My study of gas prices on the way to Montana.

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Due to popular demand, I am finally publishing my study of gas prices on my way to and from Montana. As my 4-year-old student implied, no study is complete without a working hypothesis. I will add her commentary here. It is from my forthcoming book. --- A 4-year-old girl is poking holes in the dirt with her right index finger. She pauses, and takes a sunflower seed from her left hand. She drops the seed in one of the holes, covers it with dirt, and then pauses again. She walks to another planter, a few feet away, and does the same thing. An adult man, one of her teachers, approaches her and says, "What are you up to on this sunny Wednesday morning?" She looks at him as if he were an idiot. "I am planting one seed in the shade and one in the sun. It's a 'speriment. That's science!" The man says, " I think you're right. That would be an experiment. And that's science." He thinks, "Glad I didn't teach her the word 'pothesis," but does not verbalize it. He has worked with this child since she was 18-months old, and can accept it when she is a bit intolerant of his ignorance. --- My hypothesis was that gas prices would be about $1.20 lower in Montana than they are in California. That has been my experience for several decades. I also hypothesized that there would be a big drop between California and Nevada, and between Nevada and Utah, as had been my experience in the past. Regular cost about $4.50/gallon when I left Coastal California. I only filled my tank to about "half," thinking gas would be less expensive once I made it over the High Sierra Mountains. I put a few gallons in in Truckee CA, but it was only about ten cents less than in Coastal California. But when I finally arrived in Nevada, I saw what I was hoping for: gas under $4/gallon. OK, it was $3.99, but beggars cannot be choosers. I put about seven gallons in, and looked forward to yet lower prices in Central Nevada. By the time I made it to Elko Nevada, gas prices were down to about $3.59 at the big truck stops,like Love's. Do they have those where you live? It was when I got to Utah that I got the next big dip. The lowest I saw in Utah was something like $3.09, but it settled in at $3.19 as I headed toward Idaho. I filled up for $3.29/gallon at a familiar truck stop in Idaho, topping my tank off before I headed into the mountains leading to West Yellowstone. I knew gas prices would be high in West Yellowstone, a "tourist trap," but I bought a couple of gallons there, so I would have "a reserve" as I drove through the winding and dangerous Gallatin River Gorge on my way to Bozeman MT. To be continued...