five year update

 

FINANCES: I’m going to phone it in again this year with the update. Check prior contributions to see more history if you don’t know what this is about. Spending “budget” was $71,016 (based on 2% of net worth at EOY 2021): a meaningless amount that I won’t come close to hitting. Our estimated net worth went from $1,333,772 to $3,674,059 in five years. The biggest contributors to that (in order) were real estate appreciation, VTSAX appreciation, $200k early inheritance, student loan forgiveness, and semi-passive income. Philanthropy has gone way up. My stack of donation requests (junk mail) was six inches tall after coming back from a month-long vacation.

YEAR FIVE: Life is returning to normal post-pandemic. Wife and I have started traveling again. In addition to a few local state parks, we made a quick return visit to New York City. Friend and I went to Los Angeles for a bit. And as I alluded, wife and I just got back from four weeks in Ireland and the UK yesterday (Northern Ireland was country #20 for us). Wife and I have been volunteering with the Cornell University nest watch and bird feeder watch programs. I got back into racing after swearing it off. I was able to pull off a new personal record of 2:42:26 in the 2022 Carmel Marathon (also winning the 40+ division), improving on the time I would have earned without a wrong turn in a 2019 race on a harder course that mentally forced me into quitting. I put in over 6000 miles of training in 18 months to be able to come back and do that. I’ve been decent at dedicating more time to hiking, picking up litter, reading, watching movies, visiting friends/family, and playing games.

THE FUTURE: I still want to do less internet. I still want to learn to swim and move over to triathlon. I want to volunteer more, listen to my multi-channel hi-res audio more, and get back heavier into classic cinema. I am determined to improve my weightlifting, which I have already restarted. Lots of traveling. Two weeks in Japan with a friend in August 2022. Three weeks in California with wife in October 2022. Two weeks in Hawaii with wife in January 2023. One week in Japan with a different friend in March 2023. Two weeks in Spain/Portugal with wife in June 2023. Three weeks in (you guessed it) Japan with wife in August 2023. Need to brush up on the Japanese now that I think about it. Finally going to watch Better Call Saul since Breaking Bad was so great. Excited about the JWST. I will return to volunteering more often. And yes, I will do whatever the fuck I want.

IN CONCLUSION: I realize that not everyone was able to grasp the fact that much of the humor and abrasiveness in these updates (and comments) was tongue-in-cheek. Let me leave you with a serious final thought though. Capitalism is a cruel mistress. A man who finds himself in a position to squirrel away $100k can invest that amount, do nothing but sit on the couch all day, and still pull in more money than a full-time employee making minimum wage at a soul crushing job. This country does not reward hard work. It rewards privilege, awareness, dedication, and financial discipline. I am so lucky.