September 2, 2005

New Prices

KENLY, N.C.--She was on the telephone when I walked up to the counter.

"Uh huh," the clerk said into the receiver, looking off into space. "New prices?"

Then she scribbled three numbers--prices--one on top of another like the sign would read when she made the changes.

$3.19
$3.27
$3.35

Five of us stood by the counter waiting for the end of the conversation to pay for our gas. Slightly more than nine gallons of regular unleaded gasoline cost me $27.59. Just having made the cutoff, I squeaked in and paid $2.95 per gallon, and I felt lucky.

At the same time I wanted to vomit. The last delivery of gasoline the Gas Dock got in this shitty little pit-stop of a town was Wednesday, so they were raising prices on gasoline already on hand.

The governors of North and South Carolinas both came out and asked their citizens to conserve fuel, just as President Bush had done in remarks after a lunch meeting with the Federal Reserve Chairman. What calming effect that would have no one knows. It's a nice sentiment, but telling people there might be a shortage is inviting a run on the pumps.

That's just what happened, too. When I got down to the Bishopville area on my drive back from Nags Head, N.C., and stopped at my favorite, low-priced Hess station all the pumps were bagged. No gas.

Another nine gallons at the Shell station on the north side of Interstate 20 for $2.99 a gallon.

All that said, I know it's no comparison to what people on the Gulf Coast are going through. Gulfport and Biloxi, and the rest of the Mississippi coastline, are in hell right now. New Orleans is in chaos, swirling in a cesspool of rancid floodwaters.

I'd rather pay a bit more at the pump for a couple months than have to deal with a personal, life-changing catastrophe. But that doesn't change how furious I am at the obvious price gouging going on.

- Rich