Continuing a series of blog posts involving Dayton, Ohio [and the latest in an ongoing series about pumping gas in the Pacific Northwest. Why doesn’t The Mainstream Media cover these hot-button issues?!]:

I’m [Hashtag: Not an Old Man], but one of my hobbies is bragging about cheap gas. I posted this picture on Facebook [Hashtag: It Might Have Been Instagram. An Associate Signed Me Up For Instagram, And I Now I Use Them Both at Random and Get Them Confused. But I’m Not an Old Man. Even though I spell out “hashtag.”] around the beginning of the year.

This brought up a strangely vivid memory among high school associates. One of them pointed out that I marched gleefully into class one morning and boasted that I had filled up on the way to school for just 74 cents.

I also remembered that vividly. Who wouldn’t remember 74 cent gas?! That’s not quite cheap enough to merit a song, but still.

Also, Buc-ee’s egged me on a couple weeks later by cutting the price further, leading to another picture.

But we’ve all watched, stone faced, getting the vapors as we look at GasBuddy, while prices went back up this spring.

Naturally, this brings us to the Pacific Northwest. Loyal Scaiaholics will recall my contentious history with gas pumps in Oregon.

I would frequently drive 30 miles across the state line to Washington because, as I’d holler at the unsuspecting person farther up the row at the station, I’m a man, and I pump my own gas.

Plus, because they didn’t have to pay attendants, gas in Washington was usually several cents cheaper.

As associate suggested the gas I used to drive to the Tri-Cities to fill up offset the savings of going across the Columbia River.

I sat down and did the math on how much cheaper gas needed to be to make it worth the trip. Actually, that should read: I claimed to have done the math.

Which brings us to today. HEB recently opened a store west of Fort Worth.

That’s not near the Ol’ Scaia Place, but much like the Tri-Cities, when I learned they had cheap gas, I was insistent that I would make the trip.

And now I have a blog that’s read by, literally, dozens of people every week. So I can brag about gas prices to a broader audience.

I’ve started researching how to turn my life into a podcast. I’ve thought about Texas road trips; I’ve thought about “behind the scenes,” what reporters talk about when they’re waiting for information at a story.

My first boss from Oregon has suggested a simple audio version of the blog would draw an audience, so let me know if you’d like me to wax reflectively about my past in audio form.

For instance, I could write a song as a sequel to the Tom T. Hall opus above:

Back when gas was 74 cents a gallon
Dayton was about the same as it is today
We even have the same weather guy
But GM and NCR moved away

See what I did there, with the ABCB rhyming structure?! I don’t see how this podcast could possibly miss.