[at-l] Trail Days

[us]

 >>>The fuel increase is a mind-set problem.  Everything goes up.  It 
will never get back to where it was when I was a young man.  Then it was 
$0.25 per gallon.  Wow!  Then you could go places!  But then, salaries 
were lower and the price of cars were lower and life was simpler. 
 

I remember $0.25 a gallon.  Of course I wasn't driving quite yet, I was 
riding my bicycle home from the gas station with a gallon of gas for the 
lawn mower hanging on the handlebars .  The prices of everything might 
have been lower, but all things (for the average person) weren't 
necessarily simpler.  For example, my plain Jane, basic used 1971 Impala 
(which cost about the same or maybe even a little more new in 1971 
dollars as a 2008 Impala) wouldn't make more than 12,000 miles without 
at least new points and condenser.  Usually needed a cap and rotor too.  
Plugs, plug wires, new belts all around at 24,000 miles, etc. etc.  I 
drove a 1998 Dodge Grand Caravan (power windows, power door locks, AC, 
cruise, nice cd/radio etc.)  for 168,000 miles and never did anything 
with the ignition system, never replaced the serp belt or any of the 
1001 things that required constant attention on my 1971 Impala.  Never 
had any sort of fall off in MPG either, it just ran and ran and ran. Oil 
changes though, never missed an oil change.   I fully expect the same 
results from the 08 Impala we just purchased in December.   Life back 
then was just different, not more challenging ... or less, not simpler 
or more complex, just different.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://patsy.hack.net/pipermail/at-l/attachments/20080514/ac96e47b/attachment.html