Keep Gas Expensive.

Have you seen a gas station lately? Its like they're giving that mess away. I'm half tempted to rub some in my armpits so I can savor the savings all day long. But that would be wasteful, and maybe a little bit dangerous. So I don't.

I do use Fuelly to track my miles per gallon over time and compare with my cohorts. But sometimes getting so wrapped up in MPG confuses just how much you're getting screwed over the price of gas. Did you get accustomed to paying $3.70 and thinking you were doing pretty damn well for yourself? Yeah me too.

I'd wistfully recall the good old days when I could top off and President Jackson would have my back. But at a little over $4 a gallon I've got Grant on a search party for Lincoln to cover the cost. Not really a prospect that makes you smile, but since you're accustomed, why not leverage it?

• Tip #6: Use gas prices to become your own hedge fund | I Will Teach You To Be Rich

This article describes "fuel hedging" as airlines typically do to protect themselves from rate increases. (you may be able to do the same with your heating oil company) Hedging on your gasoline costs involves the same type of though process, although you won't be saving because of the mass scale of your purchases. Its more like a method to highlight how much you're saving, rather than let that money slip away on beer and cotton candy.

Ramit suggests tracking cost per week, but I'm using the average cost of a tank per month instead. (mostly because my expenditures aren't exactly linear; granted there are variations like the actual amount in a 'tank' but I'm willing to sacrifice for simplicity's sake) I've looked at my recent purchases and decided that I'm fairly comfortable with paying $40 for a tank of gas. Oddly enough that's well under what's been going on for the past few months.

If we take a peek at last year in comparison, a $40 hedge might seem excessive. Especially since I started the year paying about $25 a tank. (I did start buying 93 octane in April, but that's not the sole factor here)

So you can see the basic trend, when gas prices are low, I'd be pocketing the difference into a special account. And when its expensive I'd have money already set aside. Well, I haven't been running this hedge fund since 2007, but if I'd been prescient enough to realize that gas would top $4.60 here's what it would look like.

And here's this year taking into account the outstanding surplus I'd attained in 2007.

That's right, paying $40 a tank for the past two years would still come up short after the shenanigans this summer. You could make the case that I'm just tricking myself not to spend that money somewhere else, and you'd be absolutely right. But I also factor the hedge savings into my fuel budget, artificially keeping the price high. Americans set record lows for miles driven this summer, mainly because of the cost per mile. So this should motivate me to drive less and save more, but instead of handing those excesses over to the oil companies I could start saving for my next, more efficient vehicle.