60 mpg

This was my mpg reading when I got home today – I averaged 60.1 mpg over the 62.5 round trip of my commute. A personal record, I think! (I drove carefully, caught most of the lights, didn't need to pull out fast into traffic, was able to drive with the windows up and no A/C, and it's a 5-speed - all good means of "hypermiling")  It's too bad all cars don't come with an mpg gauge such as this one, where it displays a bar (at the bottom of the screen there) at all times showing you your mpg as it varies in real time - you can really see which driving behaviors affect it the most, and then it's like a game to beat your previous record on that same course.

Have I mentioned that I love my little car? [I think maybe I have…]

Now, you may ask (and you'd be justified in asking)… how do I reconcile this post with yesterday's afternoon at the races, where hundreds of gallons of fuel were consumed? Er, well, um. I would guess (though I'm just making this up) that vintage cars use less fuel than, say, NASCAR or definitely than dragsters. And I'm afraid it's just plain fun to watch those old cars in a road race once a year. Maybe I'm saving enough gas to make up for it? Well, let's do the math: I've driven 135,000 miles in my hybrid, averaging about 52 mpg (that's more normal than today), vs 25 I might be getting in a regular sedan of some sort = 2,800 gallons of gas I've saved [yeah, I know I could theoretically drive fewer miles, but this is really only commuting 60 miles a day and trips to take the kids to school etc.] So, well, don't judge me too harshly, please – I'm trying, anyway 🙂

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