The Wheels on the Bus Go Round and Round

I'm back to being a bus commuter. The trip now is about 2-3 times longer than at my old job, but it is relaxing. The end result is more time traveling with the benefit now of having a fairly solid I-can't-work-any-later-than-this time.

With the extra time comes a need for something to do. I have a few podcasts I listen to, but they only run about an hour each. The podcasts only last for a single one way trip and I have only enough to last about half the week. I have 5 hours or so of time to fill up. Reading is a possibility, but reading on a moving vehicle can result in a sick feeling I would like to avoid.

So what I would like from my readers our there are some podcast or audiobook options. I am pondering getting an Audible subscription again, so anything off of Audible.com would be an option.

Crunching the Numbers: Bus vs Car

(Note: Apparently Blogger hates tables for some reason. I'll be back later to clean up the formatting. Damn that looks uuuuuuugly.)

Transportation. That's what I am thinking of. Would it be best for me to bus to work or drive to work? At my old job it was an easy decision with a free bus pass. Bus all the way. With my current job, it gets trickier. For one, there are two possible destinations: West & V.

Method

I am going to compare the two based on cost and total travel time. For the car, it will be simplified to gas cost. Even if I took the bus, I would still have to keep the car so the maintenance numbers would be roughly the same in both situations.

Assumptions

• Gas costs 3.899/Gallon


• Car mileage is 25 mpg


• West distance is 9.5 miles


• V distance is 18.1 miles


• For the 31 day period, there are 23 working days

The Numbers

West	Car Cost	Bus Cost	Cost Diff	Car Time	Bus Time	Time Diff
Day	$ 2.96	N/A	N/A	60 min	81 min	21 min
Month	$ 68.15	$ 47.00	$ 21.15	23 h	31.05 h	8.05 h
Year	$ 817.85	$ 564.00	$ 253.85	276 h	372.6 h	96.6 h

While the bus would take longer, I would save $21.15 a month at the cost of about 8 hours a month. Each hour I give up I save about $2.63.

The V location is a little different story. The 8.6 mile difference has a large impact on the car cost.

V	Car Cost	Bus Cost	Cost Diff	Car Time	Bus Time	Time Diff
Day	$ 5.65	N/A	N/A	80 min	128 min	41 min
Month	$ 129.85	$ 47.00	$ 82.85	30 2/3 h	49 h	18.4 h
Year	$ 1558.23	$ 564.00	$ 994.23	368 h	558.8 h	220.8 h

In this scenario, we see a lot more savings. I would save $82.85 a month at the cost of about 18.4 hours a month. Each hour I give up I save about $4.50.

Conclusion

The bus does cost less, but at the cost of more time. I could probably do more things to save the $2.62 per hour exchanged. The V location makes it a bit sweeter of a deal on the bus vs. car. Overall, I might start checking out the bus if gas costs get higher. This is only estimated at the current gas rates. If they go higher, the bus gets sweeter and sweeter. If the evilness of $5 per gallon comes near the end of the summer like some predict, the picture changes drastically. Under $5 a gallon gas, I save $40.40 a month (almost covering the cost of the 31 day bus pass) to West at $5.02 per extra travel hour and a whopping $119.52 a month going to V at $6.50 per extra travel hour. If I were to work at V (which I will be at some point in the distance future), it would cost me $7.24 a day just to get to work. Not a pretty picture.

So the bus will probably be coming into the picture soon. It would be good to get into the habit now when I am at West as the savings at V will be nice.

It would be even better if I could bike to West. Though that would just be a good weather thing and I would need to get my lazy ass in shape. I'll save that for another musing later.

Ulric Remakes There Will Be Blood

The dogs got a special treat today, a trip to doggy daycare! The wife was going to be gone all day and I was at work, so it's an nice treat for them to be able to play with other mutts all day long.

Ulric had a good time. Maybe a little too much of a good time. I got a call from the doggy day care that he was bleeding from his paws. Bleeding a lot. Since Ulric is still a bit scared of being touched by people, they were not able to check on what was wrong. They called me, but I couldn't do much due to work. (grumble grumble) The wife called them and got on the way and got Ulric to the vet. Turns out Ulric was playing so much, he wore his claws down to the quick and thus bled a lot. He left blood paw prints all over.

Don't fret though! He is a mighty trooper. He didn't seem to be in pain at all. In fact, he was his normal happy self around other dogs still.

The vet got him patched up with green gauze that makes him look like he has some booties on his back feet. Bleeding has stopped, but Ulric has to take it easy for a while so he couldn't partake in the fun of doggy day care. He was relegated to the world of day time boarding so he could rest up and recover.

All in all, an exciting day. On the plus side, the day care didn't charge us for the day due to the drama. They are a good bunch of people over there.

Dairy Free Day 2

A few temptations today. I normally have some breakfast with cheese on it. Today, I had to sadly peel the cheese off of em before eating.

Dairy free today, and breathing clear. Maybe there is a connection.

2 Week Trial #1: Dairy Free

In an attempt to be a bit healthier and to be able to breath better, I am starting my first 2 week trial. It will be a two week trial to see how it works. At the end of the test, I'll see if it's something I want to keep doing.

This one is going to be hard. No dairy. Here are my rules:

1. No direct dairy, cheese, milk, ice cream, etc


2. Butter is OK if it is part of the recipe, not spread on things

Not too complex. I've already got some soy milk to replace milk and it tastes pretty good. Day one has been smooth and dairy free. I don't feel majorly different, but I am able to breath a bit better today. There are some mixed reports that dairy can cause excess or thickened mucus production. Some folks say that is the case, some say it has no affect. This trial will see if it works for me.

The benefits for me if this works will be better sleep. I am having problems being able to breath clearly at night thus resulting in me not being able to sleep well. My wonderful nasal pathways did not follow the general plan to be an appropriate size for someone of my build/size. Even a little bit of nasal blockage makes it damn hard to breath, the passage is rather small. The goal is to reduce the mucus, make it easier to breath, and to hopefully be able to sleep better.

Now I could just try to use decongestants to get by to breath easier. I have tried that, and the side effects unfortunately are not worth it. Pseudoephedrine works to clear the nose, but it gives my face muscle spasms that just feel wrong. It also make me sleepless. The over-the-counter alternative phenylephrine doesn't work for me. Nasal sprays are not meant for long term use and make the blockage much much worse after it wears off. What is left is a quest to find the source and fix the issue. The dairy free test is an attempt to find the source.

More updates as they come!

Traveling In Seattle Part III

After having a damn fine meal at the icon with R yesterday, today I felt that a simple in house meal would be best. This hotel has some good pizza and hot coco. A weird, but tasty combination.

Today was a slow day lending a hand at ER reg, but the ladies there sure make it fun. Now just one more day to go and boy are my feet cheering at that!

So nothing really exciting today. Just a tired earthbane who is going to bed early. I can't wait to be able to sleep in past 4.30am on Saturday!

On that too, here's a self reminder to turn the alarm on after I set the wake up time. I forgot to do that yesterday, but luckily for me I woke up 5 mins before the time I set. Lucky break there.