Toros’am Pm Mini Market

I’ve been driving 9 hours. Maybe I don’t look like much. Maybe that’s why the snotty attendance clerk doesn’t say hello, but looks over my head insolently when I greet him; in the background, his snarling chola coworker glowers directly into my eyes as if I’d freshly awakened some past-​life vendetta between us, in which we are reincarnated time and time again according to an ancient Egyptian curse, always battling to the death. I provide my card to pay for ~$ 10 worth of items, and the man snaps with great annoyance (I assure you, I’m not being hypersensitive), «No credit,» then cracks his gum loudly as if to emphasize this. I look around the register, the walls, the doors — it isn’t posted anywhere, yet his tone suggests that I ought to have known. So, fortunately, I have sufficient cash & pay for the items.
Then I ask in a clear, audible manner, «Is there a key to the bathroom?»
In response, the cashier doesn’t look in my direction, waves me aside, waves the man behind me up to the counter. He seems to be markedly more polite to this older man, so I begin to take his behavior a bit personally.
«Is there a key to the bathroom?»
He raises his eyebrows and says in a catty, strangely queeny way, «Yes,» but offers no key, no gesture to indicate where this key might be placed. So I look around and come up emptyhanded. «Do you have it?»
«No,» he replies flatly, again without making eye contact.
Throughout this entire exchange, the surly wannabe chola is mad dogging me, wishing she was this pretty. I notice that her eyebrows are painted on unevenly and maybe that is making her face look angrier than it is. No, no, no… she definitely loathes me for some unfathomable reason. But her lingering hateful leer is interrupted momentarily by a little homeless man who totters in to hand her the bathroom key, thereby abrogating my next question — just in time, too, before I earned the semi-​cruel alliterative nickname Inquisitive Ignatius.
«Is that the bathroom key?» I ask, as she’s inexplicably putting the key away under the counter, although she has been privy to the entire conversation revolving around my desire to acquire the key. Her only response, oddly enough, is to raise one uneven eyebrow and stare daggers out of her swollen pock-​marked face. I’m driven to hate this woman, obstinately wedging herself between me and civilized facilities, and I now know what primal conflict feels like, as if I were Hemmingway wrestling a grizzly bear. «May I have it?!» I asked, with far too much restraint. But it would have been pathetic to display the extent of my annoyance without the energy to carry out the destructive, fire-​setting brawl I felt the situation warranted. I had another 6 hours of driving ahead of me, and no Pasadena Jerry Springer cat fight ought to stand between me and San Francisco.
In the filthy, leaking bathroom there was no soap, which tells me that these employees were slovenly swine as well, who didn’t care to wash their money-​grubbed hands.
I hope their failure as evolved humans keeps them up at night. But they’ll probably already be up all night as a consequence of their shared meth habit.

Ok, I know what all of you are thinking, «Why is this guy reviewing a gas station?». Well in all honestly, the answer is, because I want to and because I can, lol.
Nothing truly spectacular about this Arco, it is your average run of the mill gas station with its attached AM PM convenience store. The store has store has the normal chips, soda, and pastries. It also has the well known AM PM brand of products such as the nachos, hamburgers and corn dogs. They don’t accept credit transaction, only debit transactions but they do have a Chase ATM machine, so score for you Chase customers our there.
So far into the review, still pretty average, right? Well here is the kicker, this particular Arco consistently has the cheapest gasoline price that I have found in the Pasadena area. I have not found another gas station that has lower prices in per gallon of gasoline.
So there you have it! During these uncertain times of financial hardship and economic struggles, if you ever find yourself needing to scrimp in every aspect possible, this should be your gas station of choice. You’re Welcome! Now aren’t you glad you read through the entire review? Lol.
Side Note: Gf is a gasoline snob and proclaims that Arco gas is like putting sand in your tank. My response is, well this «sand» still makes my car «go» and that is all that counts. But just to be fair, I did switch over to utilizing Chevron gasoline and I can definitely feel the difference. But that’s another boring review of another gas station.

So I have stopped here a few times when its on my way to drop off my daughter at school. However its always got a cash machine or two down. Maybe its just me, but this is what I despise about Arco… having to hunt down the open island or being forced to go talk to some disinterested clerk who can not speak passable english most of the time. At least I havent had to go inside at this location, but I am not like wowed or anything by this place. In fact I am fairly under whelmed. But they have gas at the right price when I need an extra gallon here or there…

Why here? Because after you’ve been driving for nearly three hours and you’ve entered Southern California, it’s nice to find a bathroom and convenience store right off the freeway. Believe me, this place was nothing all that special, but when it was 2:30 am, and I knew I had to drive a lot more, this place offered a welcomed bathroom and a diet Rockstar so I knew I could keep on going.
Thanks. After this stop I was good until I reached Gorman.