One of my personal goals for 2019 is to spend less time in front of a screen. This includes phones, laptops, and televisions. Reading books on my Kindle is still allowed.
I certainly spend way less time on a device now than I did while working, but I find that I have lost time doing mindless things that could be better spent playing guitar, exercising, cooking, reading, or spending quality time with the fam.
I view this solely as a matter of preference, choosing what to do with my waking hours. So far so good.
Happy Holidays everyone! I hope 2018 found y’all becoming increasingly healthy, wealthy, and wise.
2018 was our 6th full year of early retirement and world travel. Do anything long enough and memories start to jumble together… Did we visit Paris this year or last year? Was Jr walking when we were in Chiang Mai? Thankfully our financial records and photos cleared it up in an instant. (Another good reason to track spending?)
This year we meandered through 11 different countries (Taiwan, UK, Spain, Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Finland, Sweden, Norway, and the United States.) If my math is right, this brings Jr’s country total to 35. Our Instagram shares some fun photos of each.
We’ve now started to ask ourselves, “What is next?”
This whole early retirement thing has been pretty easy so far, thanks to a solid plan and a bit of luck.
We have had a hefty economic tail wind, a strong US dollar, (mostly) good health, unexpected income, a low tax burden, and an abundance of enthusiasm and good cheer.
There is a lot to be grateful for this Thanksgiving season.
Going back to Cali, stylin, profilin
Growlin, and smilin, while in the sun
Paying taxes and health insurance premiums
Driving to the mountains in the vintage Escort
We have been having the Forever Home discussion for some time now… Is there somewhere we love that would be a good place to raise a kid or two?
We have a few International destinations in mind, but several places in California rank high on our list of criteria.
I hear California is an expensive place to live, with high taxes, costly health insurance, and sky high housing prices. I figured I should at least crunch some numbers before we consider putting some California cities at the center of our radar.
Except of course for those extremely critical items we would definitely need again some day. No, these most cherished of items were stored in a friend’s basement, because how could we possibly live without them?
Now 6 years later, we cracked open this most precious of Time Capsules, thereby rediscovering the things we think we truly need.
