1.Drinking Soft Drinks

Plenty of people pound soft drinks at least once a day, if not a lot more frequently than that. There are kids in America who think Gatorade is a naturally occurring juice.

Let's put the price at $1.50, which is about what you'd pay for a 16-ounce bottle of Pepsi or Coke at a gas station. That's a median estimate. When they're not at work, heavy drinkers can economize by buying two-liter bottles, which you can get on special for about 99 cents but generally cost in the $1.50 to $2 range. Likewise, some corner grocers will charge around $2 for a bottle. So $1.50 is a fair average depending on where you live.

Paying $1.50, if you have one soda a day, means you've spent $547.50 a year (before tax). If you have three a day, you've just flushed away $1,642.50. And while you were at it, you filled yourself with either fattening high fructose corn syrup and/or with mysterious chemical sweeteners.

2.Reading Gossip Magazines

Here's what the major gossip mags cost per issue on the newsstand: Life & Style, $3; Us Weekly $4; OK!, $3.50; Star, $4; In Touch, $3; People $4.

Now, you could buy all of them, and that would cost $21.50 a week. But it's a rare person who does that. Instead, they choose about two. Figuring on an average of $3.50 each, that would cost $7 a week.

Of course, if you're really hooked on gossip, you don't pay newsstand prices. You subscribe. That brings the annual rate to about $60 (for OK!) to $78 (In Touch, Star, Life & Style). People Weekly is like the Rolls-Royce of celebrity tattle, costing about $116 a year with a discounted subscription on Amazon.com (steep, but better than the $210 you'd pay without one).

You could also read online for free, but then what would you do with yourself on the bus, at the doctor's office, or while you're taking care of business in the bathroom? There's something about reading the dish on the printed page, and that's going to cost you. Besides, do you really want to get your news from Perez Hilton?

Annual subscription cost for one a week: $78
Annual cost if it's People: $116
Annual subscription cost for two a week (People and one other): $194
Annual cost for one off the newsstand each week: $182

3.Buying Coffee

If caffeine didn't give you the jitters before, this annual figure will: $1,442. That's the cost ($3.95) of a midsized ("grande") cappuccino at a Starbucks near me, multiplied by 365. Subtract weekends from that because you're not at work, and it's still $1,031 over the course of the year.

Ditch that fancy barista-blended concoction for a simpler filter coffee or iced coffee, and you can bring the price down to about $2.50 for a Starbucks grande. But that still tabulates to $912.50 a year for a once-a-day hit.

Annual cost for one cappuccino a day: $1,442

4.Playing the Lottery

No one has to tell you that you're not likely to win the lottery. You've heard it before: It's a voluntary tax.

You've also heard the state say its proceeds go toward supporting schools, but did they also tell you that in many cases, a corresponding amount of funding is sliced from the budget in other areas? Or did you stop to think what it would be like if you spent that $1 directly on a child in your life instead?

Whatever. Playing the lottery gives you hope, right? It's fun. It's a good time finding out that today, once again, isn't going to be the day.

Annual cost for playing one set of numbers a day: $365

5.Getting Fries With That

We're not calculating the price your thighs pay. You already know that.

In my neighborhood, a Wendy's single combo meal costs $6. (Yeah, I know. New York prices are stiff.) But single, by itself, costs $3.79, and a medium soda by itself costs $1.69. Together, they're $5.48 before tax, or 51 cents cheaper if you forget the fries. That 51 cents may not seem like much, but it adds up -- and it may be an even steeper savings in your neck of the woods. Have fast food once a week, and you'll spend $26.52 a year. Three times a week, and you'll spend nearly $80. That doesn't count the cost of the possible future angioplasty.

That's also based on fast food chains, where the price scale is rigged to encourage you to spring for a combo. At most diners and restaurants, fries are often an entirely different order that cost, let's say, $3.

If you can't cut out burgers and sodas, maybe you can at least step down and cut the fries. You get rid of something fried, and you also cut down on salt. And what is ketchup but a secret delivery system for more sugar?

Annual cost for getting fries with fast food combo meals three times a week: $80 Annual cost for getting fries with restaurant meals twice a week: $312

6.Text Messaging

Heaven help you if you haven't had the foresight to sign up for a package plan with your cell phone carrier. AT&T, for example, charges iPhone users who haven't 20 cents per text message. Otherwise, you'll spend $5 a month for the right to send 200 messages, $15 for 1500 a month, or $20 to send as many as you want.

Unsurprisingly, that most expensive plan, superfluous for most working people -- but probably not so for the average middle school kid -- is the one AT&T pushes you the hardest to buy. If you fall for that, you'll spend $240 a year, before tax (which varies by area), above and beyond what you already spend on your regular old calling plan.

That's the equivalent of sending 1,200 domestic text messages without a plan and paying 20 cents each for them. Do you send fewer texts than that? You would actually save money without the added option.

Annual cost for an unlimited text messaging option: $240

7.Watching Porn

DVDs, which were handily the biggest medium for adult entertainment in the past decade, are fading away, to be replaced by the much more private, and space-saving, method of watching streaming videos online.

There is free stuff available, but usually for only a few minutes at a time, and often, it comes to you stolen. To view professionally-produced stuff legally and fully, you have to subscribe. Without naming any names, we submit that a monthly membership to a typical pornography website, gay or straight, costs about $25 if you agree to stick with it for a while, or $30 if you take it a month at a time.

You could get a few days' worth for about $5, but as the gargantuan size of the adult entertainment industry -- it pulls in an estimated $12 billion a year -- proves libidos don't go away just because a limited membership has expired.

Even mildly erotic Skinemax -- pardon me, Cinemax -- has its cost. Keep those images of car-washing ladies off your TV screen, and you will save about $15 a month, or $180 a year. Surprisingly, in my market, the relatively spicy programming of the Playboy channel (heterosexual only) costs $13, or $2 less than vanilla Cinemax.

Annual cost for a regular monthly adult subscription: $300 Annual cost for subscriptions to three sites: $900

8.Smoking Cigarettes

The price of a pack of cigarettes in New York City will burn you: $10. In some states, packs might cost half that, but no matter what, it's still more expensive than a gallon of gasoline.

Smoke two packs a week, and the amount you spend -- $7,300 -- could have funded a vacation for two to Tahiti.

Annual cost for a pack a day: $1,825 for $5 packs; $3,650 for $10 packs Annual cost for a two packs a week: $3,650 for $5 packs; $7,300 for $10 packs

9.Playing Online Poker

Let's pretend you spend $100 a session, which is a reasonable limit a person might impose upon oneself. (If you have a gambling problem, you're likely to spend much more -- "Just one more hand!" -- but we're talking about typical cases here.) Do that twice a week, and you've spent $200 in seven days.

Do that all year long, and there goes $10,400, a hefty chunk of the typical salary.

There may be a few returns here and there, but if you keep playing, the trend is not in your favor, and mathematically speaking, you're more likely to play at a loss. There's a reason why gambling is worth $92.27 billion a year, and it's not because players keep winning the jackpot.

Annual cost for one $100 session a week: $5,200

10.Ignoring Car Maintenance

A car is not a mobile storage unit. Leave junk in the trunk at your own peril, because the U.S. Department of Energy says that a vehicle's mileage rates are calculated based on the assumption that your car is hauling a total of three hundred pounds of passengers and cargo. For every 100 pounds of weight you add (golf clubs, guns, camping equipment -- whatever you didn't feel like putting in the house), your fuel economy drops by as much as 2%.

Assuming a car burns 24 miles per hour (a typical rate) and gas costs $2.75 a gallon (a typical price), over the course of 15,000 miles (a reasonable distance for a year), you'll spend about another $30 per 100 pounds of extra weight. That doesn't just include clutter. This could also happen if you don't also cut back on the soda and french fries.

Although President Obama was mocked for suggesting we'll all get better gas mileage by properly inflating our tires, the man was correct. The rounder the tire, the less energy it takes to roll. Tires that are just 4 to 5 psi below their suggested pressure (your owner's manual will tell you your wheels' ideal psi) may look fine to the eye, but in fact can weaken your gas mileage by as much as 10%.That's about another $150 based on our typical example, but your inefficient tires may hit you for even more, depending on your car's mileage and how much you drive.

The AAA adds this: A smooth-running engine can also save up to $180 a year. Why? Things like clogged air filters just make your machine work harder and burn more fuel. Have it checked every six months.

Annual cost for hauling 100 extra pounds in a typical car: $34 Annual cost for improperly inflated tires: $172 Annual cost of a clogged air filter: $180

..thank god i don't have any money..look at all the crap i would spend it on..altho i will have to say ..someone needs to learn how to shop for bargains..

I will not give up my coffee till you pry it from my cold dead hands.

Gatorade ISN'T a naturally-occurring juice ... ?

porn 12 bill industry

poker 92 bill industry

idea: create poker site where chips are for people instead of cash...industry 100+ bill

roko

I do 3 (buy lb-ground), 5- real fries in a restaurant once in a great blue moon (thats how often eat out ), 8- SIGH....
and 10- don't ignore, just can't afford preventive care so much.
Do need to get a air filter tho. So...guess am saving alot more money than many others, although can't seem to find any of it.

Yes. I am the proud owner of "Bad Habits".

I drink tea not coffee, less expensive I believe, number 8 I am guilty of and one you forgot...alcohol!! So counting alcohol I hit 3 out of 11...shouldn't I be sitting pretty instead of broke???

Actually only one bad habit, smokes.
But I roll my own so that makes it quite a bit cheaper.


Now rent and Child Support cost me 16,000. a yr.

I am not giving up nuttin!!!

Nuttin I sat!!!

I wanna die happy!!! Lol. Jk!

My bad habit is flirting on Mingle...

and I see no end in sight!

you go girl, like the joke goes, all those health nuts are gonna feel pretty silly laying in a hospital, dying of nothing.