I logged in tonight to do a bit of ChaCha'ing and noticed that my earnings were a good bit higher than they had been this morning -- $10 higher!

I checked, and sure enough, I was one of the winners in the Sat. nite contest!!

So now I'm close to $70, with 17 days to go till the next monthly payout. I think I'll have a good bit more than just a $100 this time.

Just a quick note.

Last week at work was such a crazy chaotic week. The powers that be decided they needed to build two new offices within our company's area. Those two new offices of course are being built in the same area where another coworker and I had our desks.

So, other coworker and I had the pleasure of packing up our desks/computers etc and transferring them elsewhere. Coworker got put in the file room, and I got the pleasure of sharing the computer with the front desk receptionist. Fun.

If all has gone well this weekend, the furniture will be able to be moved back into the area by Tuesday morning, and we'll have our desks/computers back.

BTW - we're not getting the offices. There's enough room outside of them in that same area for our desks to fit. Less privacy than before (which wasn't much to speak of anyway.)

Such is life as a peon I guess.

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Up to almost $56 with ChaCha. I took a couple days off from it in order to get other things done. I'll be getting my next gym paycheck on Friday - it'll be for 11 1/2 hours *$5.55 (3 Friday's + a one-hour shift I covered). It'll be a nice start to October's Extra Monies.

I just checked my bank account balance, and saw that my first ChaCha payment has been deposited!

From Aug 26 - Sept 15 I made $101.01 in my spare time. Fun!

I also received my second check from the gym for $49.13. It would've been more, but I didn't have my timecard at the location where I worked the Friday before payday. It'll be on my next check.

So, from gym job (2 paychecks)
1st one: $67.14 and 2nd one: $49.13, then the $101.01 from ChaCha, I added

$217.28 to my Extra Monies fund for Septmeber. (Granted, some of the money was earned in August - but I don't count it as earned until I have it IN the bank.)

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I am SO glad AIG got bailed out. I have my 403b (from when I was teaching) with AIG Valic. That is 5 years worth of contributions. My Roth, 401k and TRD IRA, are all at different places, but combined are maybe 20% of the value (at least what it was two weeks ago) of my AIG 403b.

It makes me sick to look at the value of the 403b though. It is down over $1k from where it was when I made my last contribution June 05. To some, a 1k drop isn't much, but percentage wise for me, it's HUGE.

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I just realized I hadn't posted about my latest 5k!

This past Sunday I completed my 3rd 5k race. I finished with a 43:04 which didn't beat my previous time, but I was satisfied with it. I had to stop to tie my shoes once, the course was much hillier and there was a good gusty wind both ways (nearly blew my hat off a couple times!)

The really really cool thing though is that with my Dad being in CA now, my mom and stepdad have stepped up to be my cheering section at my races. Even better, my mom has said that she would like to participate!!

There is a 5k on Oct 26 which is closer for them to get to - and has a fun walk built into it. So, we're going to do that one together. Well, not totally together, since I'll be running and she'll be "speed" walking.

What is this it, you may be wondering?

Well this it is gasoline! With all the extra driving I did the past two weekends, my tank of gas just wasn't going to make thru to my usual Friday fill up.

I was starting to get a bit worried because prices were going up and up.

My gas light was on most of the way to work this morning, and then all the way home till I got to the gas station with the $3.39/gallon gas.

I bought 9.117 gallons of gas, and my Odometer was at 105,505, or 319 miles since my last fill up.

So . . my mpg was approximately 34. Not bad at all, especially considering I had my AC on some of that time.

Oh, just for comparisons sake. Another gas station near my apartment had gas for $3.59/gallon.

A friend asked me to fill out a reference for her. I wasn't able to think of a good reason to say no right then, so now am in a bit of a bind as to the best way to fill it out.

I've never said one word to her about what I think of her skills in this area, mainly because I didn't think it was my place or my business. Now I guess I'm going to have to put it out there.

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Sat night I went to the Beach Boy's concert with my mom. We had a BLAST! The crowd had an amazing amount of energy. We got them to come back out and do 3 encores! The venue for the concert was a bit strange - in the same hall where the Dallas Symphony Orchestra plays (they actually accompanied the Beach Boy's). I wasn't accustomed to seeing so many Hawaiian shirts at a DSO concert.

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I'm almost up to $70 with ChaCha. My goal is to reach $100 by the 14th, so I can get paid on the 15th. I think I'll be able to do it, even though it won't be a full month.

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I have another 5k coming up this Sunday. My mom and stepdad will be coming to cheer me on.

I've found at least one race in Oct Nov and Dec that is on a Sunday - so that works well for me.

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I've decided to drop my membership to the Outdoors club. There just wasn't enough things I was interested or able to do to make the monthly fee worthwhile.

Between my meetup groups and my races, I'm really keeping myself pretty busy anyway.

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I got an email from my dad tonight. He was saying that he is near the Texas/NM border and will be crossing into NM in the morning. Getting closer to CA!

He must be quite the sight to see. A huge Penske truck, then a car trailer w/his vehicle on it, then his little trailer. The little trailer my family purchased back in the early 1980's (around the time my brother was born!) It's gone many many miles through numerous states.

Today I got a call from E at the gym asking if I could work the 5:30 to close shift. I was only planning on watching a movie tonight, so I said sure, why not.

While I was at the gym in the afternoon, I found out that we get paid on the first business day of each month, and the 15th of each month. So that means I have a paycheck waiting for me at the other gym location. I'll pick it up on Friday, which is fine, since I won't be able to get by a bank until then anyway.

Then tonight I got another call from E asking if I'd be willing to come in *early* tomorrow and open. The person who was supposed to do it is sick. I of course said YES.

I think I'm going to REALLY like my next paycheck.

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When I checked my email tonight I saw that I'd received another ING referral bonus. YAY!

Of course, I'm still waiting for two of the last three bonuses to go to my available balance column. I think they still earn interest though, which really is all that matters.

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I'm now up to nearly $28 in ChaCha earnings. I think I've become slightly addicted to the sound of a doorbell.

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A new company has moved into our office building. They are taking up at least two complete floors.

This morning I arrived at around 7:15 a.m. and found that the ENTIRE row where I normally park was completely full!! Normally when I get there at that time, there *might* be one or two cars in that section.

So it looks like I'll be parking up on the next level from now on. That's okay though, because that is the same level that the gym is on.

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I forgot to mention yesterday . .

On Sunday my dad and I found mini-blinds at Walmart for about $8. It took us all of about 3 minutes to remove the old ones and install the new ones.

That saved me at least $27.

While we were at Walmart, we also had them fill my tires with air and move the hubcap on my one tire so we could get to the airstem. They did it for no charge.

My sidebar is updated I added a page for September to track my savings and extra monies. I am not including my income from Cha Cha or the gym until I actually receive payments.
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This morning I ran my second 5k race. Going into it I wasn't expecting great things because I felt like I hadn't been training like I needed to.

Well! Guess what? I BEAT MY TIME! Woo Hoo!

This particular race didn't use the timing chips, so I'm not sure of what my *exact* time was - - but as I passed the finish line the clock read 43:00!! I started near the middle of the crowd, so I probably could subtract a few seconds. Even so, that is an improvement of at least 37 seconds!

One kind of downer though. Most of the second half of the race there was this older lady who I kept trading places with - she'd run ahead of me a bit while I was walking, then I'd run ahead of her a bit while she was walking, etc. We both reached the 3 mile marker at the same time and agreed to run it the rest of the way together.

I wasn't able to run it the whole way because the first part of it was over dirt with lots of tree roots. I figured rubbery legs + tree roots = possible injury. Once I got to the section which was just dirt, I ran again. The older lady ran the whole way.

She made it across the finish line about 15 seconds before I did. I'd finished and drunk a couple cups of water (and my dad had finished the end of the race video) when we noticed someone laying on the ground being fanned. A few minutes later, paramedics came and put her on a stretcher.

It was that same lady I had ran to the finish line with. The ambulance stayed at the lake, so she probably was okay. Just kind of a bummer to see someone you sort of ran with go down like that.

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In other news, I've now made nearly $16 with ChaCha now. It really is kind of fun and easy.

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Saturday night I took my mom and stepdad to a local baseball team's game. I'd gotten the tickets for free from my company. The tickets included free food and parking. We all ate way too much - but had a great time.

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Today was probably the last time I'll see my dad until at least Christmas. A week from tomorrow he will be heading out to CA next Tuesday. So now it's just my mom and I left here in Texas.