[Roy Tucker]

I got a taste of what the future might bring recently.

We were on vacation in Destin FL about a week after Hurricane Dennis hit nearby. About 100 miles outside of the Pensacola/Destin areas, they had signs on the interstate saying gas was scarce further in and to fill up now (which we did). Evidently the evacuation of the area had emptied most stations and they were having a hard time catching up.

After being in Destin for a few days, I went to get gas. Most of the major refueling stations like Shell, BP, etc. had none (they put plastic shopping bags over the pump nozzles). After talking to a guy at the condo, he said there was a little station nearby that had gas.

There was a line of about 20 cars waiting to get gas. There were many panicky people that were runnig on fumes and desperate to get gas. I witnessed about 3 separate confrontations about where in line you were that featured big-time temper flares and much X-rated swearing. Some of it was racial. There were a couple times where I thought there was going to be gun-fire. To say it was ugly was the understatement of the year.

I had the distinctly uneasy feeling I was catching a glimpse of the future.