Daily Podcast: I Haven't Put Gas in My Car In Three Weeks
One of the joys of telecommuting: no actual commuting. No train ride (I’ll thank you for not spilling your coffee on my New York Times again, strangers) and no car ride. Where do I go? To my home office. The consequence is that I’ve been driving for fun and when I’m too short on time to walk the 3/4 mile trip to the grocery store. It’s a breeze parking my little VW GTI between the beheamoth luxury SUVs that have become suburban landmarks. What I always forget, while I arrogantly load up my hatchback with a 24 pack of toilet paper, is that I share a big SUV with my father – an eleven year old Ford Expedition. We bought it with 150,000 miles for about the same price as a really nice big screen TV and use it for, well what you really would need a big truck for. That means hauling lumber from Home Depot, or double sized mattresses and coffee tables simultaneously, or towing the 23 foot Chris Craft we bought to restore, or driving six of my friends comfortably to Atlantic City. While the old Ford only gets to stretch its legs once a week or so, it’s there when we do need it. It seems somewhat wasteful to have an extra car; then again, whether you consider the total cost of the small and large cars, or the carbon footprint (ahem), or the amout of gas we use, it’s all very small. I do know people with a fleet of new cars, large and small, for different tasks too. Some relatives are augmenting their current Saturn Outlook with a Saturn Astra and a MINI Cooper Clubman. That strikes me as excessive. But who am I to judge?
Immensely bored law student. I've also got 3 dogs.
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my high tech employer preaches greenery but fails to walk that walk: we're not allowed to telecommute because some people "abuse the privilege." gotta love being treated like an adult by a faceless corporate droid. meanwhile petrol costs too much, freeway traffic bites, public transit is even worse, & days are too short & wet to risk riding a bicycle.
That's a lot of money sitting on the driveway, doing nothing.
[...] in Uncategorized at 2:48 pm by Stacy McMahon TTAC’s Justin Berkowitz lets us all know how great it is to telecommute. Yep, I’d love to go three weeks between fill-ups too. There’s no real reason for me to [...]
I have an 07 GTI w/ the 6MT and my most recent tank was 34.8MPG. The best I saw in my Impreza 2.5RS was 29MPG. I gotta say I'm happy with the extra 40hp and fuel economy.