%@#$%$# Gas Prices!

[r6_philly]

I use space heaters to heat my home and office. I don't need to heat up the space that I don't occupy, and eletricity is so much cheaper than using gas heat around here. a small energy efficient space heater (ceramic, or oil radiator) set on low can heat me up personally... I don't need my back room to be heated if I am not going to be in there but twice a week. I leave my thermo at 5o so the pipes won't freeze... saves about $100 a month combined. and I am warmer!!!

[jp233]

I live off 44 cent pot pies, 60 cent cheap frozen pizzas, the cheapest cola I can find, ramen noodles, and the fish/crabs I can catch from my dock. (course boo hoo the crabs are gone now :( )

i only eat out when i really have to, or dont have the time to get something at home

my housemate and I commute to work, splitting the driving although its less than 10 miles to work

does anybody want to buy a 1985 Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham limo? hell I've gotten 18+ mpg out of her on a full tank, with 8 people in it, A/c and CD player crankin!!!  ;D ;D :o 8)

[Woofentino Pugrossi]

Chris, ya should try paying the equivelent to $4.50USD/gal like I did back in Australia in 88 and 89. My Falcon XF was no gas miser even with a V6. ;D

[Baltobuell]

 Saving money is great but also think of making money. JP, rent a couple of slips out along that pier. I don't know exactly where your at, but intown is $100 a month for a 20'er.
 Cris, I feel your pain. I went to corporate for a rate increase to raise driver pay and I thought the guy was going to choke to death. After the warped explanation of why they can't, I wish he had. There may be a strike looming and that's never good for anybody.

[K3 Chris Onwiler]

Can't sell the big house & move closer to the job.  Closer to the job means moving closer to the city, which means that half the house would cost triple the money.  No savings there!  Plus, the wife works 5 minutes from the house we have now.
Smaller house?  The wife wanted this house.  She grew up in a ranch on a slab.  If I tell her we're moving out of her dream house, I'll be the only one actually leaving.
My car is new.  It cost 14.5K, and gets 30 mpg.  I got tired of having shytebox cars that broke down halfway between home and work, thus costing me a day's pay and $200 every time.

[Super Dave]

Blame, blame, blame...

Why are the costs going up?

China.

First, when I was getting out of high school and into college and into racing, the big talk was that we, the United States, was going to loose the manufacturing jobs and we were going to become a "service industry".  

That's for the bashing going on about all these jobs leaving the US.  Tell me how many people here want to sit in a factory stamping out some kind of product.  Tell me how many of your kids would like to do that.  Tell me how many parents want their kids to grow up to have jobs like that.

Those jobs went to China.  And those jobs need materials to make it work.  Steel, aluminum, and oil.  The Chinese economy is hungry.  It needs materials.  So, now when we, the rest of the world other than China, needs some gasoline, we have to pay more for it...because the Chinese NEED it to keep making stuff for the rest of the world.

Cars expensive?  Increase in steel prices, liability, safety changes, etc...

What do you think you should pay for a new car?  How much is new technology and air bags worth to you?  How about the ability to purchase replacement parts.  There were people that bought Yugo's years ago...try to get parts for those today.  I think phone service is too expensive.  We can haggle about anything.  

E85.  The ethanol might clean out your engine quick and cause problems.  I'm from Nebraska.  I grew up with Ethanol.  The ethanol can soak up some water out of the atmosphere.  Got to be careful.  

I think that MTBE has been eliminated from most gasolines as an oxygenate, other than maybe racing fuels.  And gasoline you buy is generally oxygenated if not more oxygenated and of the reformulated type.  Hence, it probably has about 10% ethanol in it.

A proper soy diesel system would probably help the country.  The soy that is grown by farmers is not really the proper soy to be converted into soy diesel and then biodiesel.  Everything gets around by truck or train...so, the diesel would help.  But currently, biodiesel is still a bit more expensive than regular diesel...wait until road taxes are put on it.

As for the fifties and people living somewhere....

Huh?

That was a real economic boom.  Post WWII, the eonconomy grew pretty well.  That's when the suburbs came into existance.  People moving out of the city.  But work has followed to the outskirts.  Even manufacturing.  

Taxes...too many interests for maintaining certain things and certain people.  Don't get me started.

[GSXR RACER MIKE]

     There was an article in the local newspaper, the last time fuel prices got high, about the breakdown of the price we all pay per gallon for fuel here in Illinois. If I remember correctly the majority of the price we pay for fuel goes to an array of various taxes (local, state and federal).

     The tolls being increased here in Illinois is just another part of the ongoing lies and deception the governor has been feeding us since capturing his position in Illinois Government. North Central/Eastern Illinois is the only area of the whole state that has toll roads (to the best of my knowledge). The Governor, whom I will just refer to as 'LIAR', promised the Rockford area that he would remove the extremely dangerous, and massively traffic disrupting, unattended toll at I-90 & Bypass 20 by January of '04. In exchange he would raise the toll at the Illinois/Wisconsin border by 10 cents to compensate for the loss of the lesser used Rockford toll booth, which was met with universal acceptance by locals. This move would have helped to stop the up to 5 mile long traffic jams that occur at the Rockford toll almost every weekend (it's only slightly less during the week during 'rush hour').

     So last winter the Southbound toll was removed at Rockford because it was the 1 that caused the most accidents/fatalities (but was done after raising the Wis./Ill. toll months earlier, so there was huge amounts of extra money collected during the 'double dipping' time before the removal). Since then the North bound toll has not been removed as promised and they continue to collect revenue from the existing toll plus the extra increased toll at the border! 'LIAR' is now saying that he is going to double the entire toll system fees and start nailing the trucks and trailers that use the toll roads during the day with increased fees over those charged late at night. The toll roads in this corner of the state are the major ways around the bottom of Lake Michigan without going out of the way by alot, so the majority of travelers get stuck paying them. 'Liar' claims that he can't remove the Northbound toll at Rockford because it generates something like $12 million a year, even though he increased the toll at the border for both directions, that toll sees far more traffic than the 1 at Rockford!

     My respect for politicians in general has diminished progressively over the years with actions such as this! >:(    

[Protein Filled]

    There was an article in the local newspaper, the last time fuel prices got high, about the breakdown of the price we all pay per gallon for fuel here in Illinois. If I remember correctly the majority of the price we pay for fuel goes to an array of various taxes (local, state and federal).

     The tolls being increased here in Illinois is just another part of the ongoing lies and deception the governor has been feeding us since capturing his position in Illinois Government. North Central/Eastern Illinois is the only area of the whole state that has toll roads (to the best of my knowledge). The Governor, whom I will just refer to as 'LIAR', promised the Rockford area that he would remove the extremely dangerous, and massively traffic disrupting, unattended toll at I-90 & Bypass 20 by January of '04. In exchange he would raise the toll at the Illinois/Wisconsin border by 10 cents to compensate for the loss of the lesser used Rockford toll booth, which was met with universal acceptance by locals. This move would have helped to stop the up to 5 mile long traffic jams that occur at the Rockford toll almost every weekend (it's only slightly less during the week during 'rush hour').

     So last winter the Southbound toll was removed at Rockford because it was the 1 that caused the most accidents/fatalities (but was done after raising the Wis./Ill. toll months earlier, so there was huge amounts of extra money collected during the 'double dipping' time before the removal). Since then the North bound toll has not been removed as promised and they continue to collect revenue from the existing toll plus the extra increased toll at the border! 'LIAR' is now saying that he is going to double the entire toll system fees and start nailing the trucks and trailers that use the toll roads during the day with increased fees over those charged late at night. The toll roads in this corner of the state are the major ways around the bottom of Lake Michigan without going out of the way by alot, so the majority of travelers get stuck paying them. 'Liar' claims that he can't remove the Northbound toll at Rockford because it generates something like $12 million a year, even though he increased the toll at the border for both directions, that toll sees far more traffic than the 1 at Rockford!

     My respect for politicians in general has diminished progressively over the years with actions such as this! >:(    

BTW, You respected politicians before you wrote this?

Ha, ha, ha!!!!! LMAO, ROTF!!!! I dont mean to be mean, but a grain of salt is too much attention for some of them!!!

[Super Dave]

Ah, should we start on polititians?

Certainly, there are some in office that you can classify as scholars and patriots.  Those are the ones that I value.

Businessmen too.  Certainly, a businessman knows how jobs are actually created.

But many in the upper fields of office are lawyers.  Certainly, I have respect for their work to educate themselves and their prowes of tongue...but I believe the sense of "entitlement and awards" that the legal system sets up and gives out...it's a mess, and if something is related to the downfall of the greatest experiment on earth...that's the start.

How do you know anything about job creation when you are the agent that gets money from companies for product problems, etc.  Product liability is fine, but some of the "awards", as they are called, are just outrageous.  And you and I just pay for them anyway.

[Baltobuell]

 Thank You Dave! I thought I was the only one that felt like that. All hail King Dave!

[Super Dave]

Thanks.

I'm not a member of either of the two "major" parties.

But...

One of Bush's things that he wanted to do when elected originally was to reduce some of the extraordinary "awards" that get handed out.  

Seems like the members of the legislative branch (lawyers?) didn't pass it.  Now it's apparently the "adminstration's" fault that health care is going up.

Is this news?  Been going up for years and years and years.

What I do know....

When I started riding motorcycles in 1986, full coverage for my GSXR750 was $280 a year (I was eighteen and living at home), and I know that it's up two to ten times that amount.

I know that a regular wage isn't up that much from that time.  

And now a lawyer can buy the Milwaukee Brewers for $255 million...

We've got a guy that was an Airborne Ranger running for Senate here in SE Wiscoinin.  And he's part of a really booming family business.  

Basically, what I call a scholar and patriot.  Getting my vote.

On the flip side, there's all these people that haven't completed high school, never went to college, or were so self centered that they complete any of those tasks...they're using their star power and singin' for some canidates...

Yeah, they really know what it's like to be a person with a mortgage that actually knows what the cost of milk and gasoline is per gallon.

[Mark Bernard]

Politics...
Poly = many
Tics = blood sucking parasites