Inflection point

In my opinion, we could be looking at a temporary bottom in gasoline prices right now. Prices came down twelve cents a gallon off the weekend but have been holding now for the past two days. Don't count on the price stepping down again this late in the week, and of course the big threat for the following week is Hurricane Rita. That storm is menacing a whole different batch of refining capacity on the Texas coastline. We've all just experienced the sort of price spike a temporary, regional refinery shutdown can cause. If two of those events occur within a month of one another, the second could wind up being worse because the slack in manpower and supplies for repairs was already taken up by the first storm.

So I filled my tank and replenished my Strategic Premium Reserve last night. (I drive an older car that really appreciates the 93 octane). As an aside, I'm probably breaking one of Wisconsin's laws when I'm filling my five gallon gas cans. How can this possibly be? Well to begin with, I just don't like those plastic gasoline cans. I don't much trust them, don't care for them. They seem cheap. To my way of thinking, gasoline should be in a metal can. On the other hand, do you know what a quality five gallon gas can costs? Usually around forty bucks! Unless you're inclined to buy the NATO-style gas cans, which can be had from sporting catalogs for around fifteen bucks. Big savings -- but the cans are green, and there's the rub. Wisconsin statutes section 168.11 says I'm only supposed to dispense into a red container. It's the law, dadgummit! So if you wonder why I'm parking at the furthest pump, at night, lurking behind my big car to fill the gas cans -- now you know.

But back to the blasted hurricane. You'd have to be living under a rock to not notice that Rita has been leading the news all freakin' week, plus part of last week as well. I'd just like to make the point that Rita is not all that different from Katrina. Katrina also originated in the Atlantic, also passed over Florida, and also spent days lazily building strength over the balmy waters of the Gulf. And yet Katrina, which was about as swift as stealthy as an arthritic bull elephant, caught about a hundred thousand people (and three levels of government) with their trousers around their ankles. It just seems so silly and negligent -- more and more so as we trudge through this week's news of Rita approaching. And still approaching. And oh, look! Still approaching.