I know I can’t be the only one out there who finds it fascinating to determine how much money you can save over 30 years before retirement if you reduce the amount of money you spend eating out by $20 a month and earn a rate of interest at X amount. I’ve actually written about this kind of stuff before.
Someone on a board I visit had a link to this calculator. OH MY!!! This little baby is FABULOUS!!!
If you have any doubts about the long-term impact of small expenses, you need to spend a few minutes playing with this tool.
And if you love to theorize and play with numbers like I do, just remember you need your rest and should get to bed at a reasonable hour! 
Enjoy!
Hehehe…Sallie, this calculator is SO MUCH FUN! We’ve recently started to not eat out at all, so it was interesting to plug our numbers in, and see what we’d save in a year
What a fun post! How are you and Peanut doing?
My husband recently made a spreadsheet showing how many thousands of miles driven it would take to pay for a new car (in the gas savings) at various gas prices. We’re planning on replacing his truck with a more fuel efficient car, but we drive so little here it’s not worth the money yet. Also, if we get sent overseas, we could be limited to 1 car or no car at all that we could ship, so it would be a waste of money to buy another car until we know where we’re headed next.
He’ll spend hours playing with the spreadsheet, asking me to guess the answers at different gas prices.
Hello, I’m Michelle. You have a lovely site and I’ve enjoyed it very much since I found it recently.
And yes, I’m such a geek. I *love* those kinds of calculators. Someone that I was reading the other day put up a calculator that roughly determins how much each appliance costs to run per hour. Too much fun!
Of course, back in the day, I was a dedicated subscriber to The Tightwad Gazette. So now my dirty little secret is out. : )