Early Retirement Extreme Forums

Savings rate for June: 75%

New possible (small) income stream: busking at the farmers' market. I put together a list of tunes and will get practicing. I'll probably report back with how it goes within the next two months.

Update on farmers' market busking: it costs $10 and according to a friend who works there and has seen many buskers, odds are I will make it back but not by much. It's still something I'm going to pursue for the experience.

Commitment: going to busk at the farmers' market August 13th.

canoe wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 25, 2022 4:37 pm

Commitment: going to busk at the farmers' market August 13th.

That's awesome. I've thought about this a few times but never had the courage to play publicly, outside of the odd porch, campfire, or house party. Who knows where this could take you:

https://alastairhumphreys.com/my-motiva ... ugh-spain/

Western Red Cedar wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 25, 2022 5:21 pm

https://alastairhumphreys.com/my-motiva ... ugh-spain/

Very inspiring!

Savings rate for July: 78%

i’m excited for your opportunity at busking, hope you enjoy it

also i didn’t know it was called that

I did the busking! I was nervous at first but it went pretty well and I'm really glad I did it. Feels great to have overcome the nervousness and tried something new.

Some notes:
- it cost $10/2-hour slot
- I got ~$46 total (I played for one 2-hour slot) so ~$36 profit

Congrats on finding the courage to do this, and also on making money in the arts!

Thanks grundomatic!

I went again on Saturday, this time bringing a guitar player with me. Together, we grossed $120 over the two hours! $27.5/hour each in profit.

Nice! I guess I had assumed you were playing guitar...what instrument do you play?

The fiddle - primarily Irish style.

Savings rate for August: 82%

Savings rate for September: 78%

Savings rate for October: 66.6%

Got an air quality monitor. Two problems: very high CO2 and PM2.5 levels.
Solution to the first: open a window.

Particulate matter is probably caused by the furnace in my building turning on, possibly also from smoke/exhaust etc from outside (but I'll need to monitor this second possibility to be sure now that we've taken steps to counter the furnace problem).
Solution: some small filters that attach to air vents (credit to my roommate) and a DIY air purifier (good-quality furnace filter duct-taped to the back of a box fan).

Savings rate for November: 76%

Things are getting sort of boring at this stage of my journey. My optimal path forward seems to be to get better at my job/find higher paying offers and not spend more money. I guess I could be learning about investing in my spare time or developing new skills, but the lure of the higher salary that comes with increasing specialization is hard to ignore.

I guess for now outside of work I'll just continue trying to hang out with people more and consider it "social capital building" so I can continue to feel somewhat connected to ERE and not just a boring lean-FIRE tech bro. I don't feel like there's enough time for anything else. That's why I want to retire early.

canoe wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 30, 2022 8:40 pm

I don't feel like there's enough time for anything else. That's part of why I want to retire early.

I feel the same way. The ol' grind. But you, boring? Nah. How many of your coworkers are busking at the farmer's market?