Mass Hysteria

I'm not sure where the rumor started, but it spread like wildfire. I heard it almost as soon as I left the house today. While I was filling out forms at the hospital (x-rays, nothing serious), the receptionist told me she'd heard that area gas stations were cutting off their gas supply at 4pm. She was worried that she wouldn't be able to fill her gas tank and that she wouldn't be able to get to work tomorrow. Everyone else in the hospital seemed to share her plight.

Some of the folks at the hospital recognized me from the tv station, and I told them it was probably a rumor, that I hadn't heard any such thing, and that if it were true, somebody at work would have told me about it. They didn't buy it.

When I left the hospital, chaos had broken out across the city. Lines at gas stations were hundreds of feet long, blocking traffic and creating havoc at nearby intersections. Gas prices, which, the night before, had been around $2.70 a gallon had shot all the way up to $3.16 a gallon at some stations. And people were still lining up. (The gas station near my apartment hadn't gotten the memo about price-gouging, and was charging a much more reasonable $2.79)

I was smart enough to fill my gas tank on Sunday, when I heard that the drilling platforms and refineries had been closed down and evacuated. I may be blonde, but I didn't just fall off the turnip truck yesterday.

Poor Cory's been sitting in the newsroom, where the phone's been ringing off the hook with people calling about the gas situation. He says it's been like watching a twilight zone episode.