20 colorful ways to spend your money

Did you get your $500 rebate-refund-tax-kickback from the state of New Mexico?

I’ll probably spend mine on something practical, a couple of needed home repairs. Five hundred dollars is a limited amount, especially with inflation, but there’s still a lot you can do with it.

You’re probably like me, your $500 is already spent. For grins, though, let’s look at some different ways to spend your state money, which was actually your money before the state took it in the first place.

If you break it down into $25 increments, you can spend the money 20 different ways.

1. Put $25 in savings.
2. Donate $25 to a favorite charity. Las Cruces has tons of nonprofits that could put your money to good use.
3. Give $25 to your place of worship. Or if you don’t worship, give it to another charity. Or to your grandkid.
4. Fill up your gas tank. But only if it holds eight gallons or less.
5. Drive down N.M. Hwy. 28 to Chope’s in La Mesa and order a couple of chile rellenos a la carte.
6. Drive to Ruidoso.
7. Once there, go to Ruidoso Downs and put $25 on a gray horse in orange silks.
8. Back in Las Cruces, head to Luna Rossa and get a pizza with green chile and red onions. For dessert, get a birthday cake gelato and eat it real messy so your lips are all blue.
9. Go to Nellie’s and order the red enchilada plate with extra onions. Or if you’re in a green mood, get the chile verde con carne. Either works with an egg over easy.
10. Look around your house for some books you don’t want. Take them to COAS Books and get some credit on your account. Walk around the store. Maybe in the music section you’ll find a good book on the blues. If you’re lucky, you might find a book autographed by a baseball Hall of Famer, like I once did, and you still might not spend all your $25. (That one cost me $3.18 with my credit applied. The Hall of Famer was Sparky Anderson, who managed both the Cincinnati Reds and Detroit Tigers to World Series titles.)
11. Probably time to fill up on gas again.
12. Buy your sweetie some purple and pink flowers.
13. Just a guess here, but you could probably use some new underwear. Black or yellow, maybe. Or chartreuse with silver polka dots.
14. Drive the back road, Hwy. 185, to Hatch.
15. Once there, eat at the Pepper Pot. Then get a vanilla latte at Sparky’s, if they’re open.
16. Take five hikes at Aguirre Spring, $5 each.
17. After each hike, have a fried egg sandwich with green chile at the Moongate Café.
18. More gas.
19. On Tuesday, grab four friends and go to a $5 movie at Allen Theatres. It almost certainly will not be a black-and-white film.
20. After the movie, go to your favorite Taco Tuesday joint and get 25 tacos.

Enjoy it while it lasts. It won’t be long until you’ve once again got the no-money blues.