Sticker Shock

We had to stop for gas this morning. Granted, we don't do much driving, and the car is small -- not a road-hogging gas-guzzler at all, just a Dodge Intrepid with a little age on it. But it took $25 worth of gas! It gets about 26 miles to the gallon city, 30 open road. So that's not anywhere near what it takes to drive a Hummer. Still, it's a lot.

I was raised in the Oil Region of Pennsylvania, right in Titusville. We had a sucker pipe running right through our yard from a well to the refinery. No big eye-sore -- it was underground.

But I expected people to take better care of the resource. We're in danger of having it all dry up by 2015. I don't advocate drilling more wells. I advocate conserving what we have and developing better ways of transporting people, or their work (like telecommuting).

We should be ashamed of ourselves for squandering our petroleum.