People waited in a line for Gasoline. Everyone should wait in a line for gasoline, that’s why its spelled gasoline.

Seriously.

Shell runs a special every Tuesday — .05 cents off each gallon of gasoline. ABC-2-News did a report on people lining up for gas. Literally. People just waited in long lines in their SUVs and cars and trucks (and I guarantee you they let their vehicles idle instead of turning them off). One woman even brought a book to read while she waited.

There are lots of things I thought when I saw this story. The first was, “Holy crap, how cheap do you have to be to wait in line for so long to save a measely five cents?” Second might’ve been, “Gosh, wanna bet how shitty the major roads were today with lines of cars overflowing the station parking lots because people can be so chintzy?”

My Celica has a capacity of thirteen gallons, if memory serves. That means that assuming I ran my car all the way to empty, I would save a grand total of … wait for it … sixty-five cents by utilizing the Shell station for my gas.

Don’t get me wrong … generally, I get my gas from Enroy up in Harford County because it’s cheaper than what’s in “downtown” Jacksonville (usually cheaper by ten cents or more), but if there’s a line stretching out from the Enroy, do you think I’d just casually wait more than a minute for a pump to open up? Eff no! Shit, I’d waste more gasoline waiting for a pump to open up than I’d spend paying an extra five cents a fuckin’ gallon at another station.

Of course, my driving habits aren’t the same as a lot of people — I drive 30k a year, roughly. I fill up my car every night, rarely letting the tank drop below a quarter empty. I suppose if I drove a tank that had a fifty-gallon tank and got seven miles to the gallon, I’d wait for that five cent savings too.

On the other hand, I’d probably sell the tank and buy a Toyota hybrid.

As I stepped on the scale, lo’ not five minutes ago, both of my fingers were crossed. As the digital display processed its holding pattern, I trembled. And as the numbers came up, I restrained from jumping in the air with a celebratory hoo-ray!

After gaining two pounds last week and rising from a weight of 223 pounds to 225, I have lost a total of FOUR pounds, which leaves me at a current weight of 221. Overall, it’s actually only a loss of two pounds since two weeks ago, but any loss is a good loss.

As of today, I have currently lost twenty-seven pounds since I began this diet in January. If you’re interested, this means my average weight loss is .22 pounds per day.

Go me!

Inspired by this post by Messy Hair Girl, about how fucked Maryland is.

Income: Varies by Month

Outcome: Varies by Month as regards BGE and gas useage

Rent: $709 p/month ($734 beginning in June)

Health Insurance: $107 p/ month

Comcast (Internet & television): $130

Property Tax: $0.00 (hooray!)

Gas: Estimated $70-$80+ per week, depending on prices at the pump*

Car & Rental Insurance: $132 p/ month

BGE: $40 p/month off-peak rising to $80-$100 p/month peak (this doesn’t include any forth-coming rate hike, which would bring my bill to $69 off-peak and up to $172 peak).

AT&T Home Phone: $40 p/month

Cingular Cellular Plan: $40 p/month

Savings: $217 p/ month

Debt Payments (to Parents): $700 p/month

Groceries: $200 p/month (supplimented with “donations” from work)

Water: $0.00 (paid for by landlord … I mean, paid for in my rent)

Car Maintenance: Est. $250 p/ month. Including oil changes, tune-ups, replacement light bulbs, brakes, tires (I go through a set of tires every year), and major repairs, about $2-3,000 per year.

I am fortunate in that I rarely have difficulty making income sufficient to cover these expenses. Of course, it’s a seasonal thing — February and March are tough, as are August and September.

I am currently fortunate in that, if I’m short on money, I can beg, cajol, threaten, and otherwise intimidate co-workers into giving me additional shifts to work. Thankfully, most of my coworkers are shiftless bastards who don’t like working anyway, so getting their hours is easy. :)

*Mileage compensation at work covers most of my gas expenses (working & otherwise).