I just went on a trip down to see the folks in Salisbury. Me and my gal had a blast in the car, we sang sea ditties, a few rounds of Row, Row, Row your Boat, and giving away townships to each other. She would say, "Hey Dad, do ya want Elkton"? I'd respond, "Sure, why?" She would come right back at me with, "Well, you're welcome to it!" Sure enough, there would a sign that said, "Welcome to Elkton". OK, not the greatest joke, but it made the time go by pretty fast. She had filled her 97 Oldsmobile with gas before we left, but I wanted her to top it off to check her gas mileage.
We had just determined that I was welcome to Delmar, when we saw our gas station. We always get gas there, it's always cheaper then any place around. Did I need to have my prescription checked for my spectacles? Had I gone blind and these images of hell were burned into my minds eye? I started to cry when I realized I hadn't died and gone to hell, or gone blind. I cried harder when I realized the sign I saw was the actual prize. $3.91 a gallon is what we paid in our old sanctuary of gas stations.
How could this happen? They said it was going to happen. They were prepared for it to happen. It happened! $4 gas by July 4th. These people must be geniuses, they should predict things for a living. We saw gas for as much as $4.36 a gallon on our quest. The Olds worked out to get almost 29 miles to the gallon, so we escaped all the stations on the way down. I was shocked, and a little more than disgusted that we let this happen. We have set back far too long, fat cats buying 99 cent gas, eating off the dollar menu at the local drive thru barfatoriums! We were the Kings and Queens of our domains.
Now we try to figure out where the money went? OK, so gas was $10 a barrel and say the barrel held 50 gallons. We are buying it at the pump for $1 a gallon. That means they bring in $50 a barrel, having spent $10 for the barrel they are sporting a profit of $40 a barrel. Fast forward to $150 a barrel, $4 a gallon for the gas. 50 gallons brings in $50 profit. I'm not going to argue over $10 a barrel profit increase, but that adds up, it adds up a lot and it adds up fast!
Why aren't the watch dog groups saying , "Hey oil dudes! Can we have a sit down about this extra Hamilton you are pocketing while the rest of us are hurting". Let's use the small estimate of 75 million barrels a day worldwide, that's $750,000,000 a day off of that one Hamilton. I want to know why that is figured in at all. Hey, we saw the sign that said I was welcomed to Delmar, the oil guys think they are welcome to everything else!
1 comment:
You seem to miss the point. This is the same situation as you wrote about in your June 26th post "Can I Call you Mel?"
The Oil guys are people too. Just like you, me & Melvin Mora. They have bills and pay $4.00 for gas. They probably shop at BJ's like Mrs. Mora on double coupon day.
The oil companies are barely scraping by. Exxon/Mobil barely made $4 billion in profit for the 1st quarter this year. At this rate the oil dudes will be on the street corners with signs begging for cash.
They are not on easy street like you.
You're tooling around in a '97 Olds in style. You're getting 29 MPG cutting into their sales and profits.
You're going out to eat from the dollar menu. The oil guys probably never go to McDonalds.
Their mattresses are probably very lumpy from all the money stuffed in them causing them to have problems sleeping at night.
You are welcome in Elkton, Delamr, Millers, Perry Hall and all over. The gas executives a demonized by everyone. No one welcomes them.
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