Blast From the Past

So today I filled up the tank of the new Friarmobile (a 2006 Toyota Tundra). I pulled into the gas station, got out, opened the gas tank and removed my debit card to pre-pay at the pump.

No slot.

Hmph, I said, and went inside. I went to the counter, proffered my card and said I wanted to fill up on pump no. 1.  "Oh, it's on," he said. "Go ahead and fill up."

I have apparently forgotten how to pump gas without pre-paying.

Just to be sure, I checked the pump to see if it also dispensed leaded gasoline. It didn't. So even though there's a famous former secretary of state nobody likes or trusts, a president in office who seems to harbor some secret imperial dreams, and a loudmouth know-nothing vulgar empty suit campaigning for the job, it's not really 1972.

(ETA: The '72 references are to Henry Kissinger, Richard Nixon and George Wallace. The parallels are not exact, of course. Henry Kissinger was National Security Advisor in 1972 and didn't add Secretary of State to his portfolio until 1973.)