Steve had a free night at a Marriott, so he decided to use it locally so Everley and Lindley could have a swim party (the Y pool is closed now). Of course today started out raining, but eventually the clouds parted and Steve and the girls checked in for some swimming and fun.
The trio returned to the Doik after lunch because Lindley had a birthday party to attend. Sam came by to pick her up and took my car, since his car had about 20 miles of gas left in his tank. Oh, I didn't mention this weekend's gas shortage? Well, let me take this moment to enlighten you ...
Apparently somewhere in Alabama there was a problem with a gasoline pipeline leak. The story was that this problem would cause shortages and outages of gas at the gas stations. And at some point, Tennessee was mentioned as one of the places that would have these outages. And then the Governor of Tennessee got on the media and said that he was allowing gas truck drivers to drive extra hours to make sure Tennessee had plenty of gas. And therefore causing the Great Gas Shortage and Panic of September 17, 2016.
Was there really a gas line problem? Yes. Would it affect Tennessee? Apparently not. But that didn't stop the good folks of Nashville from panicking about not having gas in their vehicles. It's like when we hear there's snow a'comin - we must all rush to the store for milk and eggs. Because our omelets are at stake.
Anyhow, this morning I decided to go get doughnuts for Everley and Steve. And since we had heard of the possible gas situation (which we thought was a problem until later we found out it wasn't), I went ahead and gassed up Steve's car and Molly's car (which we had this weekend while she was out of town). I went to the pumps at Kroger at 7am, and while there were no lines, there were people at every pump - which I did think was unusual.
Anyhow, back to Sam. He took my car and he and Lindley proceeded to the party. I decided to take his car to get gassed up - after all, I had gassed up the other two cars - what was a third to gas up? So off I went to get gas.
First I went to Kroger - no gas. No gas either at the Mapco across the street, or the one down the street. I went to Ben Little's gas station - no gas. There was gas at the Mapco and the Shell across the street from each other, but as you can see, there were lines and rain, and I decided I would look elsewhere.
I proceeded across town (I was now down to 10 miles of gas left) to another Mapco - and another line for one pump out of six. I decided on one last station, and when I got there, I got in the line and hoped there would be gas by the time it was my turn (I was down to five miles of gas left).
Now I have never been in a real gas shortage. I have never experienced the craziness of people wanting gas. Until today.
The issue arose when people would turn directly into the gas station and pull right in front of the people in line, not caring if their gas tank spouts were on the wrong side. As soon as the person in the front gas bay left, these meanies would tear into that spot, preventing us "line waiters" from having our turn - because those yokels took our turn.
I was behind Mary Kay Lady. When it was her turn, she didn't pull up to the first bay, possibly because of one of the yokels. When she finally left and it was my turn, I was going to pull into the first bay - until Jerk Boy pulled in at about 90 mph. His girlfriend/wife/baby mama/whatever had been standing by the pump, saving it for him, I guess. Once he stopped his car, she told him that he might have to pull up the car. To which he replied as he got out of his car, slammed the door, and headed into the minute market, "I ain't got to do nuthin' for nobody." Which apparently also included pulling his britches up over his butt. So rather than antagonize this wonderful specimen of humanity, I backed up and pulled into the second bay and got my gas. Which had gone up fifty cents since this morning.
Of course, once I had filled Sam's tank, it because difficult to leave. Why? Because more yokels were trying to pull into the bay that butt-pants boy had just left. Because they wanted to stick it to the man, and in doing so, stick it to us line-waiters. By cheating the line, it blocked up the lanes to leave. At this point, I just wanted to return home, which eventually I managed to, since people realized that in order to break line and get to their cheating pump, they were going to have to let me out.
Anyhow, Sam and Lindley returned from the party and PawPaw and the girls left for the Residence Inn for some more swimming and a slumber party, all of which was made possible because PawPaw's car had gas!!
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Today's blessings include: nice ladies behind the counter at Krispey Kreme; Steve arranging for the girls to get to swim; fun at the gas pumps; finding gas for Sam's car
