Skip the Prius, get a used car instead.

From this blog post on Wired, which suggests that you can really pump up your green enviro-cred not by buying a new Toyota Prius, but by buying a used fuel-efficient car instead.

Toyota Prius get great gas mileage but it takes 113 million BTUs of energy to make one. Since there are about 113,000 BTUs of energy in a gallon of gasoline, the Prius has consumed the equivalent of 1,000 gallons of gasoline before it reaches the showroom. Think of it as a carbon debt - one you won't pay off until the Prius has turned over 46,000 miles or so.

Maybe you'd be best off if you could find a used Prius, but I think from a dollars-to-mpg ratio, a used Honda Civic or Toyota Corolla might be a better option. You get almost as good fuel efficiency as a hybrid, for a fraction of the cost of owning one. Unless you buy a total lemon that needs to spend time in the shop every month. Also don't forget that a new car will almost certainly cost more to insure than an older jalopy.

Makes me feel justified for hanging on to my 96 VW Golf (28 mpg, 135,000 miles), that's for sure.

[Image from Wagonized]

From $25 to $5000

Saw this great story today on the Christian Science Monitor, where for an experiment this guy left his parents' home, to find out for himself how far he can make it with only $25 in his pocket.

A former college athlete with a bachelor's degree, Mr. Shepard had left a comfortable life with supportive parents in Raleigh, N.C. Now he was an outsider on the wrong side of the tracks in Charles­ton, S.C.

He stayed at a homeless shelter for the first couple of months, taking advantage of government food stamps, then started working as day laborer, eventually getting a job with a moving company.

Ten months into the experiment, he decided to quit after learning of an illness in his family. But by then he had moved into an apartment, bought a pickup truck, and had saved close to $5,000.

This kid didn't give himself any luxuries like eating out, nor did he have a cell phone. Probably didn't have a TV either. Cell phone bills and cable bills really eat into your income. Nothing but a strong back and the will to work, he was well on his way out of poverty.