Not Just a Financial Investment

I have calculated that this sentence will end... NOW.





CURRENT MUSIC:
Infected Mushroom - "Suliman"
Vicious Delicious

Yerps. Psychedelic trance music. Woo. All the fun of trance with the unique versatility most other electronic music can't provide. (That's what I think, anyway.)

While I could probably use this for background music in a movie - action sequences, street racing nighttime driving, training montages, to name a few - I honestly believe the sound of this piece feels right at home with space-based fighter combat. (The vid here proves its compatibility with Star Fox 64, but I've field-tested and confirmed "Suliman's" compatibility with the Gradius series. =D)


Rammstein - "Sonne"
Mutter

Probably my favorite Rammstein song out there. Despite the divisions amongst the online community (still) attempting to find out what the meaning is behind this song, I could care less - I'm too busy enjoying this song.

To people looking for some PvP background music, I'd recommend this song. Works even better if you're a stealthy kind of character who destroys the competition. =P


Yoko Shimomura - "Beware the Forest's Mushrooms"
Super Mario RPG Original Sound Version

As my generation of gamers got to experience the Super NES in its heyday, this piece should bring back memories of those good old days when we'd blitz our homework so we could play our beloved video games. Of those Super Nintendo games, a great portion of us would have to rate Super Mario RPG as one the best out there.

My reasoning stands by the music - Shimomura did a fantastic job with the soundtrack. It's just musical wonder from start to finish, but "Beware the Forest's Mushrooms" really takes the cake. It's probably the most well-known piece from the game.



"A moment of choice is a moment of truth. It's the testing point of our character and competence."
- Stephen Covey

True. With so many (bad) choices surrounding so many people it's quite interesting to see that some people haven't given in to lying about themselves.





You ever take the time to just go over your finances and notice that something's missing?
Mind you, I'm not talking about fraud or companies double-charging your card. I'm talking about overspending and being gluttonous with your spending habits.

For some ungodly reason, I ended up doing that while I was at work. I pulled out some scrap paper during lunch, whipped out a pen, and began crunching the numbers. After calculating all the necessary expenditures, bills, taxes and service fees* I ended up with a positive number that was much higher than I thought it would be.



That left me baffled enough to ask the rhetorical cliché "Where [the [expletive]] is all my money going!?" I'm quite concerned - according to the math I should have "X," but instead I'm pretty much clinging to life at "-Y."



I asked myself, "How are you going to get '-Y' to start looking a bit more like 'X,' you financial blunderhead?" I came up with a few theories, and I don't like any of them.

• Starve.
  Seems like one of the things I throw my spare money at would be food. Now, don't get me wrong - I'm a bit of a food connoisseur who'd prefer good food over everything else, but that's a costly route that I simply can't afford at this time (or rather, shouldn't afford). By cutting off a major amount of gluttonous spending and refocusing on cheaper food (possibly bought in bulk), I could save a lot of money. However, by doing so I risk jumping off the bandwagon very swiftly (too much bland food in my system = me bugging out for something BETTER) - and not to mention that cheap food equates to unnecessarily-high amounts of sodium and carbs - something I'd much rather not have due to "Operation: DREAM EATER."
  
• Cut off every source of monetary-based entertainment.
  By this, I mean stop buying all the ridiculously fun toys I get for myself (and sadly, I've got a lot). This would obviously start pulling me out of the red, but at the cost of me getting bored and slowly wigging out from monotony. I get bored easily, so I figured I'd counter it by surrounding myself with a plethora of fun things. It's worked so far, but... there's gotta be a line, right?
  
• Work more hours.
  So far this seems to be the one choice I'm leaning towards at the moment. I could try to grab more hours. However, what I'd gain in money I'd lose in free time and sanity - two things I just seem to lack lately in life. I'd end up financially stable, but I probably wouldn't be there in one piece at the end. I've done this before (that end road doesn't look pretty at all), and if I have to go down this road again, then... so be it.
  
• Do the "impossible" and find a healthy balance of the above three options.
  I say "impossible" because I think it is. I've never been one to balance my life around, and those who claim that they're able to have yet to realize how thin the tightrope they're treading on actually is. (I give them a year before they lose their stability and begin burning out.) However, if done correctly** this would be the best option. In theory, of course.
  

* = I didn't count food in this equation. I figured that if I wanted to eat at a good place (which I do a lot), it'd be out of the "remainder" part rather than "necessity."

** = Pretty hard to perform correctly, but I suppose anything's worth trying at least once. Right?



So, time to test my character and competence, I believe. I'll see you all later.