the up & down price happens frequently around here as well. I've seen one station go up $.20. If the other stations follow suit, they'll all go up $.20 as well. If none of the other stations raise their price to match, by the end of the day the one station that did will lower their price back down.

This is pretty normal everywhere I've been. All of the stations around here will all be exactly the same price, except for a couple of name brands like Shell, and Chevron might be 3-5 cents higher.