Though I may still be internalizing the fact that I was self-employed last year, the IRS needs no convincing. If I had net earnings from self-employment over $400, which I very much did, then they consider me very much self-employed, and those earnings need to be reported. To be … | Continue reading
Telling people “I accidentally retired” usually gets a chuckle, but it’s actually pretty spot-on. I fully expected to go back to work once Stephanie started grad school, but I never did, and now here were are, five years later. I may need to retire that quip however, because 2023 … | Continue reading
Judging by the cottage industry of books and videos hawking strategies for “Getting Things Done”, most people seem to be overwhelmed by how much they have to do. My challenge is the opposite; I have a hard time coming up with what to do next. Even when I get into something (like … | Continue reading
I like to reflect on the financial decisions I’ve made over the past year because trying to explain them, in writing, ultimately forces me to better understand the machinery involved, and often suggests additional actions I might consider taking, now or in the future. “I’m sure y … | Continue reading
This is a reminder, as much to myself as anyone else, that if it’s early November, it’s time to make the eggnog—specifically aged eggnog—so it’ll be ready in time for the holidays. Picking up the ingredients for our 2022 batch (already had sugar and vanilla) I first learned abou … | Continue reading
This was the “back-of-the-envelope” analysis (to which I’d previously alluded) that convinced us to buy a house in Fresno for the duration of Stephanie’s 3-year doctoral program. Estimated Costs (over 3 years, as a % of purchase price) Commission 6.0% Property Tax (~1.27%/yr … | Continue reading
At some point in early 2021, I started seeing this thumbnail on YouTube all the time. YouTube really wanted me to watch “Timber Frame vs Conventional Stick Frame” Apparently I wasn’t alone. For reasons known only to The Algorithm, “Timber Frame vs Conventional Stick Frame” blew … | Continue reading
There was a time when I couldn’t wait to start drafting these annual reports. And then, 3 years ago, I stopped working. Without income to save, I thought, what did I have to say about saving? Only recently have I begun to appreciate how that sense of the word, what financial plan … | Continue reading
My alarm rang at 3:45 in the morning. I wanted to get in line early to secure a backcountry permit for Dad so he could complete the final 95 miles of the Continental Divide Trail within Glacier National Park. Though my sister had planned to backpack with him to the end, when the … | Continue reading
One row, highlighted red, near the bottom of the spreadsheet we use to manage the hike, has been giving us “the evil eye” since the beginning. This row has been threatening Dad with a 118-mile stretch of the CDT in the Bob Marshall Wilderness, between the popular Benchmark Trailh … | Continue reading
It had been a while since I’d stretched my legs, so late one morning I threw two sodas in my daypack and started hiking southbound. After the Roadwalk Reroute, things had started going according to plan—Dad had hiked 200 miles, all of it on-trail, and we’d met up half a dozen tim … | Continue reading
“So I’m thinking about walking around the fire” is how it started. In Lima a week earlier, I first learned that the Trail Creek Fire had closed 30 miles of the CDT, a span so negligible in Dad’s mind that his working plan when he reached the closure (in 200 miles) would be to ski … | Continue reading
Once outside the boundary of Yellowstone National Park, Dad took off, hiking nearly 22 miles in a single day. Though our 12th meetup was supposed to be 3 days after I left him in the park, he ended up hiking to a point where I could reach him after only 2. This set in motion the … | Continue reading
While on the phone with the Yellowstone Backcountry office, I learned that the area around Heart Lake, through which the CDT passes, is off-limits for 3 months—from April 1st through June 30th—so that mama bears can be with their newborn cubs undisturbed by humans. At his typical … | Continue reading
There was a 68-mile stretch of trail through the Wind River Range (between the Big Sandy Trailhead and the Green River Lakes Trailhead) without any points I could access by Jeep. In the best of times that would take Dad about 5 days, but we knew these were not the best of times. … | Continue reading
On the morning of the fourth day of our return to the Continental Divide Trail, Dad sent me the following inReach message: “It’s taken me 1 hour and 45 minutes to go one mile. I might not make it today. Pack one day of [food] for me and head toward me. Bring your tent.” What I s … | Continue reading
Got my first shot of the Pfizer–BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine on April 10 in Fresno Update: And I got my second on May 1st! Update: And I got my booster on November 12th! Update: And I got my bivalent booster on October 10, 2022! | Continue reading