UPS and Oil

[satellitedriver]

Originally Posted by moreluck

In school we had drills and we went under our desks.....like that would really protect us from anything.

I lived in Houston during the Cuban misslie crisis.
We were a prime target and within range of a nuke strike.
We had practice drills at school and went into the hallway.
Fetal position, head to the wall and our hands around the back of our necks.
During one of these daily exercises, an ambulance went by with it's sirens blaring.
Being a good catholic boy, I removed my hand from the back of my neck and made the sign of the cross and prayed for the safety of the person in the ambulance, as I was taught to do.
The Sister supervising the drill poked me with her pointing stick and told me to keep my hands on my neck.
The irony of that moment has never left me.

[no more than 9]

Amen Brother!!!!!!!!!!!

[moreluck]

Sat.....our family did the ambulance thing too. It was a nice thing to say a little prayer for someone who might be in a health crisis or accident.

One of the things we did on Good Friday was that during the 3 hours between noon and 3 PM (supposedly the time Christ hung on the cross) we maintained silence in our house. No TV, no radio, no phone no talking at all. This tradition broke for good when my adult cousin came to visit during one of these times and yelled out......."Whatsa matter, cat got your tongues!!" We laughed ourselves silly.

To this day, I wonder if during Christ's time they were on Pacific, Eastern or daylight saving's time and how did we know those were the exact hours He was on the cross?

We may not have kept the practices of our childhood, but I think those were simpler times and our characters were forming and we turned out as OK kids with some morals intact.

[UpstateNYUPSer]

I was discussing the current gas prices with the manager of a local convenience store and he made an excellent point when he stated that, while the prices indeed are high now, imagine how much higher they may be if there were a "crisis" in the Middle East which severely impacted the supply of oil. This should be a wake-up call that this is the time for serious attention to alternative fuels. I applaud sober in his efforts to use alternative fuels, especially bio-diesel; however, this would not work in my area as there is only one station that offers bio-diesel and the price makes it prohibitive (over $5/gal). Conventional diesel is $4.74/gal and regular unleaded is $3.99 and will surely cross the $4 mark this weekend. Although they are our competitor, I do feel for the Fed Ex ground guys.

[browniehound]

Sober,
I really hope you are a manager at UPS. The company needs people with your forward thinking vision and planning skills.

[browniehound]

Originally Posted by moreluck

Sat.....our family did the ambulance thing too. It was a nice thing to say a little prayer for someone who might be in a health crisis or accident.

One of the things we did on Good Friday was that during the 3 hours between noon and 3 PM (supposedly the time Christ hung on the cross) we maintained silence in our house. No TV, no radio, no phone no talking at all. This tradition broke for good when my adult cousin came to visit during one of these times and yelled out......."Whatsa matter, cat got your tongues!!" We laughed ourselves silly.

To this day, I wonder if during Christ's time they were on Pacific, Eastern or daylight saving's time and how did we know those were the exact hours He was on the cross?

We may not have kept the practices of our childhood, but I think those were simpler times and our characters were forming and we turned out as OK kids with some morals intact.

More,
I think its "rituals" like you described that builds character and molds us into what we will be as adults.

As for Christ dying between 12 and 3, I don't know? Was he really born on december 25th? I doubt it.

[coldworld]

do any of you all have some type of kit you keep stocked ready to go???

[soberups]

Originally Posted by coldworld

do any of you all have some type of kit you keep stocked ready to go???

I have a "get home kit" in each of my vehicles. It includes a wind-up flashlight that never needs batteries, a couple of water bottles, an MRE, a fuel-siphoning tube, a poncho, and a gun with extra ammo. You can put a kit like this together for about $200 and it could very well make the difference between making it home or not.

[coldworld]

Originally Posted by soberups

I have a "get home kit" in each of my vehicles. It includes a wind-up flashlight that never needs batteries, a couple of water bottles, an MRE, a fuel-siphoning tube, a poncho, and a gun with extra ammo. You can put a kit like this together for about $200 and it could very well make the difference between making it home or not.

i like that kit!!

[1989]

Originally Posted by soberups

Gas will last for at least 6 months if you keep it in an airtight gas can, and a year or more when you add 2 oz of sta-bil, which I do. I also rotate my gas out by running it thru my old truck once it gets a year old, and then I refill the can with fresh fuel.
I can remember getting up at 4:00 AM with my folks and going to wait in line for gas back in '73. Im not interested in doing that again.

Sober,

What do you think about one of these?

http://www.efuel100.com/

[UpstateNYUPSer]

Originally Posted by 1989

Sober,

What do you think about one of these?

http://www.efuel100.com/

Sounds good--can I borrow the $10,000 to pay for it?

[UPS Lifer]

Originally Posted by UpstateNYUPSer

Sounds good--can I borrow the $10,000 to pay for it?

At $4 a gal. you can purchase 2,500 gal of gas and at 18 MPG you will be able to go 45,000. Every MPG increase you go another 2500 miles!

Of course that is assuming a steady rate of $4 a gal! LOL!

[soberups]

Originally Posted by 1989

Sober,

What do you think about one of these?
http://www.efuel100.com/

Not interested. Pure ethanol wont run well at all in a gasoline engine. My minivan can run on E85 (85% ethanol 15% gasoline) but the gas mileage drops by over 1/3.
Ethanol has less btu's of energy than gasoline, but a higher octane. If you want good performance out of ethanol, you need to have a much higher compression ratio in your engine. This would mean you couldnt use gasoline in it at all. A standard gasoline engine...with lower compression...can run an ethanol blend of up to 85%, beyond which you start running into cold-start and driveability issues as well as poor overall mileage compared to straight gasoline.
For a fraction of the cost of the efuel100 unit, you can set up a biodiesel processor in your garage to make biodiesel out of used (or new) cooking and vegetable oil.

[toonertoo]

Originally Posted by brownmonster

What UPS needs to do is adopt a computerized dispatch system that maximizes effeciency and saves fuel. Then actually implement it correctly.

Ditto, excellent point. Before I read your post I was thinking, "dont we have gps and all to help with unneccesary mileage?"

[scratch]

Originally Posted by toonertoo

Ditto, excellent point. Before I read your post I was thinking, "dont we have gps and all to help with unneccesary mileage?"

Too bad PAS/EDD doesn't do this.

[UpstateNYUPSer]

Originally Posted by scratch

Too bad PAS/EDD doesn't do this.

I may be naive, but wasn't that one of the selling points?

[scratch]

Originally Posted by UpstateNYUPSer

I may be naive, but wasn't that one of the selling points?

Nope, you are not naive at all, you are just alert! Two drivers in the same subdivision, increase in missloads and missorts, more people on payroll, different delivery times on Sendagains, OnCar/ Shuttle Drivers, I could go on and on. PAS/EDD hasn't exactly been a runaway success.

[Hedley_Lamarr]

Originally Posted by scratch

Maybe QVC and HSN will start putting the complete order in one box instead of shipping six of the same size parcels to the same address.

That would be a novel idea now wouldn't it...

[HazMatMan]

Originally Posted by scratch

Maybe QVC and HSN will start putting the complete order in one box instead of shipping six of the same size parcels to the same address.

If it will cut costs at those companies to do that, they will, if not, forget it..

[Mike Hawk]

They do, I had a 2x2x2 QVC box come down the other day that looked like an accordian, I opened it up and there were 3 smaller boxes at the botom, with no packing material at all. Then again sometimes I get 3 QVC shirts or w/e in individual bags all for the same person.

[trplnkl]

Originally Posted by HazMatMan

If it will cut costs at those companies to do that, they will, if not, forget it..

Actually that makes the shipper money. They get to charge shipping and handling on each package. QVC, HSN and ABC all do this regularly.