The Chevron station on the corner of McDowell and 51st Avenue is giving away discounted gas from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. today, which has caused hundreds of people to flock to the station -- some even got in line last night -- and the cops aint happy about it.
Ready for the best part -- many of the people waiting won't even get any gas.
The gas station is offering 99-cent-per-gallon gas for three hours, with a limit of 10 gallons per customer and enough gas for about 250 people.
We crunched the numbers, and with gas prices over three bucks at the moment, your average gas-junkie stands to save about $25 on the deal.
According to one of the attendants we spoke to, the thought of saving 25 bucks prompted some people to get in line at 11 p.m. last night. Those fucking idiots dedicated souls were the first of hundreds of people who created a line that stretched from the gas pump, around the gas station, onto McDowell Road, down 51st Avenue, all the way to the Interstate 10 -- causing backups stretching well-past the 51st Avenue exit.
With hundreds of people swarming to save a few bucks at the pump, you would assume that the organizer of the event would let the police know what was going on in advance. You would be wrong.
The Phoenix police officer we spoke to says that nobody told cops anything about the event, but once crowds got to the point of being ridiculous, police took notice and were forced to step in and try to organize the chaos.
"I have no problem telling them it's over," the officer says. "How else do you control chaos."
At that very moment, some jerk in a dumpy pickup truck tried to cut the line, at which point the officer -- who seemed well past the point of being pissed -- slapped the truck's window and started yelling at the driver.
"It's ridiculous," he says afterward. "There were 200 cars here at 8 a.m."
Our best guesstimate is that there were between 400 and 500 cars waiting for hours to save 25 bucks. So much for working in the middle of the day on a Friday.
The big winner, in our analysis, wasn't the dummy who waited in line for hours to save 25 bucks on gas but the homeless people who cashed in on those waiting in line.
We counted nine bums on the side of the road, begging for change at different points along the line, and these gas-hogs -- so eager to save a few bucks -- were actually giving them money.
Here's what we learned from today's shindig: Gas give-aways are a bum's paradise, and consumers can be incredibly stupid.
