Hero Inc.

Due to climbing gas prices, I made a monumental decision on April 24, 2008. I decided that I would stop driving to work. Looking at head at four dollars for gas, I decided that was an insane value. I mean, it was/is going to hit an amount that is 400% higher than what I remember gas being when I start driving. What once would fill up my car ($20) will not even provide me with half a tank.

On April 25, 2008, I began my no car to work initiative. It sounds cooler if I call it that. The approach was to ride with my roommate to work. He lives roughly half a mile from a MARTA station. There is a MARTA station near our apartment, but activity and me do not mix well without sweat. I’m working on that as well. Anyway, I would walk to the MARTA station in the morning. Then when I came home at night, I would ride to the nearest MARTA station and walk home. The walk home is roughly 1.5 miles. I don’t mind the perspiration in the evening since I’m going home and do not need to present myself in an acceptable manner then.

Eighteen days into the initiative (I didn’t walk for a few of the days), I’m still going strong. My current problems with the walk are the following:

• Body Temperature – Even with the minimal walk I struggle to keep my body temperature down. This will grow in difficulty as the humid Georgia summer approaches.
• Weather – The evening walks are not bad except for when you walk home during a tornado. Having 1/4 of your body in water isn’t the greatest.
• Time – I don’t really get home at a “reasonable” time anymore. Part of this is due to my current client being on the west coast and I’m not traveling at a car’s speed here. Of course, my commute home is still shorter than most Atlanta residents who drive. That’s just sad.

Now, this is a numbers game we are ultimately playing so I’ll provide the real figures people are wanting to know.

• $45.60 => This is the amount of money I have saved by not driving to work each day. This number only includes days I would travel to work and an average gas price of $3.75. If I included everywhere I would have driven during this time period and chose to carpool or walk instead, the money saved would be $71.81. I was able to carpool home from Trivia, to kickball games, and to Winder to see my sister’s house.
• 1.9014 => This is the number of miles I walk daily. This includes the walk in the morning and the afternoon walk home. If I stay at home to work instead of going to the office, I will try to at least due the afternoon route by running to and from the starting location.
• 30.4 => This is the number of miles I have walked in just 16 days. Technically, this number is 36.4 miles including the two days I ran the afternoon route instead of going to the office.
• 3 => This is the number of pounds I have lost. Now, I don’t trust this number just yet. I’m hesitant to believe my scale even though I try to weigh myself at the same time each time I weight myself. This number can also be thrown by the fact that I am slowly trying to watch what I eat and improve it for a majority of the week.

I’d like to thank my walking coach, Mr. Will. He provided a great list of Do’s and Don’ts that have helped along my way. I only hope to match his 20 pounds he lost from walking in D.C. That’s a dream worth “walking” for. That and my wallet will thank me for it. I also want to thank the people that let me bum a ride by becoming my carpool buddies: Brad, Charlie, my parents, and Dan.

I’ll provide another update to this post during the summer when I face my real challenge in the heat.