A Brazilian miles per gallon

Never being able to brag about numbers, I have felt left out of conversations all my life. Peoples always showing off around me; "I can bench press this much," "My SAT scores were genius level," "I learned to read when I was 4." My only answer to the numbers game has been, "I once ate about 8 green peaches, and it made me so sick to my stomach that, almost 20 years later, I cannot even smell them velvety bastards." Watercooler crowd not impressed.

So, needless to say, when Mr. Pastel and I recently switched our little old Sentra for a new little Echo, I felt my day to brag had come. Hehe, 33-39 motherfuckers! Yippie-kai-yay! Obnoxiousness took over me. I was bringing this up during conversations, even if they didn't have anything to do with it. My boss: "Lopez!, this book needs to be back in time for the conference." To which I would anwswer, "Yes, I know. Hey, did you know our little Echo does 33-39?" Anyway, I know now that rolling your eyes is a sign of uncontrollable envy.

So, this 33-39 mpg dream of a life in a $2.89-gallon world was pretty cool, right? Right. Until Mr. Pastel and I were forced to eat the dust of a zippy little number in green that cut in front of us when we were on our way to see the Dragon bunch. No, it was not the traffic-assholeness that got us, it was the license plate on this Toyota Prius; 70-fucking-MPG (well, without the fucking). Yes, it was the green machine, in more ways than one. I thought to myself about our little Echo: "This obsolete piece of crap is making me look like a hillbilly."

Mr. Pastel, the voice of reason, calmed me down and in a very rational and adult way made me see the benefits of owning a car, that although not as efficient as that beautiful machine, was still perfect for us. His talk made me come to my senses. That and this AP story. Hehe =}