Money Diary #79

Morning: Mom texts at 6:30 that they're heading out to garden. I see the text and promptly fall back asleep. Hear him leave for his sailing event, bring my tablet to bed, and fall asleep again. By the time I wake up, it's 11:15. Eat a cookie that we grabbed yesterday at the golf tournament and brush my teeth. Watch Bling Empire.

Afternoon: He texts a little before 1 and asks if I want to go to Costco. That's always a yes, so once he comes home and changes, we head to Costco. Walk the aisles, sample the samples (keto cauli mac & cheese, Celsius energy drink, bread with jam, honeydew, and a low carb fried tortilla with stevia). Then we get 2 hot dogs and split a slice of pepperoni pizza. Come back home, turn on You've Got Mail, and walk around a bit. Read for a while, and here is what I learn:

• "You can do what you want": "You have over $2M, make $275k per year, and your house is worth more than you paid for it."

• "I had won the game of early retirement, but now I was also losing the playing of the game": "Winning the prize means you say goodbye to a lot of the intense thinking about how to win the prize, the habits of the mind associated with preparation, planning, dreaming."

• When going through a bear market: 

• "The average bear market lasts 2 years. You are going through it while you are: 1) still employed and 2) near your peak career earnings. This is better than it occurring AFTER retirement. This means that just before retirement, the stock market has gifted you an opportunity to systematically build up your nest egg at lower valuations while you're still working and while you have the best ability to take advantage of the opportunity (highest income & highest savings rate of your career). 

• "If a few months ago, you were within 10% of your retirement number, then you were close to retirement. Systematically build up assets while they're on sale, and by the time the market recovers to its previous peak, you should have reached your number. The worst US bear market was during the Great Depression. That took 5 years before the market recovered to the point it was before the crash. If it takes 5 years for the market to recover (and if you're dollar coast averaging during that whole time), then you shouldn't be 10% short at recovery. You should be finished."

Evening: Walk some more, watch Bling Empire, and then we head out Nordstrom Rack. He gets a hoodie blazer for his family friend's high school graduation present & then we're off to Barnes and Noble. Walk a bit and head to to my favorite burger place for dinner. We have a couple of coupons for their new bacon burger if we each get fries & a drink ($9.92). After we eat, decide to go to Wal-Mart where he gets car washing liquid and jalapeno ranch. Around 9, he starts the car to go home and the car shakes weirdly. Something happened with the front left tire, so he looks at it and then calls his friend (L). We wait in the parking lot for L to come over, and the boys look over the car. SO calls a tow truck, I wait in L's car, and then we head to SO's mom's place to meet the tow truck there. I stay in L's car, the boys deal with SO's car, and then L drops us back off at home around 11:30. Once it's just SO & me, I comment on how out of all of his friends, L is definitely the most responsible and most responsive, and how both of those traits are super hard to find now. Brush my teeth, use the activated charcoal mouthwash, and bed around 12:30.

Eating out = $9.92

Total = $9.92