherwise MINI are going to come and take their car away from me.
Carrie turned over 37,000 miles on the way to San Diego this morning; there was no ceremony. I filled up before I left and to my amazement the last tank got me 27.8mpg, another high figure for this car. I have a new driving strategy: I try to drive 70 the whole time except for when the road slopes downhill where I’ll do 75 or so. Its kinda boring but less painful than putting huge wads of cash into the gas pump.
Ok, unless I somehow hit 30mpg I promise not to talk fuel consumption again.
Yeah, I know I proclaimed this same thing only a month ago but its for reals this time. With the help of a very strong tail wind Friday afternoon, I’ve driven 357 miles on the current tank and the low fuel light is yet to come on (it is imminent though). OBC reads 30.1 so I am probably at the 28/29 mark. I’ve never seen 350 miles on one tank before so this is pretty sweet, dare I try to go 400 before filling up?
Of course, with gas now $3.60 and upwards I could really do with 457 miles.
Update: Filled up this morning at 388 miles, mpg was 29.37, a definite best for Carrie.