Lassoing Some Savings

Key Words: Quasi-Oprah, Yasso, Squeezing of Furniture
Word Count: 607
Likely Next Topic: Travel Plans

Today was sprints on Lamar High's nice, 400m track. "Headband Man", the Fall sprint coach, is now advocating that we do Yasso sprints; the theory goes like this - take your marathon goal time in hours and minutes (e.g., 4:30), and do the sprints of a 10x800mx400m in that amount of minutes and seconds. So if I can do 10 repeats of 800m, with each at or under 4:30, then I should be able to do a marathon in quasi-Oprah time (about 4:30)! Runner's World had a Yasso article this month, and they said it isn't based on physiology, it's just a tough workout with some mathematical appeal.

So off I went, doing our 4x800mx400m Yassos, hoping for each to be around 4:15. As seems to happen when I run with Anna, I ran the first a bit fast, 3:56. I then forced some time off, and ran the next three in 4:20, 4:16, and 4:13. I think doing the Yasso will be a challenge in this heat, but I'm going to go for it; gotta build from four repeats to ten! The weather looks to be building up for rain on Thursday, but I hope to belt out a five or so mile tempo run if possible.

On to moolah, cheese, cash, green backs. As I stated before, my rent is going up $62.50 a month. Since this is a static or non-varying cost, it becomes a fun exercise to try and eliminate an equal amount of other static, non-varying costs. My philosophy is that I'll do this if I can do it without changing my quality of life; unless I'm saving up for a house or something big like that, I'm not switching from Shiner to Schlitz ... it ain't gonna happen. Jon pointed out that I could probably save this amount by taking lunch to work, and he's probably right. However, that requires pro activeness, and I know I'll fall off the wagon; better to make it something where I don't have to think. Thus far, I've eliminated my unused NetFlix subscription, $10, switched to Verizon, $8, and Comcast is indeed Comcastic, as my bill went down by $2. $20 bucks a month, a nice $240 a year, with no pain; Verizon is actually better than Cingular, life is better! The big enchilada of money savings is my storage unit; I pay $32.50 a month to store a couch, a dresser, and my kick ass fake ficus tree. So I went to the storage unit Monday, measured everything, and think I've found places in the apt. to shoehorn all my stuff. It will be a tight squeeze, but for $32.50 a month, I'll squeeze. So if I can get the moving van from the storage place on Saturday, I'll follow my 15 mile run with an hour or so of manual labor (and why do I wonder how I hurt myself).

This "squeezing of furniture" will get me close to my goal; a switch to DSL, which I may not have the heart to do, is the last step in saving the $62.50 a month. Regardless of that switch, I'm going to have to either toss or give away a Wal-Mart bookcase and trendy but somewhat broken desk to make room for the new stuff. If some wants this, let me know. Better yet, if some wants to pay me $10 a month to rent it, so I don't have to switch to DSL, let me know ASAP :)