It’s finally looking like Spring in Minnesota, although we haven’t had any rain yet. Folks on a journey to FIRE know to set aside money for a rainy day, but the great majority of people do not carry a big enough umbrella insurance. That is, an umbrella policy that pays for liability judgements above the limits of your existing auto & home insurance policies. Umbrella … Continue reading Umbrella Coverage – Protect Your Nest Egg
My former boss from MegaCorp recently posted an interesting article from the Wall Street Journal titled “In Defense of the Not-So-Busy Retirement.” After retiring a year ago this month, Mr. Boss commented that he was having no problem embracing the idea of ‘Slow Retirement’ touched on in the article – that is, a retirement where one doesn’t succumb to the social pressure that one needs … Continue reading FIRE Lifestyle – Where Does The Time Go?
I’ve written several times about luxury cars being a guilty pleasure of ours. I’ve also written about my aversion to subscription-based payment schemes. So why am I so delighted with our monthly car wash subscription at the local gas station? Our monthly car wash subscription costs $30. That’s the equivalent of 2.7 ‘Works’ washes at our local station. $12 for each car wash seems ridiculously … Continue reading Taken To The Cleaners With Car Washes?
Its hard to believe that I’ve been writing this blog 2-3x a week for over 3 years. I started it more than a year before I retired and now that milestone is two years in the rear view mirror. I’ve enjoyed sharing this journey and appreciated all of the recent positive comments, messages, tweets, and emails readers passed on during the ‘Two Year FIRE Anniversary’ … Continue reading Birthday From From MegaCorp Past
Many people worry about losing connections with people as they they make their FIRE escape into early retirement. Social connections are necessary in the workplace and people sometimes fear that they will be sitting home alone watching cable news when they stop working. That might have been the case at one time, but social media has undoubtedly been a game changer for millions. I’ve long … Continue reading Social Media & FIRE Lifestyle
This is the final weekend to work on your income taxes. April 17th is the deadline this year because the 15th falls on a Sunday and the 16th is a District holiday in Washington. We filed our taxes earlier this week. We finally got the right paperwork from MegaCorp – whose bureaucracy still operates as it did in the 1990s. The cost of running the … Continue reading A Shocking Comparison for Tax Day
This is the second of two posts that detail the eight dimensions on this ‘Life Wheel’ that I developed just before early retiring from MegaCorp two years ago. It is a long answer to the most common question I get these days: “What do you do to stay busy?” Last week, I covered the first 4 sections of the wheel in this POST. Today, I … Continue reading FIRE Second Anniversary – Life Wheel Update (2)
If I’ve learned one thing in early retirement it is that if you are worried you won’t have enough things to keep you busy in early retirement, you are very wrong. Simply put, the number of fun UNPAID things to do in this world greatly outnumber the quantity of fun PAID activities! Before I left MegaCorp two years ago, I developed this multidimensional ‘Life Wheel’ … Continue reading FIRE Second Anniversary – Life Wheel Update (1)
Amazing. It has now been TWO years since I blasted out of MegaCorp HQ and into our new lifestyle based on FIRE (financial independence & retiring early). I guess that means the honeymoon period should have come to an end by now – except it hasn’t. As I was told by many veteran FIRE achievers a couple years ago, I’ve found it might be true … Continue reading FIRE Second Anniversary – ‘Kidult-hood’ Revisited
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