Halfway across the country in $300

In about four weeks, I'm headed out of the Midwest and out to the East coast in North Carolina. My sister lives out there and I figured an early Christmas visit would be great! Here's the catch: I can only afford $300 to spend on the trip. Since a friend of mine lives in Nashville, and it happens to be on the way back, I'm making it a very worthwhile vacation. So here's how it's going to work.

I calculated how many miles (and I'm over estimating to make sure I don't bust the budget), which comes to about 1900 roundtrip. My car gets an average of 30 miles to the gallon for all-highway travel. This gives me 63 1/3 gallons to fill up on. If I calculate $4 per gallon (like I said I'm over estimating to make sure the budget stays on track), then my fuel budget comes to $253.33. As far as food goes, I'm bringing some non-perishable snacks and things to make sandwiches. When I see my sister, we plan on going to our favorite (and expensive) restaurant so I'm putting a strict cash budget of $30 that night. So besides the fuel and expensive restaurant, that leaves $16.67 for snacks and food on the road.

Can I do it? I think so! My tasks until it's time to go is to go ahead and stock up on snacks and sandwich materials so I don't have to dig into the vacation budget. I always have a separate food budget each month. Remember to use cash instead of plastic to stay on track. Plastic gets you into trouble!

Stay tuned to see if this mission goes accomplished!

Journey to Self-Publishing

We all have dreams of our creativity being shared with the masses. I've never been much of a writer, more about music, but when your passionate about something you should go for it. I am currently passionate about writing a cookbook about a diet my doctor put me on. I suffer from chronic headaches and there are many foods that trigger migraine attacks. When I searched online for cookbooks pertaining to this specific diet (and my doctor added another type of food than what is normally prescribed), I found two that weren't exactly what I was looking for. Any serial entrepreneur knows that means it's time to bring in that resource. So I'm on the journey to publishing!

How will I get my idea published? I can work my tail off, generate the best cookbook I can, and present it to thousands of publishers...or I can self-publish. I've grabbed some resources to learn how to become my own publisher. First step, creating my publishing entity. Publishing companies should have a similar name to the books being published. Second step, create ways to spread your published works to the masses. Since mine is directed toward my medical condition, I will be purchasing a domain name and creating a website to share my recipes and experiences with my headaches. Since this has become such a common occurance, I can use social media masses and friends to promote my site. Advertising will fund the site and spread more topics to the masses. By promoting the cookbook and site with my current doctor and other headache clinics, I can better ensure success.

The key is finding a niche and rolling with it. If you have a passion and it's unique, then you need to work hard and spread the word! Good luck!