The price of stamps rose two cents on Monday, but this news has been completely overshadowed by the fact that gas is running at a national average of $3.71 per gallon, which is 35 cents more than it was just a month ago. My initial reaction to this statistic was, of course, “In your face, stamps! I hope you don’t want my two cents, stamps!” But then I realized that the rise in price is actually a bad thing, so I apologized to my stamps by mailing a lot of letters to myself. If gas continues to rice 35 cents per gallon each month, that means that one year from now, we will be looking at gas prices of $7.91 per gallon. And what’s worse is that we won’t just be looking at that price — we’ll actually be paying it. If that becomes the case and minimum wage continues to hover around $7 per hour, a person who makes minimum wage and only works for an hour may very well make a net gross of negative two dollars. That’s hard to explain around the water cooler: “Yeah, this week I plan on bringing home a nice paycheck of negative two bucks. I plan on buying a lot of negative things with this money.”
Of course, if the trend of gas continues, in ten years we will be paying $45.71 per gallon. At this point we can run around in circles, hoping that this circling motion will somehow create gas, or we can start now to devise a plan for this potential disaster. But not just any plan: this needs to be a plan that takes at least five minutes of thought — and I believe I am qualified to devote this very amount of time…
First off, ten years is more than enough time to learn how to drive a car while balancing another. The car attached to the roof would not have to spend any money on gas, and if wired properly, would be able to tune into the iPod in the lower car, which will be particularly important in the next decade when iPods are running the country. Or iCountry, sorry. Now, some would say that this plan would make sense if one car simply pulled the other in typical tow-truck fashion. In fact, it is very possible that one car could pull multiple cars behind it, saving a lot of gas money in the process. But the reality is that this would totally ruin the effect of parades because we would become so accustomed to the parade of cars that other parades would not seem like a big deal. Are we really willing to take this chance?
Another plan to save gas money is to simply walk and ride bikes instead, which… oh, never mind, this is America, that will never work…
That being said, one way to normalize gas prices is to create mobile lemonade stands. Granted, this will put the local five-year-olds out of business, but those who can sell lemonade while driving can put that money towards their gas. This would only work, though, if the lemonade can be sold to others while the lemonade car and the customer car are both in motion. This would seem extremely convenient in comparison to traditional drive-thrus, and would also give the lemonade car additional money because of the amount of customers who would yell out, “Keep the change!”
Probably the best way to help the gas situation is to go to gas stations and change their prices on their display boards. A price of $3.71 can be changed to $3.17 within seconds, and a true pioneer could change that same price to $.71. The easy part is the actual number change, which can take place after the station closes using a ladder and one’s own hands, both of which can be purchased at a local hardware store. The harder part is convincing the attendant that the listed price — whether it’s $3.17, $.71, whatever — is the real price. So, go early in the morning before other cars file in, pull up to a pump and then yell out, “Wow, this is the cheapest gas in town! Boy, do I love cheap gas!” Upon being told that the price is a mistake, reply, “So you’re telling me that I drove three hours for nothing?” and then proceed by crying using real tears (or leftover lemonade from the aforementioned sale). Gas station attendants are known as people with big hearts — mainly because they smell gas fumes all day — so this is bound to work. If not, carpooling is always an option…
But I digress.