Gentlemen, I need some help here with something completely and utterly not having anything to do with these forums. BUT, I need some confirmation, either way mind you for the sake of fairness. In short, I want your opinions. Here is the deal……and please, I know it is a stupid argument, but it’s what I have had to put up with for years. I leave it up to you guys, you tell me if I am right or wrong here.
As some of you may or may not know, every November, myself and a handful of other guys take an annual salmon fishing trip which encompasses maybe 300 miles one way to Oswego,NY from our general area here in central New Jersey. The motel room bill and gasoline bill for the vehicle to get us up there has always been split in the sense of fairness to all as far as equitably splitting their total costs.
The problem here is the gasoline bill. I have tried to explain this to my fellow fishermen for years and have gotten basically nowhere. I know, I know, it will be fairly self explanatory when I tell it to you and pretty easy to understand, so I know it might say something about those who are not “getting it” – but I’m tired of explaining until I’m blue in the face.
Here is my take on how the gasoline deal should be handled for complete fairness to all. Basically, the trip starts at my home. With that in mind, I opine that whomever is driving that year (we take turns driving each year so that the “wear and tear” issue of driving ones vehicle is spread out amongst everyone evenly) whomever is driving should start the trip with a full tank of gas that that person – the vehicle owner – has paid for out of his own pocket. Now, that is plenty of gas to get us to Oswego,NY, but when we get there, or soon thereafter it really doesn’t matter, we then fill up the gas tank because of all of the shuttling between the room and the river and going out to eat and such. This is usually enough to get us through the few days of the trip and maybe even home. If not enough for home, we fill up before we leave to come home. Either way, any fill up during the trip is equally split between those riding in that vehicle. Because the tank was full when we left my home at the beginning of the trip, the only gas used and subsequently paid for, is gas that was used for the trip, thus, needing to be split amongst those in the vehicle. With me so far?
Now, when returning home and we are a few miles from my home, I say we again return the tank to full with each of us again splitting the cost of the fill up and the owner now has the original full tank of gas that he began with before the trip started. This way, everyone has split the cost of ONLY the gas that has been used on the trip and the vehicle owner has the full tank of gas he paid for out of his own pocket before the trip started. It’s all very, very simple really to understand the theory behind it, but as I said, I won’t go into what it says about the extrapolating abilities of my associates.
Listen, if I am wrong here, and I seriously don’t think I am on the wrong track with this theory, tell me. If you think there is a more fair and equitable way to divide up the exact cost of the gasoline bill among everyone, please, explain, but I doubt there is since if you left with a full tank and completed the trip with a full tank and split the gas that was used during the trip, it is being split exactly evenly among everyone there. But you tell me, because the only way I am going to convince these guys is to have some impartial input from others. I will print out this posting and also the replies in hopes that this will end this annual PITA discussion.
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Originally Posted by Joe Pelonio
