m741's ERE Journal

Where are you and where are you going?
m741
Posts: 1187
Joined: Tue Jan 18, 2011 3:31 am
Location: Seattle, WA

Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by m741 »

January, 2014

What happened?

I traveled to visit my father for a belated Christmas, bringing the gf along. It was fun... she went sledding for the first time, and we basically did that for half the weekend. I also saw two big concerts that were Christmas presents to each other, and went to a film festival at a very cool location in NYC. Otherwise, it was pretty quiet - we saw friends and hung out at home. I think February will be even more quiet, which suits me just fine right now.

I worked out regularly, missing only 2 workouts during the week. I also decided to do some rock climbing (I have easy access to a bouldering wall). My fingers/forearms are super weak, so it's a real struggle. But I think it's worth developing in an area that doesn't play to my physical strengths.

Work started really slow through the middle of January, then got more interesting. It's pretty interesting overall right now, and my biggest issue is staying focused on work and getting my energy up. Maybe I'm not in the habit of deep thinking anymore.

Finances

My portfolio took a pretty large hit this month, so although my income was very high (bonus and a three-paycheck month), I didn't see as much gain as I expected. That's ok: slow and steady wins the race.

I increased expected monthly dividends by $25, not as much as I hoped. This was because I increased my automatic purchases but made only a single discretionary purchase (VZ). I continue to invest a few hundred in Lending Club and $1k in SolarCity bonds each month. I also made a large donation, $2k. I think I mentioned this before, but it was taken out my paycheck this month.

Finally, I guess the biggest news is that I tracked my finances for the first time since last August. Expenses were about $175 lower this month than my previous baseline. I think that's mostly attributable to few unusual purchases, and eating more at home rather than going out to restaurants. My expenses were $2293, which is rent + $1k.

The other big news is that as of today (2/2) I have sold out vested shares of my company's stock, and will continue to see a small amount vest each month. This amounts to a salary bump; once it's set up to smoothly pay out I'll increase my regular investments and invest a bit more with lending club.

Goals

My goals for February:
- Don't eat refined sugar (cookies, candy, donuts, cake, juice, etc). I'm tracking sugar consumption in a spreadsheet that's shared with my friend. We shame each other if we eat sugar.
- Continue to work out and climb (work out 3x per week, climb 2x per week).
- Find some stocks that look attractively priced and purchase them.
- Do some work and practice on my own (something like writing/photography/programming).

DutchGirl
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Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by DutchGirl »

Always nice to see one of your updates. I hope you're still on track for the goals you made for February? Good luck!

m741
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Location: Seattle, WA

Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by m741 »

February, 2015

What happened?

Well, not all that much. February was a month of consolidation for me. No trips, no big events. Spent time with friends, did stuff in NYC. Lounged on weekends. But I've been thinking a lot and building habits.

I'm really taking health more seriously. And I want to continue. I adhered pretty closely to my no-sweets goal and only had sugar 4 times during the month. I want to continue that, but also stop consumption of sucralose and aspartame. Not that I really had a desire to lean on these as crutches: my sugar cravings have been massively reduced.

I'm also eating more salad, more greens, and cooking at home more. I'm trying to drop carb consumption overall, and eat more healthy fats, such as olive oil and eggs. This seems to be in accord with my reading of the rough state of nutrition 'science' right now.

I've also been consistently taking vitamins and, more recently, creatine. And just eating less overall. I feel maybe 15% more alert than I did before, which is great.

My gym habits have not been great. I go to the gym maybe 60% of the time that I should. For climbing... I want to go more, but I've got some sort of strain in one arm near my elbow, so I've been taking it easy and doing lots of pull-ups at home. Better to go slowly than push too hard and have to stop.

The other big thing was that I talked to my accountant this month. This is the second year I've gone to this guy for taxes. As far as I can tell, he knows what he's talking about - I've been impressed. I had been pretty quiet and non-commital about about things last year. I go into great detail about finances online, but it's so different in person :). But I was pretty open and used the 'sabbatical' angle to open the topic: but I think he had some idea what I was considering (ERE). I'm glad we talked, because he had some good ideas, particularly from a tax angle.

The major outcome of this talk was that I'm shifting emphasis from dividends to growth. Not a huge shift, but I've liquidated some of the very high dividend, risky stuff, and slowed investments in dividend-payers. No sense paying taxes on dividends right now. If I really want to move to a dividend strategy in two years, it's not so hard. But capital gains are more tax efficient overall, both currently and in retirement.

Finances

As mentioned above, I sold the riskiest, highest-dividend holding I had. I'm now also holding a mid-cap Vanguard growth fund, and aim to add a large-cap growth fund as well. I also put another slug into GLD. It's gone down a bit since I last bought, but it's one of the few true diversification options, and I'd like to move towards a slightly more volatile permanent portfolio.

Due in part to market recovery, I saw a big boost in net worth this month.

Other than that, not much to report.

Goals

- Return to consistent gym-going, 3-days per week.
- Continue to avoid sweets (along with sucralose and aspartame).
- Invest in large-cap growth fund.

mxlr650
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Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by mxlr650 »

I'm really taking health more seriously. And I want to continue. I adhered pretty closely to my no-sweets goal and only had sugar 4 times during the month. I want to continue that, but also stop consumption of sucralose and aspartame. Not that I really had a desire to lean on these as crutches: my sugar cravings have been massively reduced.
When I quit drinking caffeinated and artificially sweetened beverages last year my cravings for sugar redused drastically. Once your taste buds are retrained/cleansed you'll never go back to drinking them. It took me almost a decade to realize that aspartame/sucralose was bad for me.

m741
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Location: Seattle, WA

Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by m741 »

March, 2015

What happened?

It was a pretty quiet month, actually. I didn't do any travel, mostly just relaxed on the weekends and did work - waiting for the winter to end for spring to really begin. The weather is changing here in NYC and I think it'll be warm in a week or two.

I've stopped working out, so I need to start that again. I kept eating mostly healthy and I'm going to be getting stricter with that for April.

I went to the NYC ERE meetup and got to meet some new people, which was fun.

Sorry if this is boring. I expect April to be more exciting!

Job

I've been happier at the job recently. It's busier, which I like as long as I don't have to work longer hours. And I've got more of an opportunity for a leadership role, which I like. It's different than what I was doing before, and overall I think it's a good move for me. I'm finally excited about something. I should have more opportunities in May (or very late April).

Besides that, work's work. My plans here haven't changed so far: January 2017 I'm looking to quit for some serious time off. If things don't change for the better as I expect, then I may consider seeing if I can figure out some partial work arrangement at the start of next year (ie, doing shorter workweeks or something).

Finances

I've continued my switch from a focus on dividend stocks to growth stocks. Basically I've cut my automatic weekly investment in dividend stocks in half, and put that into small- and mid-cap growth stocks. I'm continuing to invest in Lending Club, about $400 each month.

My net worth increased marginally this month, due to another slight decline in the market.

My expected dividends went up slightly this month, but are still below January levels (since I sold off some very high-dividend issuers at that point). I expect this trend to continue, and I'm happy with dividends increasing at this rate each month.

This was the high month in my dividend cycle, with dividend income exceeding $2k, but it's less than 3 months ago.

Some financial goals for April:
- Read some Harry Browne to see if the permanent portfolio seems like a good choice.
- Consider investing more into gold. Right now it's about 4% of my portfolio.
- Continue with investments, but monitor and consider reducing auto-investment as my cash cushion is decreasing (I can only auto-sell vested shares of company stock quarterly).
- Look to sell off the last high-yield fund I hold, about $10k worth of PFF (6% yield).

DutchGirl
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Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by DutchGirl »

Nice to read your update, m741. I myself think gold is pretty overrated. It's a metal that can be used in some electronics. That's it. Anyway, just my humble opinion. I would say: stay critical. If you are considering investing in gold, don't just read the people who want you to invest in gold ;-)

I hope you'll have a great spring.

m741
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Joined: Tue Jan 18, 2011 3:31 am
Location: Seattle, WA

Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by m741 »

April, 2015

What happened?

A nice smooth month, exciting but not too busy. It started with a trip to Philadelphia, which I really enjoyed. I also visited my father in upstate NY.

I received a few plants for my birthday, and realized how much I missed having them around. Not that I had a lot of houseplants, but I did a lot of landscaping and gardening as a kid (mostly ornamental stuff). So I visited a local Home Depot and picked up a bunch of herbs that were on sale. I have no idea how they'll turn out, but it's something interesting when I come home at night - did they grow? What are they looking like?

I haven't been very good with my habits. I'm making another push with a buddy to exercise (run) more, as well as to eat better.

Job

This was far and away the most interesting. First off, we're wrapping up a project at work. I'm happy about that the ~2 months of debugging is ending. It's just so ugly. It's not really programming and not that rewarding, and mostly paperwork.

I'm faced with an interesting opportunity. The team that I was really interested has an opening. The position is a 'leadership' position, although there's only one guy on the platform I'd be working on (the entire team is 6-7 people). The position, "tech lead" is maybe a bit of a stretch for me, which could be good or bad. And the team does stuff related to charitable work, which after all was a direction I wanted to go.

On the other hand, I can't get a read on the team itself. The guy running the overall team, who isn't that familiar with the platform I'd work on, was friendly enough, but also asked my Myer-Briggs type in the interview... pragmatic? And I started looking at the code today and it's pretty bad. Which is a bit exciting, since I can make a huge impact there.

On the other hand, the team I'm on isn't an exciting area, and is really big. But the leadership is excellent and there's a lot of people to learn from (theoretically, maybe less so in practice). And they have a good plan for slowly increasing my responsibility, that seems pretty reasonable.

I'm working with the new team on a part-time basis, and haven't made up my mind. I can go either way, depending on my mood. I'll have to decide in 2-3 weeks.

We also had an experimentation week this month, where I could do whatever I wanted on the application I work on. This was awesome, I was able to hack together a very cool project that I'm pretty proud of. One of my teammates, maybe the guy I get along with best, was impressed. In a week I'll demo it to the team. It was a chance to do some actual programming. I get so depressed when I go a few weeks without legitimately programming, so at the very least this has been energizing to me.

Overall I have to say that I'm excited about work. I just need to make a decision. At the very least, I expect things to clarify themselves in a week or two.

Finances

Finances were simply steady this month. Net worth went up at exactly an average rate. Dividends increased by an expected $50/month, half through mutual fund investments and half through a slug of WMT which was in a slump and looked juicy.

I also bought a bunch of stuff in Lending Club - I'd accumulated a small balance in addition to the small amount I put in the account monthly. I continue to get very, very reliable returns. Maybe I'm just lucky or I do some strange screening.

I've been doing the normal regular donations as well, Kiva mostly. I'm thinking of setting aside an additional $100/month to donate to entertainment I enjoy, produced by people who ask for contributions. Stuff like podcasts, NPR, open source software, videos, websites, etc. A few months back I signed up to donate $3/month to Wikimedia Foundation. Not a lot, but it's something. After all, how often do you read Wikipedia? All the time!

DutchGirl
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Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by DutchGirl »

Nice to read that you've got two good options to choose from at work. Good luck with making the actual choice :-)

Legthorn Brownboat
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Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by Legthorn Brownboat »

About the new job possibility, one of the advantages of the ERE mindset (and accumulated wealth) is the freedom to try your hand at interesting, if ambitious, opportunities. It sounds like you have a choice between interesting and engaging work, but questionable/unknown leadership, vs your existing mundane work with great leadership. If you weren't financially solvent, then it's tempting to stick with the devil you know, but your buffer should allow you the ability to make your own calls. You've earned that privilege, why does it feel like it has to be all-or-nothing, i.e. aiming for either full exit or full security?

If you're worried about not living up to expectations, what do you fear from that? Do you know of others who have been in that situation? What happened to them?

If you fear loss of job, then tactically consider the timeline before that can happen (likely many months), along with opportunities to make a jump to another team/project/job in time. It's likely that you can always go back to similar work that you have now. Even if it must end in termination, you were gainfully employed for enough of a product/review cycle plus termination period plus severance, which could put you firmly in FI, if that's your goal. At that point, you could find or even found a non-profit and program for something you believe in.

If you fear letting down authorities in your life or not meeting their approval, consider for how long you'll weigh their approval so high. Given that this is a forum where everyone is planning or at least contemplating an exit from their position, approval from higher ups is rather short-lived. Of course, even without a exit, that approval tends to also be short lived and under rewarded, but that's another conversation.

If you fear failure or letting yourself down, I think you already have the answer in your post. The code is bad, you can make real contributions, and you crave the chance to practice your programming skills. What is failure like in that case? Is that so bad?

If you fear opportunity cost, well it seems like you have a pretty good handle (as good as one can have in your position, at least) on what that cost is. You should know your current role well, and while the future is always uncertain and there might be a rainbow on the horizon, those also sometimes end up being carrots on sticks, always held just out of reach. From your description, it seems the new job possibility is the better opportunity.

Finally, make the decision early, before the supposed deadline, and own it. You'll be better served with decisiveness, once you've given it a fair consideration, and you never know when the opportunity will disappear. I've certainly seen more secure ones vanish for friends.

m741
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Location: Seattle, WA

Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by m741 »

Thanks, Legthorn. I think that's good advice. I'm not worried about losing a job or letting down personal authorities, or opportunity cost. Mostly about not living up to expectations - my own and others'. You're right, I can definitely do a better job than the way things were. So even if I don't do a perfect job, it'll be an improvement on the way things were.

I'm gonna push over the next two weeks and see what happens.

zarathustra
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Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by zarathustra »

My vote is to surround yourself with as many inspiring/intelligent/fun people as you can. Whichever choice brings you a higher likelihood of that kind of environment gets my vote (because you asked for my vote, right? ;) ). This will allow you more opportunity to learn, be inspired, and have a good time doing it. Sure there are things to learn from moving "up", but not all of what you learn may be what you *want* to learn if you know what I mean.

"They" say you become the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with, right? Choose your environment wisely.

m741
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Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by m741 »

May, 2015

What happened?

Outside work, I visited Chicago for a weekend with the girlfriend. Definitely one of my favorite cities. Up there with Seattle, Dresden, Lucca, Ghent, Reykjavik & Verona as among the most livable cities I've visited. I liked it better than NYC, and want to go back.

Outside that, it's been a busy month, but nothing really notable.

Job

Well, I made the big move to the new job. It's weird because it's an internal transfer, and the transfer time is 2 months. So my manager knows I'm leaving, but nobody else. And I'm working part-time on the new team, and they have a big release coming up. So there's some pressure to work on that, but I also have my current job, where I don't want to let anyone down. It's a lot to juggle. Right now I'm not very happy, but the official move when I stop working on the current team is the start of August, and I can handle two months of this. Blech.

It's one of those situations where it's easy to second-guess. The new team is a lot less formal, less 'nitpicky', and much faster moving. I'm still getting familiar with their procedures and the people. I think it's a much better fit for me, though the people are a little more weird (not that I've spent a whole lot of time with them). On the other hand, the team I was on was really good, and very well run. I just didn't feel I was growing much. I'm already happier with the work I'm doing on the new team. I just wish I had a clearer picture of the management.

I'm sure I'll have updates over the coming months.

Finances

Another steady month. Continuing to invest (Lending Club, Vanguard funds), saw monthly dividend income hop a bit as some dividends got raised. Small increase in net worth. There's not a whole lot to say here. I haven't started my experiment to donate $100 to things that bring me joy. I'll do that this month.

I continue to donate and may try putting some more cash in Kiva as a temporary thing (historically I've viewed Kiva money put in Kiva as straight donations that would never round trip). But this would be a better use for cash than having it sit around.

Plans

I'm going to a few concerts this month. The girlfriend and I are also trying an experiment where we listen to just two bands/musicians in a given month. This month it's the Rolling Stones and Neil Young. Two bands I like as a casual listener but which I'm not very familiar with.

I run twice a week midday at lunch. I like it, it's a nice way to break up the day. There's showers and lockers, so it's pretty convenient.

Not much else. I expect to do a lot of work over the next two months and won't have a lot of free time.

George the original one
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Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by George the original one »

Dresden, Lucca, Verona I can see... Seattle if you don't have to commute or otherwise deal with traffic. But Chicago? Hmm, I suppose if you like NYC, then it fits. Haven't been to Ghent (Antwerp is similar, I think) or unpronounceable Iceland.

m741
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Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by m741 »

June, 2015

What happened?

Another pretty slow month, outside of work. In fact, most of the month was working and recovering from work. That said, the girlfriend and I have a busy schedule ahead, through September, at least. Six concerts, two sports events, a trip to Seattle, a trip to Texas, and a trip to upstate NY. Phew!

We're going to a bunch of classic rock concerts. For example, The Who (with Joan Jett). My thought is simply that this is an acceptable one-time expense. I don't expect the performances to be amazing, but honestly, it's The Who. I'd like to see them once in my life. Same goes for Ringo Starr. I get to see a Beatle perform live. Ok!

We went to see rush play Rush earlier this week, and it was actually a great performance. Probably falls somewhere in my top 5 concerts.

Job

Well, it's been keeping me busy. I'm basically working two jobs, as I transition to the new team, which means a return to finance-type hours. It's exhausting... you sort of acclimate to the hours if you work them all the time, but you lose that adaptation if you go back to normal hours. Like an athlete getting out of shape.

I'll start with the bad news, which is that the team's planning process is pretty messed up. There's a lot that needs to be fixed, and the focus is pretty bad. The good news is that pretty much everybody realizes this except the manager. I think maybe this wasn't the case in the past, but we'll see what happens and if the team can adjust. There's also a lot more flexibility: I can have a larger impact. So I'm psyched about that, just nervous about the direction. Thankfully I don't really have a long-term goal at the company, so it's ok if it all goes to hell over the next year or two.

Finances

Net worth decreased a tiny amount due to Greek issues, but not a big deal. There's more buying opportunities and a chance to get things on sale. Dividends continue to increase. I also got an 'equity refresh' at work, which means I'll have more stock vesting in the future. It's relatively small by historical standards, but I'm not about to complain - the timing of my transfer was such that I expected to get completely screwed over and seeing something of value was a nice surprise.

Hobbies

I read a random article about bare-metal Raspberry Pi programming, and I found a good tutorial that I've been working through. It's assembly programming, without an operating system, reading and sending data directly to pins or the GPU. So far I've gotten an LED blinking and drawn a gradient on my TV. I like it, but apparently you can do the same thing with C, so I'm planning on switching after I get through the tutorial. I think it's a fun hobby and I picked up some additional equipment, including a long-deferred soldering iron purchase. I've been working with Arduino on and off for a while and want to pick all that up. You can get super-cheap electronic components from China, and there's tons of cool things to build.

I also started playing a lot more video games after work, due to the Steam summer sale (one of two times per year that I buy games), and also because I haven't had energy for a lot else after work.

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Chris
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Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by Chris »

m741 wrote: We went to see rush play Rush earlier this week, and it was actually a great performance. Probably falls somewhere in my top 5 concerts.
Nice! This is the first Rush tour I'll miss since 2002.

Hope your other acceptable one-time expenses also make it into your top 10. For myself, I'll be seeing Joan Jett on Saturday.

m741
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Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by m741 »

July, 2015 (Part I)

A lot of things happened this month, so I figured I'd break out the big developments from the financial minutiae (minutiae to follow).

The first big thing was that I asked my girlfriend to move in with me, and she said yes. I'm super-psyched. We always have a great time together, play tons of games, watch movies, and generally have a good time. She's a great friend and companion and I think we'll have fun. We haven't settled on a date, but it looks like she'll move in ~2 months.

A few things that fall out of that which relate to ERE: first, I think I know I'll be wasting less time on the internet, which is the primary bane of my existence. Which means that, even with watching more movies together and so on, I'll be more productive. At least, that's the theory, and maybe some of you are laughing right now...

Second, I will see some additional savings. It works out like this: toiletries will be split down the middle, which should save some minor amount (on soaps, etc), but I don't expect a lot there. We'll also be splitting some subscription services, which will result in a more notable savings. Right now I subscribe to Amazon Prime, Netflix and HBO Go. We'll definitely split Netflix, I'm cancelling HBO Go (until Game of Thrones returns - True Detective is a disappointment). I think we'll split Prime. I'd be happy to cancel my prime subscription, or vice versa. In total this will be $30-$40 month. Splitting utilities will net $30-50 a month.

We'll also be splitting rent, and I came up with a deal that seems equitable. Rent is $1275, so she'll pay $637, but half of that will go to paying down student loans. Thus, I'll be saving $318 per month. I really don't want her to have student loans hanging over her head, and I have none. So this seems fair.

All told, I expect I'll end up saving about $400 a month, give or take. There'll probably be more toiletry expenses, and less grocery/restaurant expenses, tough to estimate but I think it'll net out.

The second big announcement is that I discussed my long-term travel plans with the gf and she seems to be on-board. The plans are this: in 2017, I'd like to quit my job and travel for something like a year. Could be 6 months and I get sick of it, or it could be 2 years if I love it. Who knows? I'd like to do some off-the-wall travel (buy a van in New Zealand and travel there for a few months; hike the Pacific Crest Trail; etc) but I'm still in the dream phase. I'd also like to do some off-the-wall work to subsidize costs and because I think it would be interesting. Crew a sailboat/yacht; WWOOF on tea farms or volunteer, etc. Some things that could subsidize the cost. I feel so provincial in my outlook and experiences.

Also, my father is getting older, and I'd like to do something big with him before the trip officially starts. Maybe a few hundred miles of backpacking, or riding motorcycles or something. I don't know what this would be either. But I've seen so little of him since I started working...

My overall goal, as my 20s run out, is to have had some major adventures that I'm proud of. Right now, I've had one. I want to see more of the world, in a slow, deliberate way that's impossible while working (maaaaybe I'll try to finagle a remote work deal of some kind).

This is all super-tentative. I'm just happy to have brought it up with my gf; I'll have to have more serious discussions in the future, but I think we'll be able to iron out the details.

I've discussed this all before, but I've gotta say it feels like it's really happening. And now I've got a list of things I want to do that have a real timeline. Things like learning spanish, getting in shape, and picking up skills like photography. There's a specific reason I want to do these things, so I have a new sense of urgency.

Suggestions for cool adventure are welcome!

m741
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Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by m741 »

July, 2015 (Part II)

I posted the exciting stuff first... here's the routine stuff!

What happened?

I took a trip to Austin, TX, with the gf, to go to a wedding. It was pretty exhausting for me - I don't enjoy spending extended periods of time together with people. The two exceptions are the gf and people at work (where I can be with people but not *engaged with* them). On the other hand, I had a great time at the wedding.

I grabbed a near-complete set of homebrew supplies for $20 (6-gallon carboy, wort chiller, various valves and tubes). I'll be making some beer as soon as the weather cools down a bit.

Finally, I picked up tickets to Seattle and London, which will be the two big trips for the remainder of the year (Seattle at the end of this month and London over Christmas/New Years).

Job

I officially changed jobs at the end of the month. I was really working with smart people before, and I'm interested to see how the new team pans out. I don't have a lot to say here - nothing changed until the very end of July. I'm more detached, of course, because there's an even more tangible end-date.

Finances

Pretty good month financially. Markets took a big hit but then more-than recovered to bring me to a long-awaited positive month. I didn't make many discretionary purchases, mostly dumping the dead-weight Seadrill, a company I bought for dividends, but which cut them and hasn't recovered. Good riddance - I purchased it on an impulse and it doesn't fit with my other companies.

In total, my expected monthly dividends rose $40 this month, mostly from scheduled mutual fund and ETF purchases.

Finally, a small note: I signed up for a Patreon account, and there's two Youtubers whose videos I now pay $1 for. Not a lot, but it's the start of paying for free things that bring me enjoyment.

m741
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Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by m741 »

August, 2015

What happened?

August was super-busy. I flew to Texas for a 4 days at the start of the month, took a 3-hour (each direction) bus ride to visit my father and step-mother midmonth, and then did a week out in Seattle at the end of the month. Lots of travel time, and I hate buses and airplanes...

I was also starting a new job and doing a lot of other things besides. So, I'm glad that I don't have any travel plans for a few months, though weekends in September and early October remain busy. I'm looking forward to getting into a good routine. The next big trip is for Christmas.

I'd go into more details, but I remain busy and setting aside enough time for tabulating monthly totals was enough.

Job

The new job is, I guess, a "hot mess". I'm learning quite a bit, and I like working on a smaller team much more than a larger team. But the team dynamics are all over the place. I'm still letting things settle out, trying to figure out my role. I remain sort of detached, as a defense mechanism.

Finances

Yuck... like most others in the market, I took a bath this month, seeing my net worth down 4%. Strangely, every single holding was down month-on-month, stocks and bonds alike, except for my small holding in gold, which didn't exactly skyrocket.

It's a bit of a shock, and though I always like seeing small modest gains, I'm not really panicking. Right now it just seems like a good buying opportunity, though as always I'm leery of a dip. I'm simply continuing my regular spending/dividend reinvestment for now.

The one bright point is that a few late payers on Lending Club paid their outstanding balances. And I found some good buying opportunities there as well - I only trade on Lending Club, never buy new (I guess maybe people were liquidating after taking hits on the market, not sure).

What am I doing?

My three focuses right now are on Spanish, getting healthy (this time for real, I swear!), and drawing. I'm simply using DuoLingo for basic grammar and vocab right now to build up a base for conversation. As for drawing, I'm reading through "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" and doing the exercises. I enjoy it.

I'm also doing some work scanning old photo albums, for backup and so I can discard old photos that I don't care so much about. It's relaxing and kinda fun.

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I'd post more, but it's been pretty hectic for me here and I was late enough as-is!

spoonman
Posts: 695
Joined: Thu Mar 28, 2013 4:15 am

Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by spoonman »

I rememer the days, back in grad school, when I actually enjoyed business travel. The last time I had to fly for a business trip I can back sick, as usual.

Indeed, the market is down but you can back up the truck and buy more good companies on the cheap.

DuoLingo...I'll have to check that out, thanks for the suggestion.

m741
Posts: 1187
Joined: Tue Jan 18, 2011 3:31 am
Location: Seattle, WA

Re: m741's ERE Journal

Post by m741 »

August/September Follow-up

I mentioned in my last post that I was pretty busy. I'm a little less busy now and thought I'd give a bit more of an update.

It's a pretty weird situation for me - I've got a lot of things that I'm juggling right now, even outside of hobbies and interests. Here's a rundown:

- Still settling in to the new job. It's a bit stressful (more than the other job), but I think that's just how work is for me generally. I postponed any attempts at promotion this year, since I was changing jobs, etc. But I'd like to push for promotion early next year, so I'm thinking about paperwork etc. This promotion is 1/3 better money, 1/3 vanity, 1/3 resume fodder. Maybe 1/2 vanity :D . to top it off, I just spent two weeks in 'crunch' mode, finishing the end of last week.

- Girlfriend is moving in later this week (!!!) So there's been a lot of organizing, cleaning, donating, etc. Plus of course I'm nervous as realistically this is my biggest lifestyle change since college (excepting the 2-month roadtrip).

- I was out in Seattle with the GF a few weeks back, and I went through the storage unit I'd had out there since my mother passed away. I brought pretty much all the personal stuff back: scrapbooks, videos, photos, etc. It was a lot of luggage... Anyway, I don't want to hold onto this stuff forever (it's probably about 4 rubbermaid containers worth of stuff), so I've been pulling apart and scanning scrapbooks (scanning _everything_), then tossing 75% of the photos and papers. I have a device that records VHS to my computer. Then, I back everything up online (photos on Amazon Cloud Drive, and videos on Google Drive). It takes a long time, but it's also interesting and satisfying, and something that I'd been postponing forever... the kind of thing where you worry a fire will destroy things. It's emotionally exhausting at times, though.

- I've been thinking about how I want to discuss money with GF. We've talked a bit about things, and I mentioned that I want to take time to travel in somewhat under 2 years, but there's been something of a veil. I think financially we're fairly compatible: I'm not quite as conservative with money now, and she's still sorta in a college mindset. We're in very different places financially: college debt vs savings. But my biggest concern is that her family is not good with money, and they're right at retirement age. I believe they have no savings. They're working, right now, but how long will they be able to, and what will we do at that point?

- I'm trying to settle all sorts of inherited accounts. I won't go into details, but I botched some of these accounts about a year ago. Not horribly, but it was a costly mistake. Now I'm trying to figure out how to salvage things. There's a bunch of accounts that I've had to go through, and just lots of phone calls to financial companies figuring out how annuities and IRAs work.

- I'm reaching the final draw-down of my cash reserves, with about 3 months of cash left. Maybe that will carry me through bonus season? I'm starting to look what I can do to maintain cash reserves without reducing my regular investments, but I'd been investing at a really aggressive rate. Now the market's down and I'm running low on cash! Boo!

- I've been tracking lots of little long-deferred tasks (eg, oiling boots, contacting landlord about basement storage, emailing people), and I've been good about knocking things out. It feels good to resolve these things. The inherited accounts bit mentioned above is part of this.

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So, yeah. It's been busy.

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