I Can't Drive 40

General Motors says that almost 80% of Americans drive less than 40 miles each day. That fact bothers me, because I almost always drive more than that every day. With gas prices above three bucks a gallon for the past month or so, and with no sign in the future that they're going down, that takes a toll on my budget.

Today was one of those rare days where I had things to do, but they were all close to home, so I should have been able to get under 40 miles. I was planning on working out at the community activities center, but even with that sort-of-long commute, I still should have stayed under 40.

Well, two things happened. First, I didn't go straight home after the gym, like I usually do. I was ... in a mood tonight. A lot of things contributed to that:

• There were four people in the fitness room when I came in. Lately I've seen it a lot more crowded for more days than before. People trying to stick to their New Year's Resolutions, I guess. But I thought they would drop out by about now, and so far, they're hanging tough. Therefore, I'm bummed that I have the gym less to myself, at least for now.
• Letterman and Fallon are in reruns for the week. There are few things better in my life right now than going home and getting into late-night TV. But if it's in reruns, the jokes are outdated, and there might be a chance I've seen the interviews already. No need to rush home in this case.
• Didn't know till this evening there was a fairly important west coast game on ESPN2 at 10: Gonzaga hosting St. Mary's. Thinking about doing a write-up about the Zags, who are in mighty big danger of not getting into the Big Dance this year. The school that blazed a trail for mid-majors achieving massive success in football as well as basketball may see their sun set on them? Good enough to stay out and watch on cable, at least for a little bit.

Plus, I usually don't want to go home. So I told myself to drive by and if there was a car parked there, you wouldn't go in. But there was no car, so even though I ate dinner and wasn't really hungry and knew I was going to blow this fat burn I feel I got going on (even though I just ate cereal, so if I didn't get fat after work from late-night food out, I probably did just now), I parked my car and ate and watched college basketball on cable TV. (I left early in the second half of the Gonzaga-St. Mary's game, while it was good. (And it wound up a great one; St. Mary's won, 73-71.)

The second thing that happened was that I let my car cool off while eating at the restaurant. They usually say you need to drive your car ten miles to sufficiently burn off all the impurities in the oil in your car, otherwise you risk damaging your engine. Well, I looked at my odometer when I drove off the parking lot; I had about 35 miles on it. I didn't want to do ten because I really, really wanted to say I drove under 40 for the day, but I will drive a little.

So instead of going straight home I pass it up. This is something I do a lot after eating at this place: Drive down Highway 10 for a bit, marvel at how I hit all green lights this time of night, then get on the left-turn lane, turn around, and then drive back home, engine sufficiently hot. I needed to make sure I didn't go over 40, so I picked an intersection and turned around.

Oh-oh. I clicked my settings to "Trip B," which keeps a daily record of my miles traveled. While getting home, it was getting perilously close to my self-imposed limit: 39.0, 39.1, 39.2. ... I didn't know one-tenth of a mile goes by so quickly.

I needed to make one more left turn, then another left onto my driveway, and I'd be home free, mission fulfilled. I thought that if I took that initial left when the odometer said 39.8, I had a chance. How did it get so close? How did I let it get so close? But it rolled to 39.9 just before the left. At the rate the tenths-miles racked up, I was going to miss 40.0 by thatmuch. And sure enough, when I finally parked the car in the garage, I punched up the "Trip B" odometer (I was so sure I'd miss it I didn't want to see it roll past 40.0, I was so ashamed). It read 40.1.

Why didn't I take the previous left turn? I fail.