2008 was a great year. A lot of incredible things happened, paving the way for a better and brighter future for all. SpaceX launched the first commercial spacecraft into orbit, leading the way to the future of space exploration. The Large Hadron Collider at CERN powered up, leading to the discovery of the Higgs boson. Doctors grew an organ from a patient’s own stem cells and sequenced the entire genome of a cancer patient, both early steps in the revolution of medicine. We lost nearly $400,000 in the stock market.
Indeed, 2008 was a great year, a year of breakthroughs and triumphs. The future looks bright
“Hey, wait! You lost $400k! How is that a great year?! You think that looks promising?”
It is that time of year, when people look back and remember what was and look forward, planning what will be. It is also a time of giving and loving and sharing, of world peace and gratitude.
We are grateful for the opportunity we have had to share our story and to meet a lot of great people, including other travelers, writers, and bloggers. We are also grateful for the expanding presence Go Curry Cracker is having on the web
It has been a very big couple of months for us here at Go Curry Cracker with records set for number of page views, number of Facebook and Twitter likes and follows, and number of comments.
We’ve been featured and interviewed by some great reporters and bloggers, and had the honor of writing a couple guest posts for some of our favorite sites.
For the Mandarin speakers out there, Winnie’s post on how we retired early and now travel the world went mini-viral, getting over 200,000 views in just 3 days, which has led to her article being shared on a few big time sites with more to come.
Our post about how we plan to Never Pay Taxes Again was shared, liked, cross-linked, and shared again, setting a record for views and comments.
Thank you everybody for a great 2013. Thank you for reading, for sharing, for commenting, and caring.
All the best in 2014
Jeremy & Winnie, Go Curry Cracker!
PS: As you get ready for 2014, please check out these great writers and the fiscal advice and opportunities they share
In the days before early retirement and world travel we lived in the best apartment in all of Seattle. We were a block from a weekly farmer’s market, a block from a Safeway grocery store, 8 blocks from a public library, 9 blocks from a Trader Joe’s, and 5 blocks from a large city park with walking trails along a stream in old growth forest.
Home was also a block away from a main commercial street and the main neighborhood bus artery. We had our choice of a number of coffee shops, restaurants, and bars, along with easy access to every part of town just one short bus ride away. The owner of the quaint coffee shop just across the street would often give us free coffee and vegan chocolate chip cookies, due to our generous tipping and frequent gifts of home cooking.
The commute into the office was quite nice as well. I could walk downstairs, cross the street, and get on a bus that dropped me off 1 block from the building where I worked. According to the bus schedule, this trip required only 26 minutes, enough time to sit back and relax with a good book. Winnie’s commute was even better. She had to walk only 2 blocks to the University of Washington, where she was taking photography classes
Often I would ride my bicycle to work, to get some exercise and fresh air. It was also a great way to work off the stresses of unrealistic schedules and office politics. Depending on mood and weather, I had a choice of riding 8 miles, partially on city streets, or riding either 21 or 23 miles primarily on dedicated bike trails. Sometimes I would ride to and from work, and other days I might ride one way and then utilize the bike racks on thecity buses in the other direction.
“Wow, that sounds great, no wonder you didn’t need a car. You guys were so lucky! Where we live we could never do what you do.”
Absolutely, we were incredibly lucky. You know, because we have absolutely no choice where we live, kind of like we have no choice where we were born.
Below are all of the details and tools we used to find our great Seattle apartment. Perhaps it will help others become lucky too
Once upon a time, President Obama told the nation, “If you like your health insurance, you can keep it.” Our insurance company recently sent us a letter informing us that because our policy did not comply with the requirements of the Affordable Care Act, it will no longer be available.
We aren’t the only ones having our policy cancelled. The conservative media is full of outrage over this, exclaiming “President Obama lied!” I was confused when I saw it. This is news? I’m reminded of an old headline from The Onion satirical newspaper, “Politician Accidentally Tells Truth!”
The liberal media counters that policies are being cancelled only because they don’t meet the minimum standards demanded by the ACA, and therefore everybody who has had a policy cancelled will now get better coverage.
But here at Go Curry Cracker, we ignore the media hype, sensationalist headlines, and political ranting and just look at the facts. Let’s do that now
Brush after meals, floss daily, visit the dentist once a year… these are the rules of dental care as I remember them. So a year after kicking the old boss (and insurance) to the curb, we found ourselves in Mexico once again and in need of our annual dental cleaning
We started asking around if people liked their dentist. At a dinner party an American-Mexican couple gave us a strong recommendation, “We’ve been to many dentists in town over the past 25 years, but this one is the best! But he doesn’t speak English…” We also had many other recommendations for English speaking dentists, but we enjoy a challenge
Some time ago I received an email from one of the big brokerage firms, titled “Savvy Year-End Tax Strategies.” It contained much advice on how to minimize taxes and how to reduce taxable income, such as “Consider contributing as much as you can to a 401(k)” and “Be careful when selling highly appreciated assets, such as stocks, land, fine art, precious metals, or antiques.”
This might be considered good advice by some, but I just call it, “Boring!”
Benjamin Franklin once wrote that nothing is certain except death and taxes. I beg to differ. I personally expect to never pay taxes again, legally and respectfully.
