Stopping for Gas

I hate stopping for gas.  I hate cutting my speed, taking an extra five minutes to get whereever I 'm going, pull into a station, stop the car in front of a pump, find the un-lock switch for the little door to the gas tank, swipe my credit card, stretch the hose, insert the nozzle, and depress the metalic trigger that releases gas into the car.  (I do like the smell of gas, but I know I shouldn't breathe the fumes.)  I hate waiting for the tank to fill.  Now that gas is around $3 a gallon, more numbers have to swirl around, and around before the pump snaps off.  And I really hate when a stupid video ad plays and I watch it.

With the Prius, we don't have to stop as often.  We can go almost 500 miles on about 10 gallons.  (In the winter, the tank shrinks, so we've been told, and the car goes about 350 miles on 7 or 8 gallons.)   But with the dependable Volvo, we travel  about 350 miles on 16 gallons.  With a 70 mile drive each day, that's five round trips.  Plus, the Volvo has over 125,000 miles on it, and we want to preserve the car, so it's the one usually left at the train station.

Tonight, leaving an in-service just after 7 pm, almost 13 hours since I'd left this morning, I knew I'd need to stop for gas, and I didn't want to.  I was hungry.  But if I drove the 35 miles to the city and back up, I'd probably run out of gas.  Should I stop along the way?  Should I wait to get into the city and fill up in Harlem on 125th Street?  Or should I wait until morning?  I stopped in Thornwood -- about 8 miles south of Chappaqua.   The Volvo took over 13 gallons and I paid more than $40.

A Haagan Das ice cream freezer rimmed in waffles of gold stood outside the station's convenience store.  Dinner.  Yes.  A chocolate covered ice cream bar to nibble as I drive away.

A Berm of Ice and Snow

So last night I tried to get into my car and it was surrounded by a berm of ice and snow and dirt hardened like cement.  Plows had pushed a wall of frozen snow flush against the car.  Neither front door had enough could open.  I had to climb over the icy embankment and crawl in through the back door (that only opened about a foot).  The Volvo started right away, and true to its Swedish roots, pulled out over chunks of gritty snow and into the street.

Up the street in the pale light of 6:30 am, was a car barricaded by the remains of melted and refrozen snow.  To free his car (alternate side parking rules were again in effect) a white bearded man chipped his shovel into what looked like a cement block, the kind used to protect buildings from terrorists or divide highway lanes during construction.

Subway Posting

Sign on the attendant's booth at the #1 train 23rd St. Subway stop.

Back to the Street--and Snow

We moved the car from the garage on Saturday. Charges for not having to dig out our car:  $30.  Plus $9.99 for the shovel we picked up at Duane Reade.  Not bad. Next, the challenge of finding a parking place we didn't have to shovel much to get into.  We found one on our street on the Tuesday/Friday side.  A little digging, and I could back my car into the snowbound space, angled out -- for a quick escape at 6:20 on Monday.  Only, luck would have it that school was canceled again today -- due to storm damage (which is bad luck for those who lost electricity or had tree limbs fall on their homes).  And because the car was in a Tues/Fri spot, I didn't have to worry about moving it this morning.

Snow Day!!!

Snow Day!!!  And yes, parking in the garage was the right decision.

Cars were covered by at least a foot of snow, and according to Jorge, found on Riverside Drive shoveling out his car for his reverse commute to Yonkers, he'd been digging out his car for at least 45 minutes.

On the way to Riverside Park to walk our schnoodle, we passed a buried Prius.  

And a neighbor walking her dog, 

and an M-5 bus making its way up Riverside Drive.

The park was glorious!

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To Park on the Street or Not to Park on the Street

To park on the street or not to park on the street.  Generally, we park on the street.  It's not too hard to find a parking place on our street in front of one of the schools where parking is permitted from 4 pm until 7 am.  Usually I'm delighted when it snows because we can leave our cars parked for days (not in front of the school) when alternate side parking restrictions are lifted.  Then I take care to park on Riverside Drive -- where I'm sure I'm not in a school spot and sure I won't have to move my car before 7 am.

Today school was dismissed early because of snow.  Our last three 80 minute classes were cut to 45 and we all went home at 11:30 am.  Woo Hoo!!!  I traded the Prius (not good on ice or in snow) for the Volvo parked in the middle school lot across from the train station.  The wiper blade became detached because of all the snow and I had to stop before getting on the parkway to clean the front window and re-attach the side-swiping blade.  One one car accident on the Saw Mill -- a huge SUV spun around down a hill off the side of the road.  The snow was heavy and wet;  The road slushy and slippery.

I had to decide whether to leave the car on Riverside Drive where it was sure to get covered by a foot of snow and get plowed in by another three feet when the plows went through or put it in a garage down the street for $15 a night.  In the end, it was a no brainer.  I didn't want to be shoveling out heavy, wet, icy snow two or three days from now.  What a relief to pull into a garage.  What a luxury!  And on my way home there was a neighbor shoveling out her car, moving shovelful after shovelful of white weight from street to sidewalk.

My only concern was that we wouldn't have a snow day tomorrow -- that I'd have to call the garage at 6 am to have them pull my car out.  The call came at almost 10 pm.  A snow day tomorrow!!!!  And outside our window, Broadway is white.  And the cars parked on 109th are covered in white and blocked up to the top of their hubcaps with a berm of white pushed there by city plows.  And we're still expecting another 6-12 inches tonight.

Check out the story in the New York Times.

A Dog Story

This is not quite a commuting story, more of a dog walking story.  In Riverside Park I met Annie and her fluffy beigeish dog, Picca.  We walked from the park where Picca had been sitting for a very long time gazing at a tree, hoping for a squirrel sighting, to Lenscrafters at 107th and Broadway.  Just as Annie and I were saying good-bye, a man in a leather jacket turned to ask if that was Annie's dollar bill on the sidewalk.  She said no, and asked me.  I said no.  Then she asked another woman walking down the street if it were her dollar.  She checked her zippered silver clutch and said no.  Suddenly, there was a second dollar bill.  And a five.  "Dollars from Heaven" does not have the same mellifluous sound as "Pennies from Heaven," none-the-less, that is exactly what three green wing-like bills landing on the sidewalk appeared to be.  The man again suggested the money must belong to one of us.  And so we picked up the bills, handed the five to the woman with the silver clutch and divided the two singles between us.