An insane and highly ironic commute

Now this is insane, $3 gas or no. And it's highly ironic to see an employee of the world's leading provider of Internet servers drive 186 miles to use a cubicle-bound computer that could just as easily be used in a home office if Mr. Givens has reliable, high speed Internet access, which he likely doesn't.

If you're howling about paying a lot more to fill up these days, thank your lucky nozzle you're not David Givens.

Every weekday, Givens drives 372 miles commuting from Mariposa to his job at Cisco in San Jose.

On Thursday, as prices in California skyrocketed 3 cents more, to a record average of $3.18 a gallon and Exxon Mobil reported a historic first-quarter profit of $8.4 billion, Givens talked with resignation of doling out $40 a day, $200 a week, $800 a month in gas money.

For his daily round-trip journey, Givens won the ``America's Longest Commute'' contest conducted by Midas Muffler, which received nearly 3,000 entries from New York to the Golden State as part of a 50th anniversary celebration. Considering the average one-way commute nationally is 25.5 minutes, you can call Givens a runaway winner.

Story in San Jose Mercury News