Do you know how, after doing something thousands of time, it becomes second nature and you can do it without really thinking about it? Well, that’s kind of what this story is about, except in reverse.

Let me explain: After a 300 mile drive, my tired wife and I pulled into a service station for another all-too often refill of our gas tank. My wife usually does this, since she uses the stop as an opportunity to visit the station’s restroom.

As she walked around the back of our SUV, I pulled up on the gas tank door release lever. I watched in my rear view mirror as she swiped the credit card and lifted the nozzle from the pump, while turning toward the car and inserting the nozzle in the tank. As I watched, she then pulled the nozzle out of the tank, looked at it for a moment, and then reinserted it again. After another moment, she removed the nozzle and turned back toward the pump. She seemed to be staring at it as if something was wrong.

“What’s wrong?” I called out.

“Something’s wrong with this pump.”

“Like what,” I asked.

“The nozzle doesn’t fit properly.”

I got out and walked over to where she was standing holding the nozzle. “What do you mean?” I asked.

“Here, you try.” She responded.

As I inserted the nozzle into the tank, she changed the subject on me. I only note this because I’m sure that I was about to solve the mystery, but was distracted when she said: “There’s also something wrong with the gas cap.”

“There’s a big piece of black plastic stuck on the back of the gas cap.” She said. “I’m sure that I’ve never noticed that before.”

“Hmm,” I responded. “What the heck?” I mumbled as I poked at the cap.

In fact, there was a big, black plastic extension on the rear of the cap that I couldn’t remember seeing before, either.

Still holding onto the nozzle, I studied the gas cap for a few moments and then, realizing that I was still holding the nozzle, I turned back toward the pump and reinserted the nozzle into it’s holster.

And that’s when I had an epiphany. As I inserted the nozzle back into the pump, I took my first good look at the pump. Now, for those of you who have already figured out the solution to our problem, hold off and don’t spoil it for the rest of the readers.

“Oh, for crying out loud!” I exclaimed.

“What? What is it?” She said, sounding very frustrated by then.

“Look at the pump,” I said.

“What?” She repeated. “Is it broken?”

“No, I groaned, but it’s the wrong pump, this one is for a diesel engine!”

After a few minutes of explaining the difference between gasoline and diesel engines, their requirement for different types of fuel, and the different designs for the gas nozzle versus the diesel nozzle to ensure that no one put the wrong fuel in their automobile, my wife exclaimed, “Well, I think that it’s pretty dumb of them to put both types of fuel in the same pump!”

After glancing around to make sure that no one had overheard our senior moments of confusion, we agreed to keep this little shared brain dysfunction to ourselves and further agreed with each other that it was a dumb way to design a gas pump; it certainly wasn’t our fault; we’re not engineers, after-all…

BTW, if any of you mentions this incident in the future, we’ve decided to deny that it ever happened. Now, where did I leave the car keys?

Till next time,

Traveler

Last 5 posts by Traveler8343

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