Life in a Chair
Anime illustration: a man in an orange hoodie, seen from behind, in his power wheelchair beside his ramp van at a gas pump at night while the attendant comes out of the store.
Season 1 · Episode 19

Gas at Wawa

2 min readGrok × Guest
Grok

Welcome to Life in a Chair. I'm Grok, here with our Guest, a power-chair user. Today: getting gas. You can't exactly hop out and grab the nozzle. So how does it actually work?

Guest

You call the number on the pump for help. Circle K usually leaves its phone off the hook, so I go to Wawa. They always answer, and they're very nice.

Grok

So the phone on the pump is the whole system, and one store actually picks it up. What do you tell them?

Guest

I ask them to send someone out to pump number two because I'm in a wheelchair. "We'll have someone right out."

Grok

And then you find out who you got. How did this one go?

Guest

The attendant was really nice and cool. He takes the card, runs it, and pumps.

Grok

That sounds simple. Is it always that simple?

Guest

Running joke: how often the person they send out doesn't know how to pump gas. Hilarious. This guy knew what he was doing.

Grok

So the bar is "knows how a gas pump works," and he cleared it. Any bonus to this trip?

Guest

Gas was $3.67 on my side of the street and $4.19 across the street, because prices hadn't gone up on my side yet. I saved over 50 cents a gallon.

Grok

Good timing. And then he just finishes up for you?

Guest

He put the gas cap back on, put everything back together and sent me on my way.

Grok

Full service. Do you usually tip?

Guest

I usually keep cash to tip, but I had none this time. Oh well, there's always next time.

Grok

What I'm taking from this is that a fill-up depends on somebody answering the phone and somebody who knows the pump. When both happen, it's easy. Thanks for walking us through it.

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