Lifestyle Archives - Page 13 of 18

What Will We Miss About Home While On The Road

June 8, 2015 JustinRoG Lifestyle, Parenting, Travel

Right now we are rushing to pack the last few items in our backpacks so we can hit the road for our seven week adventure in Mexico. I’m sure we’ll all have a great time while on the trip, but travel fatigue is also a possibility.

Before we leave, it’s a good time to reflect on how great our lives at home are by thinking about the things we’ll miss the most. Absence makes the heart grow fonder and you don’t know what you got till it’s gone, as they say. Even though we don’t spend a lot of money, I recognize by world standards that we live a luxuriously bountiful life that offers everything we need and then some.

The Early Retiree’s Weekly Schedule

May 26, 2015 JustinRoG Awesome!, Lifestyle

“But what will you do all day?” they ask when they hear you are going to retire early. “I could never retire, I would get so bored” they proclaim. Thank goodness there are tons of employers in this world who will gladly tell you how to spend your free time if you let them.

Don’t get me wrong – I get bored easily. The prospect of sitting in a waiting room for an hour without any source of entertainment or external stimulus scares me. It’s even scarier if I’m forced to watch day time TV while I wait.

Fortunately we live in the twenty first century, a glorious time filled with entertainment overload, instant digital connections, and unlimited choices of pastimes (indoors and outside).

The Sabbatical – A Mini-Retirement

May 18, 2015 JustinRoG Awesome!, Financial Independence, Lifestyle

For long time readers, you probably recall that Mrs. Root of Good is still working even though I retired over a year and a half ago. Maybe you’re wondering how we’re able to jump on a plane and head to Mexico for seven weeks if she’s still working full time?

The answer is a three month paid sabbatical.

A Day Of Early Retirement – Going on a Walkabout

March 16, 2015 JustinRoG Awesome!, Lifestyle, Travel

After a cold and abnormally snowy winter, the first day of beautiful spring-like weather came calling last week. We answered that call by getting outside and enjoying the fine weather. Even though it was Monday, a day that normally brings dread to cubicle dwellers the world over, we found ourselves embarking on foot for a journey to… a gas station? That rather strange destination, especially given our mode of transport, was sheer pretext to pull us out of doors and into the great urban Wilderness that surrounds us.

It was the most ordinary of mornings in the most extraordinary sense possible. We caught the budding cherry trees just before the blossoms opened. We passed by an empty bird nest temporary vacated or possibly deserted. A recent ice storm deposited scattered hulks of downed branches across the neighborhood’s yards, some already smartly stacked by the sidewalk obediently awaiting a ride to the city yard waste center.

My Version Of Financial Independence As A 17 Year Old

March 9, 2015 JustinRoG Financial Independence, Lifestyle, Parenting, Personal Finance

Half a lifetime ago I developed a financial independence plan before I knew anything about financial independence and early retirement. My 17 year old self scribbled out a poorly refined plan to never work again and live off of savings from a minimum wage job. The bottom line: I thought I needed $120,000 to fund a perfectly adequate lifestyle forever by living on $600 per month in interest.

The year was 1997, the place was North Carolina in the wonderful United States of America. The federal poverty level back in 1997 was $657 per month, which meant that I was planning on living below the poverty line (before I even knew what a poverty line was).

February 2015 Financial Update

March 2, 2015 JustinRoG Lifestyle, Personal Finance

February’s headline: “Massive net worth growth and tiny expenses”. Our net worth shot up $74,000 thanks to robust returns in our investment portfolio. We managed to spend less than $1,000 because two winter storms kept us partially housebound for two weeks. And we simply don’t spend a lot of money in general because we already own just about everything we need or want.

January 2015 Financial Update

February 3, 2015 JustinRoG Lifestyle, Personal Finance

How did we kick off 2015? With a month of average spending of course! January’s expenses of $2,548 were very average in spite of some lumpy expenses like the annual property tax bill. When it comes to spending money, average is good. Our income of $2,068 was on the smaller side and much lower than last month’s income.

Why We Chose The Worst School In The District

January 26, 2015 JustinRoG Lifestyle, Parenting

In my last article asking whether we should conceal our wealth, I mentioned the high poverty school that our children attend. We had a choice of many different elementary schools, and decided to go with the objectively worst school available based on traditional measures like test scores, percent of students in poverty, percent of students with limited English proficiency, and other demographics that most would say indicate a failing school. What persuaded us to choose this “failing school” was the direction it was headed and the fact that it was in our neighborhood only a few blocks away.

Should We Conceal Our Wealth?

January 16, 2015 JustinRoG Financial Independence, Lifestyle, Parenting

“Today my teacher asked me how we are able to go on another cruise so soon after the last one. I told my teacher that my daddy is retired and my mommy is about to retire, too. Then a kid in my class asked to borrow a few thousand dollars from me.”

That’s what my nine year old told me at dinner a few days ago. Some parents might freak out about how honest their kid was with their teachers and fellow classmates. Not me. But should I be more concerned?

December 2014 Financial Update

January 5, 2015 JustinRoG Financial Independence, Lifestyle, Personal Finance

We closed out the year with a financially busy month. With income exceeding $17,000 in December, we way more than covered our abnormally large expenses of about $10,000. We finished the year on a strong financial note and wrapped up a major home renovation project during the month. And booked another Caribbean cruise.