By Robert Emslie
So this week we saw a surveillance cam video of a gas theft in which the getaway driver suffered an itchy right foot and sent his female accomplice flying. That was pretty weird. What other oddities have you witnessed while filling up? I had the. . . well, I wouldn’t call it good fortune, to once witness an extremely rotund gentleman climb aboard the speedboat he was trailering, dragging the gas pump hose over the poop deck as he did so, and he was wearing nothing but a Speedo. Yeeesh!
I’ve always considered the gas station to be like a public urinal- not the smell mind you, just the rules of engagement. It’s generally a good idea not to butt in line, keep conversation with your fellow patrons to a minimum, and avoid eye contact. Still, sometimes your best efforts to simply get some gas and then on with your life can be thwarted by others.
Have you found your fill ups to be drama free events? Or, have you ever experienced the gas station loiterer whose sad tale of needing a few bucks for gas so he can get home to see his dying mother plays even less well the second time you hear it, a week later? What is the weirdest thing you’ve ever seen at a gas station?
Image: pdnphotooftheday
Jeff Glucker
An attached casino. I think this was in Louisiana, on the way to Houston, TX. I've see fruit stands, restaurants, tourist traps, but this has been the only casino so far.
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They got those in Nevada as well.
It was a head scratcher. It seemed like Louisiana was trying to sell itself as another Nevada, from the bilboards. We unfortunately didn't get to stop anywhere noteworthy as it was one of those last minute rushed road trips for a funeral.
Yeah, not uncommon to see slot machines in supermarkets there too.
Huh. You mean slot machines are not everywhere? Around here we only have one real casino in the whole country, but slot machines are in every shop, kiosk, gas station, and bar.. Some bars also have blackjack or poker tables.
I've been in one, just north ov Vegas, near the race track and Nellis. I was passing through, and have never done the casino thing before. I got this idea in my head that I wanted to play a slot machine, just once or twice, because Ive never done it before. Then I got inside, and there was such a sad feeling to the place (helped by the many people just sitting at slot machines in a gas station) that I changed my mind and left. I've still never played a slot machine, and I think I'm better of for it.
I put in 75c to try to win a Cadillac once, yes it's sad.
I think the only gas station that I've stopped at in Nevada that didn't have a mini-casino was in Reno. (EDIT: I've never gassed up in Vegas, but I bet the stations probably don't have slots there, either.)
Probably, we ran into them in the Vegas airport the first time we went. My wife had gone that time for a conference and hadn't gotten to go to the casinos, so she ended up taking out 20 bucks at the airport slot machines and ended up taking home $200.
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Sadly, not me.
Beautiful!!!
The red car is ok, too!
Not super weird but definitely unexpected. A 1934 Aston Martin Ulster gassing up.
<img src="http://farm1.staticflickr.com/192/510081357_ad5980472c.jpg" width="500" height="375" alt="1934 Aston Martin Ulster">
A Ferrari 288 GTO on a flatbed at the BP in downtown Atlanta at Northside Dr. and Peachtree St. At the same gas station, way back when I was in college, I was heading home on a Friday afternoon and gassing up. At the time I was driving the old Chevy C-10. This was in the days before pay at the pump. I was going in to pay, I don't remember if it was before or after I had pumped my gas, but there was some woman demanding that I move my truck. My response was "I'll move as soon as I can." That wasn't good enough for her. She proceeded to bump the front bumper on the truck with her car. I just had to laugh. Grandpa had installed a front mounted trailer hitch for moving trailers around easier. It made a nice big dent in her car and she left. I go back to my truck. A woman on the other side of the pumps says: "I'm an Atlanta police officer and I saw the whole thing. Do you want to make a report?" A little paint on the rusty trailer hitch wasn't worth a report.
Just last week my dad witnessed a road rage incident that involved a zip gun being pointed at someone at a gas station. He decided he didn't need a fill all the way up and left ASAP.
I haven’t seen anything particularly odd while refueling, but I did read in the race recap that Speedycop and his “Spirit of Lemons” team was driving to a nearby gas station for their refueling stops. I have to imagine that for most, if not all, bystanders, a road-racing Cessna refueling would have to be the list topper.
Speaking of Cessnas:
At a gas station in the obscurity of central Sweden, in a ski village in summertime, next to a lake, simultaneously for rent:
– trailers
– a sea plane (maybe not a Cessna)
– an orange Lamborghini.
That's the swedish outback – don't extrapolate what the gas stations in the capital might offer!
Also speaking of Cessnas, Somewhere in central California there is a combination airstrip/aviation gas station/normal car gas station/burger joint. When I lived in California I had a friend who was working on his private pilot's license. When he finished we were going to fly there for a $100 hamburger (so called because of the gas cost, the burger would have been the normal under $10 type). Unfortunately I moved away before he finished his license, but that would have been a cool place to see.
Not car related but was leaving a fuel station in Toledo, OH and there was a "gentleman" on a bicycle filling glass coke bottles with gasoline and putting them in a backpack, muttering something about "burning the whole world down."
In hindsight, I probably should have notified the authorities. But I didn't see any arson incidents on the news that night.
[youtube E5a93wABHNM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5a93wABHNM youtube]
Relevant around 1:42
In hindsight, that edit got rid of the most relevant part. My bad…
thingsthatdidnthappen.txt
I once saw four male models in a Jeep get in a gasoline spray fight.
Wow, I feel like my life has been boring. No major weirdness at my pit stops, other than the usual weirdness that is life. I did have a woman with a furrin' accent ask me a while back if all the gas was unleaded. I thought about telling her no, the 93 octane gas was the only unleaded gas, but I was nice. Hey, I don't hate furriners as much as I just hate people in general.
My sister-in-law is a huge Steve Yzerman fan. She was getting gas a few years ago and he pulled up to the pump next to hers. She was so flustered and excited that she just blurted out, "STEVE YZERMAN!" She realized how dumb this was and promptly ended her fueling and left. She still turns beet red when we bring up this story.
Strangest would probably be the lady in the Suzuki Samurai that ran into the station. She pulled up to a pump, and when she would normally start braking instead surged ahead into the brick wall in front of her, hitting a good 3 ft up the wall from being bounced up by the curb. All I can figure is she hit the wrong pedal and panic mashed it. She wasn't badly hurt, just a little cut on her head, but the poor little Samurai was DOA.
Once I was at a gas station and my high school biology teacher tried to convince me to drive a hitchhiker to Regina. That was weird.
Otherwise just the old standby of mysterious blood in a bathroom stall.
Restrooms.
Good grief.
Your last paragraph, but something about cancer treatments. Three fill-ups in a row, different stations along the same road. But, you know, all's fair in love and war: I knew he was lying about the cancer, and he knew I was lying about not having any cash.
This only kinda counts, but back when I was 15 or so my family lived in East Texas. My dad was driving his '88 F-150 and I was in the passenger seat. We were sitting at a traffic light right next to a gas station when I turned to look and saw a driverless '68 Mustang convertible flying out of the station and heading right into the side of the truck. Hit the truck right in front of the rear wheel.
Apparently the owner of the car was working on something under the hood with the car in gear (manual trans) when he dropped a wrench and it hit the fender mounted starter relay and bridged the connections. The car engine started and immediately took off. Nobody was hurt but I was a bit shaken up since it was the first accident I had ever been in.
Our truck bed was damaged pretty good but it was drivable. Couldn't say the same for the Mustang, since it hit hard enough to push the radiator into the fan. To make things even worse, the car had JUST been repainted, and didn't even have windshield wipers put back on it yet.
Whoa, East Texas? Where specifically?
Nacogdoches. We lived there for 2.5 years.
A cousin of mine lives there.
I drive a manual. What is with people leaving their cars in gear? My ex would do it all the time.
Doesn't everyone leave a manual parked in gear, brake on? I've been doing it that way for 27 years. (Motorcycle parked in gear too, any time it's on the sidestand.)
I've only totaled one car in my life … the direct result of me parking and leaving it out of gear. I've never done it since.
Putting gas in the car at the big 7-11 on the highway, I saw a teen in the back seat open her door and dump out tea or water and about 2 sliced up lemons- all right beside the car and made a mess. I moseyed to the car and told her she dropped something.
She opened the door, looked down and said, "Oh, that's just trash."
While pointing at a proper trash receptacle I old her, "Nice- well, there is a trash can RIGHT THERE!!"
The look on her and her parent's faces may be the weirdest thing I'd seen while at a station. It was great.
Restrooms are a whole other matter.
Classic. Wish I had seen that!
<img src="http://media.caranddriver.com/images/media/108200/one-lap-is-the-ultimate-anything-goes-competition-but-even-so-a-geo-metro-is-unique-in-event-annals-veteran-lappers-david-and-faye-teal-commandeered-the-metro-from-their-son-this-year-when-other-rides-photo-131877-s-520×318.jpg"> Whoohoo, it's a twofer, IZM and you, why not, congrats on the century! Also, there is woman smoking in the photo up top, that's the strangest thing I've seen too.
Freshman year in college, we had a scavenger hunt, One of the things we had to get was a note from a gas station attendant that we washed some people's windows in our bathing suits. 6'-0" 280lbs of pasty white me with dreadlocks and carabiners in my ears (they are stretched to 5/8") running around in just my swim trunks washing windows was certainly on a few people's list.
What the–that was you?
Yeah, hey look, uh, it was pretty cold alright?
Also I hope you enjoyed your clean window.
I haven't been there yet, but there's a gas station mini-mart with a five star restaurant, Chef Point Cafe, in the Fort Worth area (in Watauga), and it was featured on Food Network's Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives:
http://www.chefpointcafe.org/
Stuff like New Zealand Rack of Lamb, Escargot, Atlantic Salmon Piccata, etc., with your fill-up of Conoco (hey, I've got a card!)
I'll have to check that out.
There was a gas station in Southlake with a crawfish restaurant inside. Pretty good stuff but it didn't last long.
Let me know what it's like. I heard a commercial for it on the radio one day, recently.
Wow- I know where that is. I drive by it several times a week.
The weirdest thing that's happened to me was at a gas station in Maryland, where I was gassing up my Citroen Traction. An older man approached me, and started talking to me in German. When I told him I don't sprechen zie Deusche, he starts this weird Comic Nazi routine right out of Mel Brooks. I know these cars were common in the old WW2 movies, but this was just weird. I got out of there as fast as I could. Springtime for Hitler? Really?
Mine seems on the tame side. The pictures of people dragging the pump hoses is hilarious to me, because I actually watched someone drive off with the pump handle still in their tank and take part of the hose with them. I was a bored teenager selling Christmas Trees on part of the lot, so it was a welcome bit of point-and-laugh levity.
I worked at a car wash/fuel station through high school, and this was a common sight for me. This happened at least twice a month, and it was hilarious every single time 🙂
Given that they design the hoses to fail at a specific point without damaging the pumps (and probably reattach quickly), I figured it had to happen at reasonably common frequency.
I once saw gas for under $2.00 a gallon.
Seriously.
I'm tossing out the BS flag on this one.
Must have been Dubai… it's so cheap stations don't advertise prices.
In a movie?
When I was in high school, filling up at a station after my night job (grocery store stocker/sacker), two guys pull in, driving a '71 Torino that's clearly overheating. They get out, and one of the guys (shirtless) opens the hood, unscrews the radiator cap, then gets the water hose and starts adding water. A moment later, the radiator pukes hot water on his shoulder and chest, causing him to cuss loudly, and then kick a large dent in the front fender. Sorry it's all I got, but it was entertaining at the time.
On my last road trip, I saw a fire fighter (at least he had the license plate) filling up with his car running. I kind of figure if anyone should know better than to do that, a fire fighter would.
I pulled up to the pump once, noticed the guy on the other pump island enjoying a cigar while filling his tank, and decided I really didn't need gas right then.
Very descriptive article, I loved that bit. Will there be a
part 2?
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