Gas Gauge Hovering on Empty, But Kate's Late

The needle on the car's gas gauge is teetering on big "E" and I am a bit nervous. "I should stop and fill up my tank," I think, but if I do I'll be even later than I already am for my hair appointment, and it might be canceled and I can't go another day without a trim. So I hope I can go a few more miles with very little gas, because I'm opting to risk running out.

Things brighten as we go up hill and the gauge registers at about the one-sixteenth mark. I'm in good shape; I won't even need to buy gas on the way home. Now we are on level ground and the gauge is teetering around "E" again.

Uh-oh. We're going downhill and so is the gas gauge. I wish I had worn more comfortable walking shoes. I may be hiking to a gas station.

Whew! I made it. After the haircut I'm going directly to a gas station - if I can get the car running again.
Why am I always in this predicament? Whenever I'm in a hurry, I'm out or almost out of gasoline, and when I'm not in a hurry I don't need gas.

Of course, I never think I need gas until the gauge registers below one-thirty-second of a tank. Oftentimes I just can't get around to buying gas. Yesterday I drove car pools and I noticed I was entering the danger zone but I kept putting off stopping.
"I'll wait until after I cash a check so I can pay in cash and get the discount," I thought.
Later when I was driving again, I decided to skip the gas pumping because it was too cold outside and I didn't have my gloves.
"I'll wait until I pass that cheaper price station that pumps for you," I thought, but I wasn't going that way.

Then last night I drove the whole crowd to skating and safely back home again and it never occurred to me to look at the gas gauge. My fairy godmother must have poured some of her magic dust into my tank to get us home. But today she is saying I can only get so much mileage from those gasoline fumes. "Go to a gas station!"
Another peculiarity I have about gassing up is that when we are traveling I never want to stop until we are at the desperation point.

I figure the longer we go without filling up, the farther we can go before the next stop.

I'm one of those no-fun people who never likes to stop on trips. I want to get where I'm going, and a bunch of gas station stops only prolongs the agony. Plus, isn't it fun to see how far you can get on one tank of gas?

Fortunately, good sense - and traveling with kids - puts a damper on such an adventuresome idea. I don't think I'd like hiking down the Interstate in search of a gas station.

That doesn't mean I've never run out of gas.

We had a car once that didn't have a working gas gauge. It also didn't have a parking gear. That went out Thanksgiving Day, 1971, when one of my nine brothers-in-law - I won't name names threw the car into park before it was completely stopped and ran into our house to watch on television what he was hearing on the car radio: Nebraska's Johnny Rodgers running long for that famous touchdown against Oklahoma.

The gauge on this early marriage car always said full, but the tank never was.

Our plan was to try to remember the mileage on the odometer and then add the number of gallons pumped in the car times the number of miles per gallon the car would travel.

This was pure speculation since we never got around to accurately
figuring the mileage.
You probably are not surprised to hear that this system seldom worked. It was confusing.

Was the mileage 80,230 or 80,320? Did we put in 10 gallons of gas, or was it $10 worth? Does the mileage differ if we drive more in town or on the highway?

I could never keep these numbers straight and John never seemed to care. Our solution then was to keep an empty gas can in the car at all times. I hope I don't end up wishing I had one today.
January 20, 1988