Too Old To Retire "Young"

Where are you and where are you going?
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Sclass
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Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by Sclass »

I use a bunch of security items that might help.

I recently acquired a Skybell internet connected doorbell camera. Photographs everyone approaching the door and chimes my iPhone. I can answer them over intercom if I’m connected to the net. It’s good for crooks who like to knock to see if somebody is home. It may be useless if they don’t care if their photo is captured. It seems like a nice deterrent. It took me a whopping twenty minutes to set up. I’m very happy with it.

I started locking my side gate with a little three digit combination lock. The local cops said if I discouraged crooks from coming around back I could up my chances of being passed up.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

I am so angry on your behalf. I take it more personally when women attempting to live independently are knocked about in such a fashion. Rather surprising that your dogs were not more of a deterrent, although wonderful that they were not harmed. Unfortunately, I think it is likely that many of us will have to allot more time/energy/money to security in coming years. The frustrating problem being that it is sometimes difficult to buy security without also being forced into buying luxury.

EdithKeeler
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Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by EdithKeeler »

Thanks, everyone. Yeah, being robbed has sucked. I still don't have my back door fixed--dealing with Home Depot and super busy at work. The good news is the insurance company was great, although I learned that I was WOEFULLY underinsured for my jewelry. I had quite a bit of gold jewelry, though seldom wore most of it, and usually went to a handful of favorite pieces (which were not stolen because they weren't in the jewelry boxes). The basic jewelry limit is $1000. I sent my list of items in, described as best I could, and the adjuster said, "well, we stopped valuing it when we hit $5000 because we were so far over your limit." Yikes. Especially stupid for me because I work in .... insurance. I should know better. I just hadn't really thought about all those bits and pieces, collected over the years, really were worth that much, though I should have, because i know the price of gold is up. So.... learn from my mistake.

The funny thing about it, though, is that losing my stuff has made me want to declutter even more. Weird, I know. I guess it's because I've realized that I had all those things that i wasn't properly valuing--just sort of sitting there, and i don't really even miss them since they're gone. The sentimental stuff, I do, but not the valuable stuff. It's just odd. I've been tossing through closets like crazy the last few weeks.

My college roommate, her freshman year, had a dorm fire. The entire dorm was pretty much destroyed, though no one got hurt, fortunately. She became sort of a hoarder (a little, not TV worthy...) after that, because she lost so much. But she went thru a phase for several years where she bought RIDICULOUS amounts of clothes and stuff, because for a while there she had nothing.

Getting robbed has had sort of an opposite effect on me, i think. Maybe I want to get rid of stuff so there's nothing left for them to steal. (Well, we're sort of there already now, anyway).

EdithKeeler
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The Shame...

Post by EdithKeeler »

I am writing this as a reminder to myself. My biggest financial issue, over which I have the absolute MOST control, is eating out and buying grab-n-go meals. I am ashamed to admit this, but I’m going to write this down here, for anyone to see…. According to my credit card “Spend Analyzer,” I spent <gulp> $6430 on restaurants in the last 12 months. Um…. that’s for one person. There are (just a couple) caveats to this: whenever we go on vacation, I put all our drinks and meals on my credit card for cashback bonus, and DBF pays me back for most of it and we went on 3 vacations last year. And I buy restaurant meals pretty often for my mom and brother.

But still… I’m responsible for the vast bulk of this ridiculous amount that works out to over $500 a month. (I’m not even going to talk about what I spend at the grocery store--which is another ridiculous amount--my only excuse there is that “groceries” also include pet foot, toiletries, etc).

Damn…. I just realized I spent almost one Jacob on restaurants alone!!!

So, the goal that I am setting right now is to cut that restaurant number in half for 2018. (Actually, I’ve “only” spent $199 so far this month, so I’ve already improved). I have been pretty conscientious about packing my lunch to take to work most days, and I take breakfast, too, so I don’t stop on the way. I usually take my mom lunch on Saturday, with a stop at a restaurant--today I bought a roasted chicken (cold--half price!) the grocery store and other supplies and made salads for her and my brother and myself. Total cost was still relatively high for a salad, but even with artichoke hearts, hearts of palm, chicken, lettuce, etc., the total cost was roughly $20 for the three of us…. And I have leftovers. (I spent $34 out at lunch Thursday for just my own lunch--ouch. That’s really painful to admit….).

To that end, I just spent some time preparing breakfasts for the coming week (turkey sausage, eggs with zucchini, pepper and onion). The sausage was $3.99 for 10 links, eggs were 2.12 a dozen, the pepper was .89, the onion and zucchini roughly the same (can’t find the receipt at the moment). So that’s about a buck fifty a breakfast (free coffee at work) for next week. Lunches/dinners are being cooked now--chicken breast with salsa verde, tortilla, black beans with various veggies. Also planning a pasta meal to rotate with lunches/dinners. All less than $2 a meal and definitely tastier than fast food. Spending that is so ridiculous, too, because I like to cook and am a pretty good cook. It’s simply laziness on my part.

OTCW
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Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by OTCW »

I got burglared a while back. Stole my Husqvarna Chainsaw, and a tool bag full of wrenches that were in my mudroom at the time. Don't think they went any further into the house than that. It happened while I was mowing the back yard and left the house unlocked. I live on a dead end, so I'm thinking it was someone who lives around me rather than a passing car. Frustrating and sad.

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Sclass
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Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by Sclass »

EK I’ve had the same feeling when I discuss the missing stuff in my mother’s home with the rest of the family. People get so upset that we’ve lost family treasures but I’m just numb now. I don’t care anymore. That stuff was a source of pain and now it’s gone.

Now I just want to roll that whole house up and sell it to the highest bidder and convert it into interest bearing paper. I’m so sick of owning stealable stuff.

Hope something good comes out of this. I can see a glimmer of silver in your cloud.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

Do you think there is any link between your recent break-in and your renewed resolve to cook more often? The reason why I ask is that in human pattern analysis, the "wall" and the "hearth" are both primary components of "home." So, you might be feeling a subconscious urge to throw logs on the central fire.

Don't feel ashamed about your restaurant spending. My food lifestyle has been completely out of whack for the last year or two. Disjointed combination of restaurant meals with my BF, heirloom tomatoes from my garden, and dollar store cookies.

Clarice
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Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by Clarice »

Hello EK,
I am very sorry to hear about your burglary. You've mentioned the fingerprint powder: it looks like the police is doing its job. My husband's sister was rubbed a few years ago. When she inquired about the fingerprints the police officer just laughed and said they take fingerprints only for murder victims because of the backlog.
Thank you for sharing your "shame". We all have our fair share of those. It makes it easier to share when other people are honest and stay away from "marketing your frugal self". :)

FBeyer
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Re: The Shame...

Post by FBeyer »

EdithKeeler wrote:
Sat Jan 27, 2018 5:52 pm
...I am ashamed to admit this, but I’m going to write this down here, for anyone to see...
Don't beat yourself up, set up a system to help you move on instead. If you're a good cook, but pretty lazy, figure out what causes you to be lazy, when you're lazy and when you might have the energy to cook something nice for yourself. Schedule time in your calendar, like weekends say, and cook then. You'll clear out mental space that way, you'll cook more, you'll feel more accomplished, you wont have to beat yourself up for wasting money on things you didn't truly want to buy, you'll save time during your weekdays where you might be tired from work and walking the dogs.


I'm happy to hear that you've managed to somehow find something positive about the burglary. I know I might soon start to come across as a preachy newborn-minimalist but getting rid of stuff and learning how little I thrive with has been one of the most enlightening things I've learned in my life. Math, programming, construction, and minimalism. I can live anywhere and do almost anything by now. I hope you find at least as much happiness in owning less as I have.

FBeyer
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Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by FBeyer »

One more thing:
Right now you want to write more books in 2018.
You are considering a more minimalist/simple living approach to your stuff (PM me if you want recommendations, books, tips, advice anything on the topic)
and you want to learn programming?

Which of these are important AND urgent? Obviously you should be pretty shaken about a burglary, but from a complete stranger's point of view it could appear like you're sublimating. Are you 100 percent certain you wouldn't rather want to scream, cry, and beat the shit out of someone rather than optimze your existence?

EdithKeeler
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Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by EdithKeeler »

Which of these are important AND urgent? Obviously you should be pretty shaken about a burglary, but from a complete stranger's point of view it could appear like you're sublimating. Are you 100 percent certain you wouldn't rather want to scream, cry, and beat the shit out of someone rather than optimze your existence?
Hmmm. Now THAT is some food for thought.... Thanks.

EdithKeeler
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Optimist/Pessimist

Post by EdithKeeler »

We talk a lot on these boards about being an introvert or extrovert, but I was thinking today that I think successful ERE probably has a lot to do with being an optimist. I suppose you could be a pessimist and still successfully retire early--I would think a pessimist doing ERE is the person who mostly socks away a BIG chunk of money because s/he thinks the worst is going to happen--and maybe lives in a bunker with 5 years of food stocked away as well. "The shit's inevitably gonna hit the fan, and I'm as ready as I can be," maybe. (though there's something optimistic about that, in and of itself....). But I think mostly pessimists are going fall into the "There's no way I'm gonna save enough to retire early, so I might as well eat, drink and be as merry as a pessimist like myself can be, and buy a new car every year, too, because I'm going to die in my office chair at age 97 in debt anyway."

Optimists are more likely to ERE, to me, because they seem to be the people who say "I can fix/do/be anything, and what I can't fix/do/be, I'll learn! Just give me a few YouTube videos and a stocked toolbox and I'm ready for anything. Plus, I don't need no stinkin' job to define me--I know who i am." They don't need a lot of money because they truly probably can fix/do/be or make a friend who can fix/do/be what they need. That's really how I see ERE-ers. Supremely confident people who are correspondingly very ABLE. I see this in Jacob, 7wannabe, cmonkey and others on these boards.

I was thinking today that I think I used to be more optimistic, but I'm turning a little bit into the pessimistic person who just shoves a lot of money in the bank because i don't think I can handle or weather the rigors of early retirement sufficiently. I think I'm still an optimist in general--I have blue/down moments, but generally I am optimistic about the future in most ways. I think, though, what has changed for me, is watching my mom's health struggles in old age and that's made me less optimistic about the future. And I suppose I've had my own run of bad luck lately. My whole life I've been like that Seinfeld episode, where Jerry loses a $20, then gets it back--he never loses, even Steven. I think that's pretty much how I've viewed my own life--something bad might happen, but good things sort of even it out. Really more than even it out, if you think about things we talk about today like white privilege, etc. Yeah, my life has been overall much more good than bad. And generally, with things i've been interested in, I've been the "bag of tools and YouTube" gal myself. But I think certain things are pushing me over to the pessimist side. My break-in and that helpless, pissed off feeling that accompanies it. I had two bad upper respiratory infections essentially back to back late last year, and I NEVER get sick. (Really I think it was the same one that I never quite got over). I fell and hurt my knees pretty badly in September. Early this week I was felled by something like a norovirus thing that resulted in some of the worst (tmi alert) vomiting and diarrhea I have EVER had in my life, and then my back went out when I was helping my mom up from a fall. Work has been going worse than usual for a lot of reasons, and personal stuff hasn't been so hot, either. It's been a SHITTY few months (a few days of that I don't mean it figuratively....) and lately I feel a pessimism that I don't generally feel. It's not depression, but more a feeling that I'm getting older and my health is eventually going to decline like my mom's has, and it's more important than ever to stock up on cash to buy my way out of future problems. I do need to work on my fitness--the back thing is definitely a fitness issue, and I'm looking at hiring a trainer because I frankly just don't have strong enough internal motivation to make myself do what i need to do (but that's a sort of pessimistic "buy your way out of a problem" thing, too.

Anyway.... this is really just a public musing. I still have very little to complain about, and crappy things happen to everyone. (But really, that norovirus thing--I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy). And maybe this is also a symptom of getting older. I think about young adult years when I had like three things in life to worry about about--food, shelter and getting to work. That was about it. (The "where are we going for drinks after work" I knew was optional and never worried about!!). When I was really young I had absolute certainty that I was going to be rich, famous, and fabulously happy. These days I worry about work, making sure I have enough to retire, I worry about family, pets, house maintenance, my own health, am I doing what I want to creatively, who's going to take me to the doctor when I get old, will i be able to afford/handle my future medical/disability issues...... Worry is really too strong a word. It's really things I'm responsible for, not that I worry about--I'm not staying up at night worrying about getting my taxes done.

I think maybe I'm just realizing my mortality and hating it, hence feeling pessimistic. It may just be that simple.

Thanks for letting me ramble.

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Sclass
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Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by Sclass »

I try to think of myself as what you would call an optimist. However I recall having a conversation in the cafeteria of my first grown up job where I discussed the giant mortgage a young coworker took on that week. He claimed “Hey don’t worry, you know we will make more money every year.” I wasn’t so sure. In fact I thought he was assuming a lot. He did go on to make more money but not more every year. He’s gone sideways for decades and lives in that same home. My take is I thought I’d be fired at anytime and I’d be forced to work in my family’s business. So I acted like the job was the last good salary.

Yeah watching parents fall apart is sobering. I’m there too. One thing I see is everything they thought was important doesn’t mean squat now. All that matters for Mom is her supply of wet wipes, ensure, depends, paper bed pads and her 24hr team. I stumble over her assorted collections in her sprawling house. It is all a liability if her oxygen tank bursts into flames. Crystal bowls, vases, Tiffany lamps, oriental carpets, old violins :x just slow me down. The house looks like the storage room from at Hogwarts. The pragmatic side of me wonders why she didn’t have he vision to buy nothing and just put her money away in an investment account for the day I needed to withdraw it for Depends.

Try a Hoyer lift. I got one for our caregivers. Some of them aren’t strong enough to heft my mom by hand. I got mine (a $2000 model) for $250 on Craigslist. There are tons of wheelchairs, walkers, lifts, shower chairs etc. forsale there cheap. If you are willing to hear the sad story about a parent’s last days you can fetch a second hand human crane cheap. One of our caregivers is really good at picking Mom up alone. She uses a milk stool as an intermediate step. First she sits her up on the floor. Then she gets her butt on the milk stool. Then she hefts her up into a regular chair.

Good luck.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

I was reading something recently on the difference between optimism and hope. Made me realize that I am generally more hopeful than optimistic. I mean, "the sun will come up tomorrow" is a purely rational statement, but sometimes people who are actually behaving in a "hopeless" manner claim to be rational. In a way, my permaculture project is based on rational evaluation of worst-case scenario in which availability of solar energy is all that remains. I am not optimistic that I could survive such a situation, but I am hopeful that I could survive and even once again thrive in such a situation. I am not the sort of person who would throw herself off a building if I lost all my money in the stock market. Losing just means that somebody pushed the re-set button on the game and maybe changed some of the rules.

OTOH, I totally grok what you are saying about health and aging. I have had a cr*p year myself. I just tell myself that if I am not devoting at least 2 hours/day, 6 days/week to taking care of Zone00 (my body) then money saved towards health or elder care is almost irrelevant. One of the primary benefits of achieving FI (or being full-time aging sugar-baby) is that you then have the luxury of spending your entire morning at the hot yoga studio, or some such equivalent. At the studio I used to attend, there were women in their 60s/70s in great shape who would nap at the studio in between first and second class. It would probably be better to be an indigent homeless 63 year old woman with an unlimited hot yoga studio pass than the opposite.

EdithKeeler
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Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by EdithKeeler »

I was reading something recently on the difference between optimism and hope. Made me realize that I am generally more hopeful than optimistic. I mean, "the sun will come up tomorrow" is a purely rational statement, but sometimes people who are actually behaving in a "hopeless" manner claim to be rational. In a way, my permaculture project is based on rational evaluation of worst-case scenario in which availability of solar energy is all that remains. I am not optimistic that I could survive such a situation, but I am hopeful that I could survive and even once again thrive in such a situation. I am not the sort of person who would throw herself off a building if I lost all my money in the stock market. Losing just means that somebody pushed the re-set button on the game and maybe changed some of the rules.
I think for me “hope” is about things over which I have zero control: “I hope I never get Parkinson’s!”

Optimism is about being able to exert control over situations: “But if I do get Parkinson’s, I’m optimistic that my quality of life will be better than my mom’s because I’ll take steps to maintain my fitness as long as possible, as well as have plans in place for when I need outside help.”

Of course, my pessimistic side says: “Who am I kidding? I’ll probably just get cancer like my dad and die!” :D :D

Jason

Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by Jason »

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/29/nyre ... erson.html

Might bring some perspective to your imminent demise.

EdithKeeler
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Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by EdithKeeler »

Good piece. It’s worth noting that the people described all seem to have family around them or have built community one way or another in their facility. I think that’s key to happy aging.

Jason

Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by Jason »

It’s going to be a book. I like the various perspectives - one doing his art, one considering marrying, one wanting to go on indefinitely, one not so much.

I doubt I’ll male it to that age but I’d I do I am using my old man card at every conceivable opportunity.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Too Old To Retire "Young"

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

So, first 2 hours any given day devoted to Health, second 2 hours any given day devoted to forming and maintaining personal village social structure, next 2 hours devoted to mental exercise towards erudition in the "library", next 2 hours devoted to maintenance of all the good things constituting "home" and "garden." Yup, very little time left to engage in "Creative Production and/or Lively Trade Towards Positive Flow of Money into System", certainly nothing like 8 hours/day, 5 days/week.

EdithKeeler
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Restaurant spending

Post by EdithKeeler »

So my goal for the year is to substantially reduce my restaurant spending. It's the end of the month, so decided to run a report on my credit card to see how I'm doing. Of course, I thought I was doing GREAT... pffpht. I managed to spend $421 on restaurants for the month of February. Geeze!! (My credit card number was stolen 2 weeks ago, so of course I thought there was a mistake, someone was running up restaurant tabs on my number. After careful scouring... nope. All mine).

For the month of January, though, it was only $253. So the average for 2 months is $337 a month, which is still a good bit less than the $535 I averaged last year, so I guess that's progress. But definitely need to nip it in March. I do have a double family birthday coming up--that won't be cheap. So definitely need to get in the groove of making lunches and breakfasts. When I plan, I do much better.

And--no lie--I ate 3 meals out today. Only one did I pay for. I'm really, really bad about eating out. It's my one thing. It's not really a blind spot, because I'm well aware I do it, but it's a combination of reasons why I do it. I consciously decided to eat out today, despite having a while internal monologue about why I shouldn't on the way home from work tonight. Tonight's reason for grabbing food? I didn't want to mess up my kitchen. (Yes, I could have heated soup in the microwave for minimal mess).

I've got at least 2 vacations coming up this year, and I count my eating out while on vacation. I definitely need to curtail it the rest of the time. I'm also going to start working from home more--that should curtail some of the lunch spending at work.

Gah. Shooting for under $250 next month.

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