What is Gasoline and Why Should I Care? – Conversations with Stella

I am Stella, Queen of the Olde English Bulldogges. The humans are speaking gibberish again, but I am attempting to understand them. Once more, they are stressed about some nonsense called ‘gasoline’. Of course. They are always stressed about something or other. This is just the latest in a long list. Lady Human, what is ‘gasoline’ and why should I care? P.S. I don’t really care, but you all are talking about it and not about me so…

Me:        Do you remember going on those campouts with me?

Stella:    How can I forget? We went from living in a comfortable house that is real to living in a cramped fake little house made of cloth and you thought it was fun. By the way, what does the word ‘fun’ mean to humans, because I don’t think it means the same thing to dogs.

Me:        Getting back to the gasoline issue, do you remember on those trips when I would stop, get out, and put a nozzle into the side of the car?

Stella:    Yeah, that was just plain weird.

Me:        Okay, as weird as it looked, that nozzle was pumping gasoline into the car. Cars and trucks use gasoline as fuel and, if the car runs out of gasoline, it stops working until it gets more. Does that make sense?

Stella:    All right, so gasoline is to a car as food and treats are to us.

Me:        YES! Very good, Stella!

Stella:    So, gasoline is car food. Why are you and Tall Man talking so much about car food?

Me:        Well, the hurricane impacted some of the places on the coast that make gasoline and there are these things called pipelines…

Stella:    Yet another nonsense word.

Me:        …that carry gasoline so it can be put on big tanker trucks and brought to stations where we pump it into cars and smaller trucks. And the flooding impacted a pipeline and so not as much gasoline is flowing temporarily. They are working on it and fuel is coming in from other places.

Stella:    Do these pipelines carry our food and treats, too?

Me:        No, and you wouldn’t want them to because the food and treats would taste and smell like gasoline and might catch on fire if you lit a match around them.

Stella:    I can’t light matches, Lady Human. I am a bulldog.

Me:        I am grateful for that, Stella.

Stella:    Bottom line: Our food and treats are all right then.

Me:        Yes.

Stella:    So, the problem is…what?

Me:        People around here are buying up as much gasoline as their vehicles will hold all at the same time so they won’t go empty over the weekend and some gas stations are running out of gas. It should all be fixed as soon as the tankers roll in. Local problem. Minor inconvenience. It just requires a little planning if we are going far.

Stella:    Gas stations? Running out of gas? Why didn’t you say so? We are bulldogs. We have plenty of gas. You will never run out. Just take us to them. We can fill them back up. Happy to help.

Me:        Hmmm. It doesn’t really work that way. It’s not the same thing. You see, ‘gas’ can mean different things and they are all different from ‘gasoline’.

Stella:    Never mind, complicated human. I give up. We offer you our store of gas and you turn us down. Fine. Just plan to stay home this weekend while a whole wealth of fuel is sitting right at your feet.

 

 

 

 

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