Aaron Ewer

The past week I have been watching the cost of gas creep lower and lower. Thank God we have a little relief from the cost of transportation!

I hate to say it out loud and put a hex on the situation, but we have seen the price of gas drop from over $4.09 per gallon last month down in the “Land of Excess” where I work, to $3.19 per gallon at the little BP station down the road from my house. There is a price difference of over 12 cents per gallon between the stations at the highway exit by my house to the cheaper stations about 2 miles from the highway in the neighborhood shopping areas. It pays to check with Gas Buddy online before heading out for a fill up.

I would love to see the price get down below $3.00 again. That would make a huge difference in my household budget. Too late to resurrect the vacation plans we had to cancel, but at least we can get back and forth to work with a little less pain to the wallet again.

I’ve been working on a web site for a group of local lawyers who have their own radio show on the AM talk radio station here, 1510 WLAC. The cool thing about AM radio is that late at night the broadcast signal goes really far and this show can be heard in 33 states and 3 countries on a regular car or truck radio. Plus it is broadcast live on the internet, so it can actually be heard all over the world.

It’s an interesting show - the lawyers take calls on the air from real people and help them explore their options and explain their legal standing. You can learn a lot from listening every week.

A story in today’s Chicago Tribune reports that Sonic will be entering the Chicagoland market this year with 4 new drive-in restaurants. That’s great news! What took them so long?

Sonic is headquartered in Oklahoma and is the country’s largest operator of drive-in restaurants, with over 3,000 drive-ins nationwide. SONIC enjoys the highest customer frequency rate in the quick-service restaurant industry.

In 1953, SONIC was founded by Troy Smith and was originally named Top Hat Drive-In, and the name was changed to SONIC in 1959. The prototype of the first SONIC Drive-In opened in Shawnee, Oklahoma and the unique use of curbside speakers to allow customers to place food orders without leaving their cars, was the basis for their slogan of “SONIC, Service with the Speed of Sound.”

They have a special offer of milkshakes for 99 cents - that makes it awfully hard to drive past one without stopping for a different milkshake flavor every day at a bargain price!

With the housing market in the tank for most of the country, this is a tough time to be a real estate agent or mortgage broker. I hope these people have set back some money to help them ride out the tough times. But realistically, I’m sure that like most people they spend their money as fast as it comes in.

My neighbor is a real estate agent and has been doing well by focusing on just new homes by one particular builder. The builder has several projects underway and is known for helping first time buyers get into a house. They work together to coach the buyers through the loan application process and even self finance some people that might have problem credit and need a year to fix their credit report.

As a thank you gift to her home buyers, she came up with a really cool idea - customized Gift Cards. These cards are actually VISA gift cards and she has them printed with her business card photo and information, then presents them to the couple at closing as a nice thank you.

This summer might turn into a staycation for us - the cost of gas is still going up and my fun money part of the budget is drying up pretty fast.

The wife would like to just stay at home and have a little staycation instead of an expensive trip to the beach. We can fix up the backyard and maybe go on a few Harley rides to the parks and natural areas that we never seem to get around to seeing.

I’d like to put in a small pond and fountain in the backyard, with a swing and garden area for some quiet moments in the early morning or late evening when either the wife or I want to get away from it all. I’m even thinking about buying a couple of marble statues to make the garden area a little more formal and classy.

I found a website that has a great variety of marble statues and figurines - from classic to modern. I liked one that I saw and then I noticed that the same site has fountains, too. They also have planters, urns, and ornate marble fireplaces. Now I’m getting all kinds of great ideas for landscaping the yard and then we can have a year round staycation - right at home.