Editorial: Dark days of 24 hours without car

So you figure having to spend $10 to get barely one old imperial gallon of petrol is pretty rough. You clearly were not around in the mid-70s when the Government of the day introduced a bizarre scheme called "carless days".
All motor vehicle owners (although motorcycles and scooters were thankfully exempt) were allocated a day, and not of their choice, during which they were not allowed to take their car, ute, van or whatever out on the road.
Doing so would result in being issued with a fine.
How did the authorities know a driver was transgressing?
With the mailed notification of the designated "carless day", the registered owner received a coloured sticker. Different colour for each day of the week - with the day of the week printed on it.
Failure to stick your carless day sticker on the windscreen would also result in being handed an infringement notice.
Draconian, I think the word is.
But the early to mid-70s were desperate times in the oil industry.
The word "crisis" was applied to anything pertaining to oil, diesel and petrol.
Things got so bad the Government also stepped in and banned petrol sales on weekends - that lasted through until the end of the winter of 1980.
That piece of legislation saw myself and other riders of modest-tanked motorcycles filling a 1.5 gallon can of petrol on the Friday night and strapping it to the back of the bike to get to the races and back at Manfeild on the Sunday.
While it all seems quite ridiculous now, back then the response was a typically Kiwi one of "oh well, if that's how it has to be ..."
But in reality, all the "no weekend sales" part of the fuel-saving strategy did was to turn probably one suburban garage in five into a potential bomb site as people bought and stored fuel during the week in readiness for the weekend.
I knew one bloke who had a 20-gallon drum of it stored in his shed ... sometimes you could smell it.
Much of this latest crisis, of course, is as the result of purpose-built explosives which are being unleashed in Libya - a major oil producer.
That and the foibles of the exchange rate, apparently.
Like the fuel crises of the past, like the great depression of the 30s and the economic downturn and sharemarket crash of the 80s ... and, of course, the global recession brought about by idiot financiers in the US two years ago ... we are at the mercy of the world.
With this surging rise in fuel prices there is nothing we can do.
No, wait a minute. How about we put the car away for one day of the week?
Now, there's an idea.