Operation Broke As S#%@
For those of you who don’t know the guy, take a moment to hop over to Twitter and take a look at @fejimanz’s twitterfeed. Ok, now run on over to the listing of his articles at twowordheap.com(actually, cruise around the site a bit. Pretty cool place). Mostly, note his May 1st posting, “Operation Broke As Shit: The Prologue”. When the link to this posting popped up in Twitterfox earlier today, I was of course intregued. How could I not be? I went on over and read up what he had to say, and I was stunned as I totally related to what he was saying. In short, the idea that at the end of the month, for all intents and purposes, I’m broke, and have no idea why.
What Grant went on to say from there really struck me- for 30 days, he’s not going to spend a single red cent.
I know what you’re thinking- How will he pay for gas? Rent/mortgage? Delicious foods that fuel his mind and body? Of course, that’s not what he meant. One of his major points was to prove that in the 3 days a week that he’s going to make himself be active, out, and having fun with his lady, fun can be had without spending even a dime.
Think about your last trip to the store, real or virtual. I’ll recount a recent trip I made to Wal-mart. My wife works at 5 in the morning, resulting in her getting up at 3:30 AM, and by Friday evening, the last thing she wants to do is run to Walmart. I headed in for 2 things: milk for the kiddo(Lactaid, she’s mildly lactose intolerant), and bread. $40 later, I got back home and went WHOA. My $15 trip almost tripled because I saw thinks like MLB 07 on sale for $10- a bargain!- and wax for my car- who doesn’t want their car to shine?- among other things.
This is a great place to point out another idea Grant had- one of his best ideas and analogies is comparing this to AA, or Alcoholics Anonymous. Spending may as well be an addiction. That said, he will have a sponsor during this journey. It’ll work just like AA’s sponsorship system. When he has a desire to spend money, he can call his sponsor who’ll either take his mind off of it, or more desirably, will take him out for a cup of coffee/McDouble to take his mind off of it on the sponsor’s dime(Exception 4 says this is OK). In this case, a sponsor probably would’ve saved me 25 smackaroos.
I sat down with Quicken to do a budget the other day, and it says at the end of a given month, we should have a $700~ excess. Excuse me for a moment while I pee my pants laughing-
HAHAHAHAHHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
*wheeze*
HAHAHAHahahahaa..heh… WHOOhahahaha.
Pants changed.
OK. $700 is ridiculous. Still yet, the dough is going somewhere. I mentioned to Grant in a comment that I’d be following along with him, doing this 30 day mission myself. A few Twitter DMs later, and this has become a competition between him and myself.
At the end of 30 days, we’ll each total up any money we’ve wasted on random stuff(“A yo-yo ball? For $5? SIGN ME UP!”) and divide it into our respective incomes to see who blew the lowest percentage of their money. My wife asked what the winner gets; I told her, “A positive bank balance, and the pride of knowing you did it,” in my best Hank Hill voice.
And now- I challenge you. Does the story Grant painted sound like you too? Then take the plunge with us! As the days and weeks go by, we’ll each be updating the situation on our respective sites, Twitter accounts, 12 Seconds pages, YouTube accounts, wherever we can keep you up to date. Interested in joining up- drop me a line here, send me a a message on Twitter, email me, or do any of the preceding to fejimanz. The more the merrier, IMO.
And with all that said, I leave you with a video of something you might be tempted to waste your money on:
Enjoy your [time of day] and do this with us!(Vince Shlomi/Offer RULES)
