I like the sodas at Chevron . . . they’re not restaurant quality, but they’re better than the flat, tasteless sodas you get at most other gas stations.
On the downside, Chevron as often as not has some donate-a-buck-to-charity shakedown going on at the register. Today the place is plastered with photos of bald children with brave smiles on their faces . . .
“Would you like to donate to St. Jude pediatric cancer research?” the clerk asks.
“I already donated two dollars last week and they haven’t cured it yet?”
Meanwhile, I notice another employee plucking all the hot dogs off the rotisserie with a pair of tongs and dropping them in a trash can . . .
“You have to throw those out if they sit too long?” I ask the clerk.
“Yes.”
“Do you ever pluck a couple off and eat them if you’re hungry?”
“No,” he says, with the kind of look someone would give you if you asked them to eat something inedible . . .