I’d better label this the March Paycheck Challenge. I can see myself doing this several times this year until I get it right.

That last statement makes it sounds like I’m not doing so well, does it? I’m actually doing ok. I have $255.39 less the $17.00 or so I spent on take out Friday (with enough leftovers for lunch on Saturday) and $10.00 I spent on dinner last night.

My planned expenses till I get paid again on the 31st:
1 tank of gas, $25.00-30.00 (It’s gotten shamefully expensive this week!)
Meals out, no more than $15 a day for 5 days = $75.00
2 Concert tickets in NYC = $46.80

I actually had to charge it because they didn’t take my Visa check card online, (Remember those Visa Extras I’m getting?) but I will be putting out a payment to the card company for that amount, just to be disciplined. That total still brings me well under the remaining $255.39.

I got invited to an Indian Dance aerobics class in Maryland about two weeks ago. I got in for free because my friend is thinking of coordinating a class in Virgina with this instructor. It was very fun, Bollywood/hip-hop dance moves. I am kind of interested in doing it again. But here’s the rub. It’s $15 a session for about 90 minutes.

I hate working out. I hate, hate, hate it. I had mandatory athletics in junior high and high school. While it was a fun and good experience in many ways, I hate wheezing from wind sprints in 40 degree weather for field hockey and lacrosse. Hence my desire to get fat eating Cheetos while typing at work. Oh the other thing is that I’ve been blessed with good genes and quick, but slowing metabolism. I don’t *have* to workout to stay thin, I just moderate what I eat.

Now for a $10-20 cover on a Friday or Saturday night, I can dance for 6 HOURS instead of an hour and a half. I know I’ll be all stinky from the cigarette smoke, but I was going to shower anyway. It’s a much more social experience going out dancing. If you’re out there throwing it down non-stop, it’s a great workout, but I admit, it doesn’t work the abs like the Indian dancing class did.

So I can’t tell if I want to spend $15 a class for 6 weeks. That’s $90. What’s a girl to do? Get fat and be frugal? Get fit and be $90 poorer? Go dancing out a lot, but potentially spend even more than $90? It’s a tough call.

I don’t have a TV, so normally I wouldn’t watch. But through PFBloggers like Boston Gal, Jane Dough, they keep me alert to TV trends I’d normally miss. I can watch clips for free online. Watch some of these clips. They’re grotesque. It’s like a car accident on the side of the road. You can’t help but look. I try not to judgemental because debt happens to everyone, and yet…

These people are pretty crazy. They’re liars. They’re cheats and gluttons. (350 pairs of jeans?! Are you freakin’ kidding me?) It’s frightening. I’m amazed that they aren’t deathly afraid of the poorhouse. They just keep on digging their debt hole deeper. That hole is their grave! They all seem to live in the suburbs. Haven’t they seen an unwashed homeless person recently? Do they really want to lose the roof over their heads just to keep a freakin’ piano in the house and an SUV in the driveway? The beggars on my commute remind me that I am only one or two financial disasters away from being homeless on the street.

Oprah talks about the relationship between money and emotions, one of my favorite topics. Jean Chatzky mentions that it’s desire that makes us keep up with the Joneses. Now I’m not Buddhist, but there is something to the foundation of that religion. Buddhism says that strife comes from desire, therefore you should desire less. I strive to desire less always. Be humble in your desires and needs. I really believe in the Shaker melody, ‘Simple Gifts’. (Aaron Copeland lovingly uses it in his classic master work, Appalachian Spring. Scroll down for #7, “Appalachian Spring: Doppio movimento”. Bernstein = genius!)

    When true simplicity is gain’d,
    To bow and to bend we shan’t be asham’d.

I know I did a very bad thing by buying my lovely Lilly Pulitzer skirt last month. It was feeding a coveting feeling I’d had for years for her work. But I know that I never have to buy another Lilly again. Part of curbing desire is subjugating it. Control it, don’t let it control you.

It’s all about mind and money. The biggest thing to getting out of debt is spending less. I make enough, but I spend it. I have only my mortgage and my credit card as debts now, but I know my credit card spending always seems to creep back up. It’s the biggest struggle I have in my finances. To live more simply is possible. In this upcoming week, I’m going to try and find some websites about living simply and share them with you.

[The best free vocal recording I could find was here. Scroll down for it. It’s quite good. All the rest of the recording clips I could find on the lousy interweb were plodding renditions and not uplifting as it should be.]

The best piece of advice is to become a lightweight. (Tip #1) Seriously. Then all you need to do is nurse a single beer all night. That was me in college. The me you saw on Thursday night was a totally different story, but I digress.

A friend of mine taught me at a young age to tip the first drink really generously so you’ll get good service the rest of the night. I can’t say that advice has worked for me. Usually it’s by being a regular patron and being recognized by the bartender. I’m a bit mousy so it’s not me the bartender knows. Go out with your barfly friends to their regular hangouts on their regular nights. (Tip #2) That’s another way to keep the bar tab cheap.

I don’t mind buying a round of drinks. I have been known to splurge and pick up five or six beers for my friends. Paradoxically, I am frugal so that I can be generous when I feel like it. We like going to places that serve more than Miller and Bud. We have a preference for dark stouts and ambers. (I love Guinness, but let me recommend a local brew, Old Dominion Oak Barrel Stout, a very admirable beer.) Sometimes it’s the wallop a beer packs that makes the difference. (Tip #3) I like Guinness a lot, but I can have just one or two for the night and be perfectly happy.

In my firm insistence of being self-sufficient, sometimes I carry cash and just pay out of pocket for each beer I get. (Tip #4) No one’s drinking on my tab and I keep myself to my limit. It’s a pretty good strategy if you want to make sure you’re not drinking or spending too much.

Oh, and the killer app on your cell phone isn’t that you can call people wirelessly. It’s that most models have a calculator. So don’t fall back on the excuse of being drunk made you tip generously. Be fair, in a town like DC, please tip 17-20% since the cost of living is high. But if you’re too tipsy to figure it out properly, break out the calculator on your phone.(Tip #5)

I hope I’ve busted the myth that people who are interested in frugality and personal finance blogging aren’t out to have fun. Let’s get real here, I love going out as much as the next person, maybe more, but it doesn’t have to break the bank to have a good time.

I hacked off about 12″ of hair tonight. I put it up in a ponytail, not high, but not too low. I bound it with two good hair elastics, and three clear poly bands. (They’re like rubberbands, but better for your hair, and cheap.) I was only going to cut off the 10″ required for a donation at Locks of Love, but then I thought of the kids who need the wigs and my scissors kept moving higher.

So I have about a foot-long ponytail to send them. I hope they don’t mind the yucky split ends and the dry condition it’s in. I would have cut my hair ages ago, but I was aiming for the free haircut.

Now I can rest easy and I don’t have to spend so much money on hair care products. You literally watch it go down the drain. Someone at worked who is bald was surprised that I washed my hair everyday, but some people have to wash their hair everyday. I realize some folks have dry hair and scalps and washing constantly is not a good idea, but we each have a regimen to follow that helps us look our best.

Jonathan wrote about how much Aveda costs compared to Pert. I have tried the cheapest of drugstore shampoos, and you do get what you pay for sometimes. Quality over quantity is sometimes important, and honestly, the unit cost of a squirt of shampoo or conditioner starts going through the roof when you have to use twice as much get your hair the same amount of clean or conditioned.

I finally got around to opening a 180-day CD at Millennium Bank. I had to wait for money to electronically transfer around, but today was the day. I have moved the Save-O-Meter to 50%, though technically I’m about 7 dollars short. NCN Network has the more accurate figure at 49.83%.

Prime Rate, From the Chicago Fed’s handy online glossary

The interest rate charged by leading banks to their best, most secure customers. The rate is determined by the market forces affecting a banks’ cost of funds and the rates that borrower will accept.

While I was at the bank I saw the rate card for HELOC’s. It’s much better than the rate I am getting from my original loan. I am considering applying for it on Monday or Tuesday next week. They have Prime - 1.0%. I believe I’m paying Prime + ~1.2%. For all the hassle, I think it will be worth it. I don’t need more credit, I just want to retire the old loan to get a better rate. I am wondering if there is any penalty if I do that. Even if there is, I believe that the monthly savings in interest will be worth the change for the duration of the loan.

While shopping around for rates on Bankrate.com, I noticed that a small player like Millennium doesn’t show up on their regional rate surveys for either the 6 month CD or the HELOC. There are Prime - X% rates out there, but few places are offering a full percentage point less than Prime Rate.

There are two that I just love.

Not Martha and LJC FYI. I actually found LJC through Not Martha a few years ago.

Check out their wonderful project pages. Easy step by step instructions. I admit, they are very girly projects for the most part, but creative and cute. There are many gift and baking ideas. One of my favorites is the Shrinky Dink Wine Charms. If you’re any good at drawing, you can make them look like your friends!

Udandi has many wonderful craft ideas as well as being a PFBlogger. Check her out!

I’ve lived in the DC area for the past few years and spent four years in college in Maryland. I know the drive on I-95 between DC and Philly pretty well. I’ve stopped at most of the rest areas at least once. In my ongoing quest for the cheapest gas, I’ve learned a few more things I wanted to pass along.

1) Don’t be a gas snob. Exit 100 in a town called North East, MD, has a Flying J truck stop. It’s a little bit off the beaten path but it usually has gas for a good price. It’s not a Shell, Exxon or BP, but gas is gas. Buy it where it’s cheap. If I’m running low before I hit the DE border, this is usually the place with the best price.

2) Know what the gas taxes are like. Generally speaking, people think MD has high taxes on stuff, and the same is true for gas. Unless I am going to a cheap section of Baltimore, I rarely find gas cheaper in Charm City than in DC. Delaware, being an income-tax free state has low consumption taxes on everything, including gasoline. Therefore, I usually stop there for gas. Now here’s the fun part…

Last Saturday I left with a half tank. For some reason, my mileage took a plummet recently and I knew I’d have to tank up somewhere along the way. There is one rest stop in the middle of I-95 in Delaware. As you head north, it’s on the left side. (Actually, it’s also on the left when you head south too.) There are TWO stations at this rest stop, one at the south end and one at the north end. For some reason, these two stations are always priced differently. Due to this price differential, I always play gas arbitrage. The trick for me is to leave DC with as little gas as possible as required for my trip.

When I got to DE, I saw the south end Exxon station $2.39 and was really happy. When I left, my local stations had it for no less than $2.42, most places in DC had it for more than $2.55! I filled up. What a great price! Well, what killed me was driving past the second station on the north end and seeing that it was $2.35. Grrr. I could have saved about 48 cents more if I saw the other station’s price. I made a mental note to stop at the north end station on the way back down. So when I returned south on Sunday, I topped off and got a quarter tank of gas at the north end station for $2.37. When I arrived home, gas was still around$ 2.43, so I made out well and saved around a 70 cents overall.

I must not be the only driver that knows this because that station almost always has a line of cars waiting there.

My insurance company allows me to split my payments into monthly installments, or do it as one lump sum. I’m finding that if I do the one lump sum, I’m better off. Here’s a good post as to why you want don’t want to do this, especially by direct debiting (same source).

My insurance is coming due next month. I don’t know about yours, but some insurance companies reward loyalty by knocking down your premium when it renews. I’ll be looking for that this time around since I’ve been with this company for 2+ years now. If your company isn’t doing that for you, considering calling around and making a switch.

I found out that as a single female over 25, I’m already paying the lowest possible rate. The only way to make it cheaper is to drive less miles, take less coverage or have a baby. Needless to say, #1 and #3 are a little tough to do without some serious life changes.

Lately there has been news of class action lawsuits because auto insurers consider your income and education when setting your rate. Some people say that those are actually codewords for race. I beg to differ. What’s the point of doing actuarial analysis if you don’t differentiate your pools of insurable clients? I assume that income and educational accomplishments matter. I bet there are spaced-out PhDs who are crappy drivers and the rates are adjusted accordingly.

If we all get lumped into the same pool, therefore it will not matter that I worked my butt off to finish college and that potentially as a group, college graduates have less accidents. I should find an insurer that DOES care about that and cuts a break for alumni. For what it’s worth, my current insurer doesn’t give a break to alumni from my college, but they do for other groups. (Car insurance tip #1: Ask your insurer if they give discounts for affinity/special interest groups like Kiwanis or college alumni. Many do.)

If I am in a class of drivers that does not benefit from the differentiation what does it matter that these questions are asked? What about credit scores? Did you know that car insurers pull your credit score? Because people who have good credit scores have less accidents. (Yet another reason to raise your score!)

There’s a few people I’d tag to respond, because they like to play blog-tag, but I’ll wait to see who’s mouthy enough to leave a comment.

I see since the last Festival of Frugality, more people have subscribed to my feed. I guess that means I have more readers in general, or else a lot of people wanted to know how to sew a coat button. I hope you found the advice useful!

There’s just a few rules about posting comments. That was written a bit testily a few weeks ago, but I wanted to repost it because I’ve had a few anonymous commenters lately and now it looks like Anonymous is arguing with himself. In the spirit of open debate, please try to leave some sort of moniker, even if it’s 24601. (Try putting that on your name badge at a hacker convention. It really freaks them l337 g33k b0yz out when they don’t know what every number in the universe is. Virtual biscuit to the first commenter to guess the reference.)