FoxTrax Blog

So while driving in to work I stopped to get gas and saw a little box across the parking lot that said “Free Air” and this struck me as somewhat peculiar.

Why, for example, wasn’t air free to begin with? Isn’t “the air is free” one of those ubiquitous go-to examples in entry-level business classes? If you were to try and come up with something that was totally free, completely available, and absolutely necessary, the first thing you think of is “the air”. If you were in a political discussion and trying to find something ridiculous to tax for the an analogy, you’d say “that’s like taxing the air”. I would, anyway.

But maybe I’m missing the point. Maybe the point is not that the air is free, but that it should be free. Free air! Release it from its compressor-prison, into the vast open wild… or you tires. Air has rights too, you know.

Okay, I know I’ve completely dodged the point of the sign. It’s not the air that’s free so much as it’s the use of the gas station’s compressor that is free. Discounted from $.25, I suppose. But “Free use of our compressor” or even “Free compressed air” just doesn’t match the succinctness of “Free Air.”

Labels: humor

# posted by Kurt @ 8:07 AM