I started this morning with a trip to the Toyota dealer — both Priuses needed regular service (oil change) as well as the “60C Special Service Campaign” (aka the steering-shaft recall). I’d called yesterday to make appointments, and the service writer I talked with said to bring in one car this morning and they’d do the oil change and handle the recall; then I could swap cars in the afternoon and they’d do the other one the next day (in the meantime, I’d have one of their cars).

But I had an inspiration — if I was quick, maybe they could do both cars in one day. So I dashed out of the house bright and early and got to the dealer well before 8. I got a different guy as the service writer, and when I told him what I wanted to do, he asked me, “why do you think we can do the recall today?” Apparently there are two different shafts for the Prius, and some cars need one and some need the other, and they didn’t have both in stock.

In fact, they didn’t have any shafts on hand, so it didn’t matter which one I needed. But they did check to see which one, and they claim they’ll order it and notify me when it arrives.

But I still had to get the oil changed, so I waited while they did that — then I went home and repeated the drill with the other car. Fortunately, they have wi-fi, so I was able to work while I waited, but I’d really rather have been able to finish the process instead of having to wait for the shaft.

For years, I’ve kept track of the mileage I get at every fill-up, with the thought that if it changes significantly, it might mean problems with the car. But I’ve never bothered to look at the mileage closely, until today.

I was curious about the mileage I got on the trip to Tucson, and whether it was significantly different than the mileage I get in normal driving. So I brought in my logbook and started entering data; when I finished, I’d discovered that my cumulative average mileage had been very close to 45mpg since my second fill-up, even though the individual fill-ups gave me very irregular results (especially the one where the automatic shutoff on the pump didn’t work and I pumped 11 gallons, some of which went outside the car instead of in the tank!).

The average mileage for the Tucson trip, 45.9 mpg, was slightly higher than my long-term average of 45.0 mpg, but not by a lot. On the other hand, my average speed on the Tucson trip was undoubtedly significantly higher than my normal speed — most of the distance was on roads with 70 or 75 mph limits, and we spent a lot of time at or above 80 mph (just keeping up with traffic, of course). Around here, the limit is 65, and traffic usually moves about 70.

Diane’s car gets somewhat lower mileage (currently 44.3 mpg long-term), but it’s going up with almost every fill-up.

Naturally, neither of these numbers comes close to the EPA figure of 60 city, 51 highway, 55 combined, but they are much better than the 20mpg or so I was getting from the Saab most of the time!