There's a tear in my gas...

Just blowin' through records on a daily basis, we are. Three months ago, the ever-present Economists (supposedly the experts on the subject) were saying we'll never hit $100 a barrel in this country, because our economy, though strong, could not support the resulting surge in prices at the pump.

Blah-buh-blah buh-fucking-blah.

So today prices shot up above $109 a barrel in trading, and show no signs of slowing down. When we broke $3 per gallon at the pump last year, it was all over the news and no one could stop talking about it. It didn't last long, although it never really dropped very far after that. This year, long before the spring/summer driving rush, it breached the $3 mark again and no one even blinked. Yet, folks keep buying and buying, because they have to.

From MSNBC.com:
Where oil goes from here is anybody’s guess. Many analysts expect prices to moderate, while others predict oil could keep rising to $120 a barrel, or higher. And with demand for gas expected to rise as warm weather arrives, analysts say pump prices will likely spike as high as $3.50 to $3.75 a gallon, regardless of what happens with oil prices.

That doesn’t sit well with some consumers.

“I’ve got to say, if they ever go up to $3.50, that would be the point where I’d feel angry,” said Alex Magby, a Morrisville, Pa., resident who was gassing up near his New Jersey restaurant job one recent afternoon. “I’d feel cheated at that point.”

Cheated? I don't feel cheated. I feel like I am being screwed up the ass without the courtesy of that other petroleum by-product, Vaseline.

Personally, I don't buy like I used to - of course, I used to be able to budget $6o every two weeks for gas, which at the time put me pretty close to a full tank. That would last at least two weeks, if not longer, depending on where I went. Unfortunately, life having gotten harder and harder these past few months, I can now only eke out $20 or $30 for gas every two weeks. Now it doesn't even put me to half a tank, and I can ONLY drive to work and stop at the store on the way home, or I won't make it until the next gas-ration day.

If it goes up to $3.50 a gallon, $30 of gas won't make it two weeks for me, no matter how little I drive. Work isn't going to suddenly move closer. At $3.75, I am not sure what I'd do. My beloved, responsible DH** is again amongst the ranks of the unemployed (gnashing teeth) and so I already do not make enough for our ends to meet, so to speak. How can those schmucks out there who are, like me, classified as "working poor" possibly make it in a world where regular gasoline is $3.75 a gallon?

Because that means diesel will be well over $4 a gallon. And everything that we buy (including the gas itself) gets to us either on diesel-powered trucks, trains, ships or all of the above. Trickle-down economics, or the ol' shit-rolls-downhill verbage, certainly applies here. I flipped out the other day when I saw that my WIC checks now allow $4.80 for eggs - that means I can get two dozen eggs again, like I'm supposed to be able to get. (Usually, the allotment is at $4, which won't get two dozen eggs.) I saw milk at Walmart on sale for $3.50 a gallon and, after I dry-heaved in shock, found myself thankful that I was at least able to get MOST of my milk on WIC as well. (That's the Walmart brand, too... the name-brand - which probably comes from the same set of cows - costs over $5 a gallon. And people are BUYING IT!!!)

Well, all you can do is hang on... and hope something happens sooner or later, I guess.

**DH stands for Dear Husband or Darling Husband on most mommy-oriented chat boards I frequent. However, it also stands for Dick Head, which is the term I prefer to apply in this particular situation.