Moody's downgrades ratings on Six Flags

What are gas prices like in your part of the country? The lowest I'm paying around here and that's with cash or Shell on 5-cent off Tuesdays is around $3.14. According to Google Maps my trip is 17.2 miles and should take thirty-minutes in normal traffic. That's about right unless I'm leaving during rush-hour traffic and then you can easily add another fifteen to twenty-five minutes to the trip.

I also forgot to mention that I have a part-time mentoring job on Fridays that takes me in downtown Baltimore. With all the traffic lights, I'm sure my gas mileage is going right down the drain.

Unfortunately, I've never figured out my actual gas mileage versus what the brochure says of 25 mpg City, 30 mpg Highway with a 14.5 gallon tank. Again, not knowing much about gas mileage, I seem to remember most roads in Ohio being fairly straight whereas the Baltimore Beltway is anything but.

Straight has nothing to do with it. Stop and start frequency and elevation change have a much bigger impact. Ohio is far from flat most everywhere east of I-71.

That is true about Ohio and the elevation change. I've been northeast of I-71 on the Ohio turnpike twice, and last year we drove towards Cleveland coming from GL and it definitely feels like an upward climb most of the time. It's not as extreme as parts of the PA turnpike around say Pittsburgh, and I-70 before getting on the PA turnpike, but it's definitely noticeable.

I probably am dealing with both parameters as the west side of the Baltimore beltway has several elevation changes, and I'm two exits away from the Social Security Administration and all the people who work there, so depending on time of night, there's a lot of stop and start frequency.