About sixteen years ago, I met him for the first time. My trainwreck sibling brought home this adorable puppy he had no business adopting because he had not one thing in his life that wasn’t a mess. I was furious at my sibling – he didn’t even take care of himself, how could he drag
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March 2, 2020
If you’d like to join me in helping Lakota families and/or rural libraries this year, please read this post. Over 6 weeks in 2019, we raised $2669.94 for the Lakota families, touching 27 lives. What can we do in 2020?
Current total: Lakota, $521.62; Rural libraries, $321.62.
On Money
Income
Our primary income comes from our full time jobs. We have minimal income from an investment property (which is all saved for maintenance) and investing in dividend stocks (all reinvested). We earn money on the side to supplement our main incomes. We get a bit of income from Swagbucks and cash back sites (Ebates, Mr.Rebates). Some posts have affiliate links that pay a micro-commission to keep the blog running and I’ve added a way to support the blog in the sidebar to the right!
Our long term goal is to replace our day job income with passive income before my health prevents me from working. I know from my Mom’s experience that qualifying for or relying on disability is incredibly tough or near impossible here in CA. Aside from that, I aim to do my best to make the most of what we have today.
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Dividend income. We received $545.98 in dividends in February. This was an unusual month.
Ko-Fi! Awwww, another kind reader! I so appreciate the support. Thank you! <3
W-2 income. We’re making a little more money this year. This was just about enough cover our increased costs of living with inflation plus a trickle to savings but thanks to my new health spending category below, that’s gone. Drat. Every bit counts. Especially with PiC’s increasing unhappiness with his job, and the peculiarities of his company’s financial stability, I am banking and investing as much as I can. We’re earning well right now but I also know that can go away very quickly. Maybe this is me being pessimistic but I don’t think so – he’s been unhappy for two years and they’ve been through five layoffs. Also I AM admittedly pessismistic because I feel physically terrible all the time. How long can I keep going?
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February 28, 2020
If you’d like to join me in helping Lakota families and/or rural libraries this year, please read this post. Over 6 weeks in 2019, we raised $2669.94 for the Lakota families, touching 27 lives. What can we do in 2020?
Current total: Lakota, $521.62; Rural libraries, $321.62.
1. There’s something immensely satisfying about setting Ronnie the Robot Vacuum to take care of one room while I clean another area and start the laundry. Ronnie’s taking care of the other room! (This seems less satisfying when I get an alert that Ronnie needs help because its left wheel is stuck but I have no idea where it IS because it left the room and to another one. It’s been 5 minutes and the robot’s already gone a bit rogue. I was not wrong to worry about Cylons.)
2. I KNOW it’s not tax efficient but I still get a little zip of happy when my original stock portfolio notifies me of two dividend payments on a Saturday morning. I reinvest all of that money but it feels like a micro payday. Plus I haven’t decided if there is a good tax efficient way to move that portfolio in our index funds portfolio yet. At least not right now.
3. If I had to be wrecked, at least it was on a weekend when I could try to rest.
Challenges: Even though I did everything “right” with my diet – no sugar, low carbs, no gluten – AND even got what seemed like a full night of sleep, an hour after waking up on Sunday, I felt crushed. Zero energy, brain clouded, short of breath. Ugh.
4. Our emergency fund is held in CDs and a bit of cash. I have 2 CDs expiring in two weeks and 2 more expiring in March. The renewal interest rate options are paltry so after kicking around some ideas on Twitter, I think I have a plan of action. I’ll cash the first two out at maturity and deploy the cash into a new savings account for a good bank bonus. When that’s paid, I’ll rinse and repeat in PiC’s name. It’ll be more work for me but it should bring in better returns over the year than the 2% or less APY.
5. I finally got all our tax documentation together and thoroughly vetted our spreadsheet with all the details! *little dance* I sent it off and now I have to try veryvery hard to be patient. And to remember to breathe while I’m waiting to see if my estimates were right. Right here right now, I’m banishing that stupid guilt I always feel for not doing the final lap on my own, every year.
:: How was your week?
February 27, 2020
If you’d like to join me in helping Lakota families and/or rural libraries this year, please read this post. Over 6 weeks in 2019, we raised $2669.94 for the Lakota families, touching 27 lives. What can we do in 2020?
Current total: Lakota, $521.62; Rural libraries, $321.62.
This employer is so icky.
Don’t break your own heart.
Something I have to practice to battle pain-induced stress brain: The Peaceful Place exercise is practical yet grounded in evidence-based clinical theory. It is one you can do within two minutes’ time with practice. What is the most peaceful place you have even been? Close your eyes and use all of your senses to recall it. What does it sound like, look like, smell like, feel like and possibly even taste like? Be there for at least two minutes. Feel it resonate throughout your whole being. Why does this work? Because our brains are like computers and only respond to what we input.
My Money Blog on Healthcare sharing ministries. TL;DR: his advice is do not buy. I know folks who use them and have had good experiences but I’ve been through the gamut of bad to good insurance and if I have the choice, I’m avoiding HCMs. Insurance is bad enough with their loopholes (though my insurance right now is stellar), I’m not signing up for an even less certain care plan where they aren’t overseen by any agency at all and provide no guarantee of payment at all (at least my health insurance has some guarantees).
Self forgiveness is something I have to keep working on
February 24, 2020
If you’d like to join me in helping Lakota families and/or rural libraries this year, please read this post. Over 6 weeks in 2019, we raised $2669.94 for the Lakota families, touching 27 lives. What can we do in 2020?
Current total: Lakota, $521.62; Rural libraries, $321.62.
It’s time for a more pragmatic look into whether or not we should get out of the landlord business. I can’t just make a decision like that based on my irritation level and a vague recommendation from the PM who hasn’t given me enough data to go on. The thing is, they were originally pushing me to consider selling because of the money, now it’s because of “the neighborhood”. When a professional’s recommendations are vague and unsubstantiated, I have to do my own research.
I consulted with a friend who’s a veteran in the business and we did some searching. Initial research says: the neighborhood isn’t sketchy. Maybe the next one over is, and there’s overflow, but their gut feeling was to keep the property. The PM just sounds lukewarm about it, but as Veteran Friend advised, if it was an actual problem, they would say so outright and refuse to handle the property any longer. This bears observation but not a rush to sell.
So it was time to run the numbers. Getting into this rental cost about $34,000 out of pocket. After 6 years of rent, rent has paid down 10% of the mortgage, and the house has appreciated on paper by 66%. We have about $140,000 in equity if it sells for what the assessed value is now. (more…)
February 21, 2020
If you’d like to join me in helping Lakota families and/or rural libraries this year, please read this post. Over 6 weeks in 2019, we raised $2669.94 for the Lakota families, touching 27 lives. What can we do in 2020?
Current total: Lakota, $521.62; Rural libraries, $321.62.
1. Actually my first challenge was also a good thing. The success of the thing I was organizing was why it became a little too much, but that’s still a good thing!
2. PiC and I split the work on registration for kindergarten. I am not ready.
3. I found Ann Leckie e-books at the library – woot!
Challenges: I was working nonstop last week organizing support for a loved one. I most definitely bit off a little more than I could chew and I most definitely pretended that I didn’t. My checking account was a total mess so I opened a new checking account at Ally just for their funds so that my neurotic money managing self could clear things up and that was helpful. Then I ordered a gift without actually reviewing the order and that was a bit of a mess, I had to frantically message the seller to tell them not to send ME the gift. *FACEPALM* Work was a mess of many messes to clean up.
4. Watching that episode of Psych where Juliet’s dad comes in and tries to reconcile with her at the same time as pulling another con, I found myself curiously ok. For the past two years, seeing fictional characters clashing with their fathers (and especially this where her father also conned her) hurt. Why didn’t my dad love me as a father should? Why didn’t my dad care enough as much about our well-being as his? Not this week. I had just told a beloved mentor of our estrangement. An excerpt of what I shared:
“I have needed all this time and careful intentional revisiting of the facts to help my heart adjust to the reality that was painful for a long time. I usually make painful decisions with my head and then let me heart catch up, this was no different! Even though it is a sad and regretful situation, I am slowly healing.
I’ve done what he should have done – protected my family – and I will heal from the less obvious wounds he inflicted, like feeling doubts that anyone can love me if my own parent didn’t. I am slowly accepting that his choices and actions don’t make me a lesser person. Even if he couldn’t love me the way a parent should, others do, and even if I have moments of doubt, I will grow away from them.
Not that I don’t still get angry at him. I do. Every single time I have a flare-up that’s incapacitating, and feel too painful and fatigued to exist, and I have to keep working because I spent so much money caring for him instead of saving for my future when he was much more able than I, that he was a selfish liar knowing he was hurting my health. THAT part still makes me angry.
For all that anger that’s left, I am lucky and I can see that. I got to choose to walk away before he drained us dry and ruined my marriage and future. We aren’t in the place we could have been, but not even he could destroy the fruits of my careful money management and that gives me a redemptive feeling of control. I think that choice I took when I did made a big difference in my healing.
The thing I now work on is how I feel about the future. I do not want to feel obligated to again endanger that recently saved financial foundation for either of them. As a daughter in this family, it’s very hard to say that. Taking care of your elders in their old age is ingrained in your mental and emotional self down to the cellular level! But he abused my sense of duty for 20 years, he would have let me die of the pain and despair, for his own benefit. I had told him how severe and debilitating the pain was, to the point of suicidal ideation, and that didn’t change his behavior other than to stop him insisting that we have the 14 hour wedding ceremony and reception that he said was necessary. (Because that’s just what everyone does and he wanted to look like everyone else.) But he still demanded his prerogatives like a bottle of the finest ($$$) liquor so he could share with his friends and pretend he had money. So I am working on weaning myself off that gut level sense of obligation.
I don’t want it. If I keep saying that, it too will slowly become ok.”
5. The refresh work at the rental is nearly done! Details to come.
6. I’d forgotten, it’s been so many weeks since I’ve felt up to it, how fulfilled I feel when I get to go to a store, pick out a new food to cook, AND get to cook it in the same weekend. It did entirely wipe me out but the fact is, I haven’t been close to feeling up to doing that much in so long. I loved the feeling of anticipation and it renewed my sense of wanting to cook and eat. I hate that dull feeling when I don’t have the energy to think or cook anything new. I love the zing of chasing down new recipes I might be able to make.
7. It “only” took me six weeks to take our new robot vacuum out of the box, charge it, and install the app. I finally ran it! It’s been kind of fascinating to watch and also it makes me very self conscious about all the stuff cluttering our floors. I’m in yet another period of transition in my office where lots of boxes and bags are strewn about. We’re in yet another cycle of: organizing, decluttering, package up things meant to go to new homes, and donating. None of this makes it easy for a hard-working robot vacuum just trying to clean up these floors! It was pretty distracting at first as I figured out how to get myself and my towers of STUFF out of the way. JB was fascinated by it too. The only one who thought the robot vacuum was nothing special was Sera. Go figure. She’s normally a basket case about anything too new.
:: It has been A WEEK. How was your week? How do you say “no” to a sense of obligation that will only harm you? What makes cooking fun for you?
February 20, 2020
If you’d like to join me in helping Lakota families and/or rural libraries this year, please read this post. Over 6 weeks in 2019, we raised $2669.94 for the Lakota families, touching 27 lives. What can we do in 2020?
Current total: Lakota, $521.62; Rural libraries, $321.62.
The Guardian: White supremacist propaganda in US more than doubled in 2019, report finds
“If Simon & Schuster and the authors want to make this right, I would like to be credited for my work and see sizeable donations made to the Ali Forney Center, The Brooklyn Community Bail Fund, and The Campaign against Hunger.” From @tangerinejones: The Privilege of Rage
Yay for building out Signal! I use it. Privacy should be the default, not a special thing, so I am increasingly moving to services that respect privacy like this and Duckduckgo.
I couldn’t see myself living in a space like this, there’s too much stuff for my liking, but I admire the colors and design.
Mr. Tako on non-financial abundance. If I don’t focus on the need for money to fund an early retirement (chosen or forced), I do a lot better at focusing on the richness of our lives. I try to generate this kind of abundance in food even though we can’t garden yet, we are cultivating friends who enjoy trading food and I love it.
Congrats to Mrs. Rich and Regular!
I support some creators on Patreon but I resent the way they act like the creators aren’t the entire reason they have money in the first place. No, Patreon, you are a business that exists because we want to support creators in a meaningful way, YOU don’t pull in business. Ugh: “Patreon Capital exists because Patreon is itself a business, one that pays out a significant amount of the money it pulls in to the people who populate its platform. “The reality is Patreon needs to build new businesses and new services and new revenue lines in order to build a sustainable business,” the company’s CEO said in an interview last year, a year when it paid more than half a billion dollars to its creators.”
Best cats
February 17, 2020
If you’d like to join me in helping Lakota families and/or rural libraries this year, please read this post. Over 6 weeks in 2019, we raised $2669.94 for the Lakota families, touching 27 lives. What can we do in 2020?
Current total: Lakota, $521.62; Rural libraries, $321.62.
Behavioral challenges
We just got through a really rough patch with JB just being the smallest unit of the most concentrated contrariness ever. I found myself holding my breath and counting off deep breaths A LOT. But then we randomly zipped out of that like coming down a slip and slide into a period of attentiveness, cooperative spirits and unexpected eloquence instead of immediate tears and tantrums when they hear something they doesn’t like:
Us: This won’t fit in your backpack.
JB: Could we try it, just to see?
* What kind of monster says no to reasonable request for scientific inquiry?
PiC in the morning: Today has to be a short dropoff, I have to get to a meeting.
JB 3o minutes later at daycare: Ok daddy, you should go. You need to get to your meeting.
*They were LISTENING? And they acted on the information??
Naturally this means that there’s a spike in not great behavior at school: not listening to the teacher’s instructions, pushing to get to the front of the line, following classmates into bad decisions.
Our teacher / parent friend shared that their experienced educator mentor advised them to always be aware that it’s common to have this teeter-totter of behavior: if they’re terrible at home, they may be great at school, and vice versa. It doesn’t make me feel a lot better though.
Raising JB with minimal technology
JB is coming up on 5 years old very rapidly and we still enforce pretty strict boundaries around technology. They have a fake VTech cell phone (gift from a friend who likes to torment me), and no access to phones, tablets, or TVs at home. Well, no free access. They know how to turn on and off the one television, how to use the camera on my phone but also knows better than to EVER turn on the TV without express permission and they certainly never get free rein on my phone. They may borrow it to enjoy a music video once in a while but from the age of 2, they knew the rule: after the song what happens?
*Emphatic hands* “Give it back to Mommy!”
This isn’t to say they are meant to be a Luddite. They have lots of access to computers and tablets at school, they can play a computer game at the library once in a while, and they has gamer aunties and uncles who share their love of video games. They have plenty of access in the big picture. I want to take this foundational period and foster their love of books and crafts and sports and games and just the plain ability to find a way to entertain yourself before letting them zombie out into games and television. We are addictive personality people, it’s easy to get sucked into tv and never come up for air.
I push them, on our mommy-child days, to do that when I have to work. They will go rustle up a craft, or a coloring book, or a pile of books and sit at my feet “reading” and drawing and the like. I much prefer that to the reflexive flipping on of the television.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with tv, we enjoy shows and movies together, but I want their world to be as interesting and creative as they can make it be before getting addicted to the screen.
What this looks like is sometimes I get irritated because they hang about my desk asking “what can I dooooooo” before figuring out what to do because I refuse to give a concrete answer: figure it out!
Or sometimes in the car they ask to watch a video, get flatly denied, and we end up “mixing salad” in my hat using markers for ingredients and it makes me wonder what they think is food: please add cornstarch, now pepper, now green leaves. Now add purple leaves. Ok now lettuce. Now bell peppers. Now more cornstarch.
It takes more effort to press them to think and they don’t always like it, but I see it bearing occasional fruit where they don’t pester me constantly for ideas, they come up with their own. Like deciding to be art director and hanging art on my pristine refrigerator while I work. Or organizing my to be gifted books in the office. Or cleaning the table off.
Precious Moments
I contain multitudes
JB outside after being scolded: you’re the meanest! Mommy is the meanest!
Me: Yep. Yep I am.
JB that same day, wanting me to snuggle when I’m so exhausted I’m about to drop and refusing PiC in my place: I want to snuggle, but not YOU. Mommy is the BEST!
Me: Yep. Yep I am.
Passive aggressive, much?
JB: Who is this card for?
Me: I don’t know yet.
JB: I know! Auntie M!
Me: Maybe.
JB: Well, you don’t HAVE to do it. I’m not making you. You’re the grown-up.
Soliloquies
*dolefully* I was the last one to wake upppppppp. *perks up* Daddy was the first, Mommy was the second, and I was the last! That’s how a family works! Uhhh blood.
Empathy
JB: Mommy, are you washing your hair today?
Me: No honey, my hair doesn’t like being washed everyday. It feels bad. So I wash it every other day. When I was little like you, I washed it every day though.
JB: *thoughtful silence* I’m sorry it hurts when you wash it every day.
:: This has been a weird month and a weird age with JB. We’re staring down kindergarten in the fall. Do you remember your kindergarten teacher?