Gosh.. am I the only one affected by this bull!???!!

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jacks'thunder

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These gas prices are killing us!!! I drive a 3/4 ton big block suburban and hubby drives a v10 Ram! Ok before I begin let me tell you when I bought the burb gas prices were around 2.70 a gallon. So prices go up and were getting behind, nothing majior but I can tell something needs to change. So I get a job just to help out there and there and now were fighting even harder to put gas in these beasts! I thought good .. job close to home( 7 miles away), not much gas, wrong!!! All the stop and go eats everything right up! So I'm thinking about riding my bike to work, good idea! My MIL must have been thinking the same thing as she works in town too. She goes and buys a new bike and visits me at work on it all excited, cool, if she can do it I know for sure I can!! Well on my way home that day I pass my hubby on our road and he stops me and says his mom has been hit by a truck and trailer!!!
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I'm freeking out and to make a long story short she had Angels watching her because she only got scraped up!!! Ok so the bike thing is a no go for me because I really don't want to be a road pancake!! LOL!! Hubby gets his Jeep up and running! Great for us because he has a longer distance to go to work and is saving gas that way! My boss says to me the other day, I know of a Dodge Neon for sale, would you be interested? I told hubby and he went and drove it, good solid car but ugly. I told him I'm beyond what a car looks like! LOL! I just need better gas milage!!! So were getting it!! It's "should" get at least 20-30 miles to the gallon where the burb is getting 8 miles to the gallon! Also FIL is helping by giving hubby and old Honda motor cycle to get on the road too! So the goal is to park the gas hogs(put farm plates on them to lower insurance
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!) and be alittle more gas concience! Thank God I have a machanic at home!! LOL!!!! I'd never attempt buying an older car unless hubby checked it out first!!! LOL!!!

I KNOW I'm not the only one feeling this pinch!!! Have any of you all changed your vehicals/life style to accomadate this wonderful(complete sarcasim!!
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) rise in gas prices?
 
Check this out: http://www.americansolutions.com/ You can go into the site w/out "signing" anything if you want by clicking the red skip button to the the lower right.

I think a belief that we plan to start seriously tapping our own resources would bring prices down very drastically. From what I understand from very knowledgable people whom I've discussed it with, not to mention the ones I believe who I hear on the news, we could be doing so and using it w/in 3 years. A time frame of "10 years" is thought by many in the know to be nothing other than false. I actually was just "shooting the breeze" with a good client about this on Monday. He was one of the highest ranking executives within Exxon during his hugely successful and long lived career.

Additionally, our Nation is a huge resource when it comes to feeding the world. We could bring the world to its knees if we ever decided to use some of this leverage we control to change things for us.

I'm sure plenty would like to string me up now -- but I've never been shy about saying what I think
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We have not changed vehicles but I sure have changed how many times I go on the road and into town. I used to go out just about every day or every other day....now it's mostly a couple of trips a week and I try and compress most things into one trip. Gas prices are almost $4.00 here now. We've also noticed shore traffic down some and the casinos and boardwalks are reporting less business. But it is nice to spend a lot of time at home...especially on the weekends. We certainly have gotten plenty done and getting grungy without having to clean up to go out is kinda fun. Nice to just hang and enjoy being on the farm. But on the flip side rising gas prices is no fun. I think a lot of people have probably changed or are changing their lifestyles due to this.
 
Lol come up here to Canada! It is now 1.51 a L where I live which is 6 bucks a gallon. I have a matrix which is pretty good on gas so I lucked out there but still I remeber when it was only 40 to fill up my car now its up to 76!! thats over 300 a month! Im thinking about getting an electric scooter just for buzzing around town!
 
It was hurting us big time even before DH was laid off, now even more so.

My Toyota Sienna Van only gets around 22mpg but is the only thing my back can handle at this point. However it is parked for the forseeable future. Just hope we do not have to sell it.

DH has a 2000 Toyota Echo that used to get 44 mpg....until they changed the gas mixture in Oregon and it is down to between 36 to 38mpg. His Motorcycle gets 48mpg. So those to are pretty good.

We have never gone to town for one thing...unless someone got hurt and had to go to the hospital. Always had DH pick up what ever we needed when he was coming home from work.

Not an option now so we just make do with what we have.

I almost laugh at the commericals with the car ad's saying,,, like it is a good thing that it gets up to 22mpg!! Oh Please... if it doesn't get at least 40mpg, its not saving gas in my books.

Don't know how folks can even drive their big trucks and afford it. I know we couldn't...even though things would be much easier on the farm if we had one.

Add all the products that have really gone up in pirice...is enough to pull ones hair out.

Just glad we got a small kitchen garden in because it sure helps with the food bills.

If things work out and all the ducks fall in a row...would love to get one of these. Even I could handle this scotter.

http://www.piaggiousa.com/pscooters/MP3500.cfm
 
Does anyone want to know I'm driving a biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiig SUV next week up to Cincinnati?

It's about 500 miles each way but it's still easier, by FAR, than flying out of Dulles and actually door to door time is not any longer to drive it all when you count the horrific commute in Northern VA traffic to Dulles. AND, an Escalade is actually a lot more confortable than even first class on those little puddle jumper planes.

Still, I'd rather be staying right at good old WFM
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I'm pretty boring...
 
No flames from me either Jill. We have plenty of gas and oil right here that the government has said no drilling or looking for. Visited with hubby's nephew in Florida this past week-end, and he had 500 gallons of bio-diesel brewing in his barn. The gov. did away with the forms that he can fill out to pay road taxes on his bio-diesel, so he can only make it for his own use. Not that he really wanted to sell it, but just wanted to do everything legally. If the gov. would only allow us to use alternatives, and even explore more for our own resources, things would certainly ease up a lot! He said that the restaurants and sources of used oil are even afraid to even talk to him about selling their oil to him.
 
He said that the restaurants and sources of used oil are even afraid to even talk to him about selling their oil to him.
I saw a 30-Days episode about some "hippy" types but it was interesting to see how they were making biodeisel to use in their vehicles.

We've got the solutions within our grasp. We just need to do what we need to do... Fix the current "supply" issue and look towards redefining our needs as we go forward.
 
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You think gas prices are bad.....I drive a 1 ton diesel most of the time. I only have to go 13 miles to work but like someone else said, the stop and go driving sucks the fluid right out of my truck. Diesels were built to drive hard and long. Normally it gets about 16-18mpg. SO....I bought a motorcycle and that's what I drive to work now. It has a 2.6 gallon tank and I can go 200 miles on a fill up.

One of our friends has a bio-diesel plant but he hasn't put the effort into producing more than just for himself. Hubby's even offered to collect the fryer oil and pay for the fuel.
 
Additionally, our Nation is a huge resource when it comes to feeding the world. We could bring the world to its knees if we ever decided to use some of this leverage we control to change things for us.
I have to completely agree with Jill and others on this, i work for my brothers trucking company (office work
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) and we keep our eye on the fuel market as that is how we determine our fuel surcharges, anyway, i was chatting with him not so long ago and he brought up "How would they like to pay $22 for a gallon of milk over there?", now im not sure if that is something we export, but i think if we increased the prices on what we are exporting to our big fuel countrys. Then agian, what do i know ?
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I have a Pontiac Grand Am and it takes only $45 to fill it up at the moment
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. My 08 F-150 isnt as bad as other trucks, i think maybe like $100 to fill it up, almost ..then agian, its been parked for a while so
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.
 
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Yes we have a dodge hemi and it costs me about $90 dollars to fill that sucker up
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Lucky for me I only drive about 7 miles to college everyday. Hubby has to drive an hour and a half both ways to work everyday. He is spending at least $500 dollars in gas every month. He drives a little toyota matrix but the gas is just so high. So we should get to pay our truck off this month (FINALLY
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) and then in a month or two we will be looking at purchasing a small car. We want to keep the truck because we always need it but at least I won't have to drive it everyday.

I sure hope something changes soon for everybody's sake
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No flames from me either Jill but don't be so sure that tapping the US resources would bring down the prices. Canada pumps a great deal of gas and oil and our prices are even worse than yours. Granted that is a lot to do with our government tacking on taxes (most recently a 2.4cent per litre 'carbon tax' which I won't go into
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) But still the big oil and gas companies are making HUGE profits while our economies stumble. We can blame the mid eastern suppliers but some of it is a lot closer to home than that. My husband drives a 1ton diesel and I have a subaru legacy but we live in snow country and NEED 4 wheel drive (its really not an option for us to have a 2 wheel drive come winter since we are in a rural area) and being farmers we have to be able to pull stock trailers etc, try to do that with any vehicle on the market that gets 40 mpg. The problem as I see it is our government policy makers have an income that keeps them from feeling the bite of this so they are less motivated to do anything about it. JMO
 
No flames here Jill. I think we need to be tacking on higher prices for EVERYTHING we export..just like we are paying higher taxes and money on EVERYTHING we buy here. I'm not sure what exports we export to the oil countries but i bet it's more than I'd guess because most of the oil countries are desert...what can they grow in a desert??

I think a BIG part of our problem that people keep forgetting is that our PRESIDENT is a big oil man. It benefits him to have the oil prices high not just his pocket but also his "oil friends". I'll rub your back if you rub mine. I don't think bush has made any big push to get oil prices down ....hopefully the next guy will (course i'm sure he's not our ONLY problem but he's a big part of it i truly feel).

Ohhh yeah and I think we need to stop giving money away to other countries by the millions. Seems like everything that goes wrong our government sends out millions (if not billions) to those countries.. do we EVER see any of it back when we have a catastrophie? I'm not saying we shouldn't nessarily help but i also feel that there is a LOT in our country that our goverment could be helping out with that they don't.. lets just send it out of our country like all the rest of our money and watch our economy go right down the toilet!
 
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No flames from me either Jill but don't be so sure that tapping the US resources would bring down the prices. Canada pumps a great deal of gas and oil and our prices are even worse than yours.
I do see your point, but what I feel along those lines has to do with the tremendous consumer force of the US.

We consume so much (and are hated for it, but...) that if we had the ability to provide it for ourselves, then that could shake some things up in terms of prices. Just the big size difference in population and consumption in the US (vs. Cananda) is why I think it would get results before we'd even be able to produce. Just knowing it was on the way would effect things I think. Like if your far and away #1 customer said "I'd rather do it myself than pay your price" then you might lower the price vs. lose the business
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We are so powerful as a Nation and can be a lot more in control than we currently are. I feel we should do what we can do to make things better for us now, and make changes to keep things better for everyone going forward.
 
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Jill.........I agree with you too.......... I also agree that we are not handling our exporting properly.

Right now Larry is parking his diesel pickup most of the time. We are using my minivan a lot more and making our 10 mile trips (each way) into "town" into a multi-task trip. In other words, I don't go just for one thing, I plan and make lots of stops, or I put off going.
 
I really think another thing that is really hurting our economy is all of the banking crap. there really needs to be regulations put on credit card companies and banks. They should not be allowed to charge such huge percentages. they've also lulled people into debt over time (granted i know people tend to be a little foolish and are somewhat to blame). I think it only hurts our economy right now that they are upping APR's HUGELY when people are already hurting.
 
We are so powerful as a Nation and can be a lot more in control than we currently are. I feel we should do what we can do to make things better for us now, and make changes to keep things better for everyone going forward.
Yes the US is arguably the MOST powerful nation in the world at this time (China may be running a close second now) and is certainly the one most capable of finding a new energy source. Canada and the US are so closely connected that what is good for one is usually good for the other (in spite of our sometimes sibling like behaviour towards one another ;) ) If your economy crashes we will be right there with you. Personally I believe that our (North American) scientists could find a solution to this problem (they put a man on the moon for pete's sake) if our governments were willing to invest the required money in it but I believe they don't see a benefit to themselves if things change. The politicians give lip service to the popular idea of reducing green house gases to stop climate change etc. but what are they REALLY doing about it? Hubby and I have begun to look into wind turbines, solar energy, geothermal heating and things like that to reduce our demand for fossil fuels and the huge price increases that seem to happen when our need is highest like mid winter.
 
You think gas prices are bad.....I drive a 1 ton diesel most of the time. I only have to go 13 miles to work but like someone else said, the stop and go driving sucks the fluid right out of my truck. Diesels were built to drive hard and long. Normally it gets about 16-18mpg. SO....I bought a motorcycle and that's what I drive to work now. It has a 2.6 gallon tank and I can go 200 miles on a fill up.


OH Shawna, how I'd love a pic of that! You go! Me; I stay home, go out once a week for groceries and use the internet for my shopping much as I can. Lucky I work from home!
 
My BIL drives one of those scooters around town. He gets like 60 miles per gallon and it can go 40-60mph. Not bad, but wouldn't work for me. I've been driving our diesel to work (30 minutes away) becuase my car decided to bust. It has sucked!!!
 
Just read an interesting article on MSN pertaining to this subject.

Quote:

"Part of the problem is that U.S. oil companies aren't investing enough in the millions of acres of "untapped" lease holdings they have in the U.S., said Benjamin Cardin, D-Md., one of the senators who questioned energy company execs in the Judiciary Committee hearing in May. He also thinks they fail to put enough money into developing renewable-energy resources. Spending more in both of these areas could increase the security of the country's energy supplies or bring down the cost of energy in the long run, he said." End quote.

The article goes on to say that Exxon Mobile chief Rex Tillerson made $21.7 million last year and Chevron's David O'Rielly made $15.7 million. I would guess it is not a problem to pay $4.00 a gallon for gas if you are the CEO of an oil company.LOL

Living on the gulf coast of Florida I"m not crazy about seeing oil wells off our beatiful beaches, when there is millions of acres of untapped resources available now, and believe me the current high gas prices are affecting our family and my small business greatly.

As with most major problems there is not an easy solution, but giving oil companies free rein to drill in some of our most environmently sensitve areas is not the answer.

I, for one, would not trust big oil to "do the right thing."

Gary
 

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