Ten Dollars on Regular

The list of American states where drivers can expect to have someone pump gasoline into their tanks now contains just one entry: New Jersey.  And who knows how long that will last, so I encourage all Marylanders to drive up I-95 and cross over that imposing Delaware Memorial Bridge and go into NJ. Pick up Route 40 and sail along through the towns with names like Woodstown, Elmer, Newfield, and Buena. 

In any of these boroughs, you can pull into a filling station and remain in your car! In fact, you have to. And while you sit and fiddle with the radio, someone will come to your window and ask how much and what grade. It's just like Chuck Berry wrote about in "Too Much Monkey Business":

Workin' in the fillin' station, too many tasks

Wipe the windows, check the tires, check the oil, dollar gas

Too much monkey business, too much monkey business

Don't want your botheration, get away, leave me be...

Of course, when Chuck wrote that, a dollar's worth of gas would get you a lot farther than it would today. But the song remains the same; it's a luxury to have someone top off the Toyota for you.

Oregon had been the other state where U-Fill-It was No-U-Can't, but they just changed their law this summer, and Alex Fox, out in Portland, welcomed self-serve. 

Alex is 28 and he just learned how gas pumps work!

“I was a little bit anxious. I actually had to ask someone next to me if they knew how to do it. But once they explained it, it was pretty easy.”

Oregon changed the law in 1951 to make it unlawful for people to squeeze Ethyl, citing fire safety and the need to maintain solid jobs for gas station attendants.

If you really know how to cruise the gas pumps, try to find a station around here where you can get a soft ice cream cone to fill your tummy after you fill your tank. 

There is no better feeling than Soft-Serv on top of Self-Serve.