Tips on pumping gas

Who woulda thunk it... I got an email forward from my mumsy, and it was actually pretty interesting. Rather than analyzing why I'm single, or something I have to debunk on Snopes for a change.

Here's the complete article from Associated Content:

Tips on Pumping Gas, and Saving Money
(from an Industry Insider)
By D.S. Hamilton

Here is some background information on my informant. He has asked NOT to be named.

He is currently living in California. In California gas is probably the most expensive I've seen so far. There are places where people are paying upwards of $3.50 a gallon. He has been working with petroleum companies for more than thirty-one (31) years now. He has decided to share some tricks to get more of your money's worth for every gallon of gas you pump.

"Here at the Kinder Morgan Pipeline where I work in San Jose, CA we deliver about 4 million gallons in a 24-hour period through the pipeline. One day is diesel, the next day is jet fuel, then regular and premium grades of gasoline. We have 34-storage tanks here with a total capacity of 16,800,000 gallons." -The "Insider"

Tip number one:
Go in the morning to buy or fill up your car or truck. The ground temperature is much cooler in the early morning. You may have noticed that all service stations have their storage tanks buried below ground. So, when you go early in the morning the ground is much cooler, which in turn makes the gas cooler and more dense. As the day warms up the gasoline expands, so buying in the afternoon or evening means you're not getting exactly a gallon when you pump gas.
"In the petroleum business, the specific gravity and the temperature of the gasoline, diesel and jet fuel, ethanol and other petroleum products plays an important role. A 1-degree rise in temperature is a big deal for this business. But the service stations do not have temperature compensation at the pumps." -The "Insider"

Tip Number Two:
When going to pump gas, always allow yourself a few extra minutes so that you don't have to rush. Why? Let me explain. When you look at the gas pump, you will see that the trigger has three (3) stages: low, medium or middle, and high. In the slow stage, you should be pumping on low speed, that way you are minimizing the vapors that are created while you are pumping. All hoses at the pump have a vapor return. So, if you are pumping gas at the high stage, some of the gas that goes into your tank becomes a vapor. Most of those vapors are being sucked right back into the underground storage tank, so you are getting less worth for your money.

Tip Number Three:
One of the most important tips is to fill up when your gas tank is HALF FULL, if you're an optimist, or HALF EMPTY, if you're a pessimist. The reason for this is, the more gas you have in your tank the less air occupying its empty space. Gasoline evaporates faster than you can imagine. Gasoline storage tanks have an internal floating roof. This roof serves as zero clearance between the gas and the atmosphere, so it minimizes the evaporation.
"Unlike service stations, here where I work, every truck that we load is temperature compensated so that every gallon is actually the exact amount." -The "Insider"

Tip Number Four:
When you arrive at the service station and you see a gasoline truck pumping into the storage tanks, DO NOT get gas at that service station. Instead, find another one close by. The reason behind this is while the gas is being delivered, it stirs up the gasoline already in the storage tanks. That means you might pick up some dirt and grime that normally settles at the bottom of the tank. That can be very bad for your car. Not to mention, you're paying for dirt.
Hope this will help you get the most value for your money.

World's Worst Pharmacy

(and don't try and argue with me on that one, I really do go to The Worst.)

OK, bad enough that I'd already left the house an hour early (damn you, Daylight Savings Time! This has nothing to do with the fact that I was too lazy to change my bedroom clock last weekend!). Bad enough that I mysteriously lost my mad parallel-parking skills -- on Nassau Street, no less, where parking spots fit an SUV and a half. Bad enough that my Weight Watchers meeting was cancelled (so much for fasting on a Saturday night). Bad enough all that went down by 9:30 on a Sunday morning. I knew I shoulda just stayed in bed.

Almost home, I think, y'know this isn't too bad, I should stop at the pharmacy --- I'd forgotten to pick up a prescription the day before.

Now what can I tell you about My Pharmacy? Hmm... I remember it all well, because my tales of woe always flash before me as I pull into their parking lot. And none of it's pleasant. The fact they can't handle address and phone changes, that they always seem to lose my prescriptions, that they always seem to serve other customers who happen to have more time-consuming issues than I do and they happened to arrive just seconds before me and now I'm trapped in line behind them. You think I exaggerate? I do not, I swear it. I have watched many minutes of my life tick away while standing around in My Pharmacy.

Today? They couldn't find my prescription. Seriously. Not in the out bins (which never seem to be alphabetized, mind you. In that case, why BOTHER with them?!). Not in their computer. And no sign of my prescription anywhere. Sure as heck makes me glad I'd bother to drop it off 24 hours before, and go over, letter by letter, the spelling of my name and my address (which they will, invariably, get wrong. Again.) All that effort, and some moron lost the piece of paper.

Without a trace.

I tell the pharmacist on duty, "Look. I don't need this right away, so could you call my doctor in the morning and have her order it?"

Pharmacist on duty gives me a look of grateful relief. I smile cheerfully, despite having waited 15 minutes looking at mascara. After all, it's not her fault. And after all, quite frankly, I expected it. I mean, they didn't earn my marks as World Worst Pharmacy by being good or anything.

In 2004, I had a wisdom tooth pulled by Dr. Pith Helmet & Pick Axe, after he'd reassured me the year before that he was done excavating my mouth. He gave me a script for a fancy narcotic drug that you need DEA #'s to dispense (I felt very Paris Hilton), and I drove the 45 minutes from dentist to World's Worst Pharmacy, not aware that that anesthetic was just... about... to wear... off.........

I returned for the pick up an hour later, prompt. Actually it was 52 minutes. And after doing the whole looking-through-every-not-alphabetized-bin thing, finally looked it up on the computer and said, "Oh, well we tried to call you. Your doctor put the wrong date, it's for tomorrow, so we can't fill it." I'm holding my cell phone in my hand, "What number?" Sure enough, it's my cell phone number. From 2001. Which I'd told them three other times already.

He then asks me: "So, can you get a new script?"

OK. I'm standing in a pharmacy, with my cheek puffed out and full of cotton, holding a prescription for a dentist 45 minutes away, and they're asking me to get a new prescription?? Do I look like I want to go get a new script????

"CAN YOU CALL THEM PLEASE?! THIS IS AN EMERGENCY."

Actually it sounded more like:

"CUN YOU CULL THUM FLEAS? VISH ISH UN UMMUR JUNSHEE!" (It was a lot of cotton.)

World's Worst Pharmacy: By the numbers

Since 2004:

Number of times I've had them correct/update/re-enter my contact info: 6

Number of times I've actually had changes on my contact info: 0

Since ... EVER:

Number of times they've actually gotten an order right without controversy: 5

Number of minutes on average I have to wait in line behind one other customer: 8

Number of times I've actually walked in there, gotten my prescription, paid for it, exited in under 4 minutes: 1

(TOTAL FLUKE, I'm sure)

Sometimes I like to think that my insurance company, who've been on this crusade to get us to use their mail order pharmacy, are in cahoots with World's Worst Pharmacy to get us to HATE the whole experience of actually walking into your neighborhood pharmacy, and be forced into submission simply from the anguish of it all. Maybe the postal service is in on it too.

Frankly, it's working.

Oh, I hope to God that's what's actually going on, a massive corporate conspiracy.

Because I'd hate to think that one single local pharmacy could be consistently populated by that many morons.

Want straight teeth. Will dig through trash.

GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH.

Apparently threw my Invisalign trays in the trash, balled up in a napkin, I'm thinking sometime after lunch. I'm not sure. I'd probably remember better, if I'd remembered to have eaten dinner on time, therefore eaten lunch on time, therefore remembering to brush my teeth, and therefore remembering to pop the dang things in 12 hours before realizing they're missing.

Did you follow all that?

It was midnight when I decided to hit the sack, exhausted, with barely enough energy to brush my teeth and pop the buggers back in. I'd already neglected them all day (they're supposed to be in like 20-22 hours a day). And sure enough, when I looked in the pocket of my bag where I usually toss them in carelessly, they were NOT THERE. Because, of course they were either inside an empty frozen dinner tray in the kitchen trash at the office, balled up with a dirty Lysol wipe in the trash in the studio, or in the bottom of an empty styrofoam cup in the trashcan next to the copier.

Whatever. Point is, the cleaning peeps at the station are SO good at their job. At midnight, I knew it was pointless to hightail it back to work with a mag lite and some rubber gloves - that trash ship had sailed.

Luckily, with Invisalign you wear the same tray for 2 weeks at a time, then you move on to the next set of trays (they look like teeth whitening thingys, but they fit your teeth like a glove, and sometimes hurt like heck). I'm the middle of one set of trays, and I had a whole other week to go. I had no option but to FORCE the new ones on. And FORCE, I did. DAMN GINA!

Finally popped two prescription painkillers (NON NARCOTIC, EVERYBODY) before I clamped my teeth down in agony and forced myself to bed.

It's 20 hours later and my teeth still hurt like a bitch, but this is the price I am paying for straight teeth, and not having to get up in 20 degree weather in the middle of the night to drive a half an hour to dig through trash that might've ended unsuccessfully anyhow.

Plus, I read that new trays could cost like $200-250. Apiece.

And to think, just yesterday morning, Dentist Guy was giving me mad props for being on target with the invisalign sched because of my dental diligence! Maybe I was floating on a cloud of orthodontic-my-sh!t-don't-stink attitude, and that's how I forgot!

Well, silver lining.... silver lining.... Oh I know, the road to straight teeth is now one week shorter. Grrr. Still 6 months away and my teeth frigging hurt right now!