Looking for the cheapest gas in town?

If you live in or near Kingston, check out the gas war being waged between the Stewart's Shop at Albany and Foxhall avenues and the new QuickChek a few blocks up Albany Avenue at the corner of Harding Avenue.

QuickChek - which is staging a veritable assault on the region with new or about-to-open locations in Kingston, Lake Katrine, the town of Ulster and Saugerties - was down to an astonishingly low $1.83 last night, forcing the neighboring Stewart's to compete at $1.84. That allowed me to put 12 gallons of gas in my car (at Stewart's, because I happened on that store first) for about $22. A mere five months ago, when gas was selling for about $4.20 a gallon, that same 12-gallon buy cost me just over $50.

There are financial experts who will argue that a rapid decline in prices is bad for the economy. But I've got news for them: The economy was bad before this rapid decline in gas prices, and, that being the case, we consumers will take any relief we can get.