Apr 11, 2019
There have been a lot of big bills coming across my kitchen table recently. Property taxes, car registrations, income taxes, things for the school orchestra in which little MM plays the standup bass. Plus the usual credit card bills for all my spending on groceries and not-all-that-rare luxury indulgences. There’s nothing bad or unexpected in…
If you’re going to become rich, you need to either earn way more money than you spend, or spend way less money than you earn. This is the basic math of it, which even the worst complainypants cannot dispute. The whining usually starts when Mr. Money Mustache starts talking about how to implement the ideas above.…
If you set aside your fancy adult concerns for just a moment and think deeply, it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that this entire world is really just a giant zoo. It is a giant zoo packed with silly animals, and we’re just the one who takes itself most seriously. Every speck of life exists simply to…
The Man With the Big Keychain An old friend of mine is obsessed with security. He carries a huge bundle of keys and makes his way through each day meticulously locking and unlocking anything that can be locked. He drives his car through the alley into the detached garage, and the door seals shut behind his…
For most people in this country, financial problems are caused by not thinking enough about money. One of the guys I hire occasionally to help me build houses, for example, is permanently broke and always requires full payment in cash at the end of each workweek. Yet at the beginning of each workday, he arrives…
A big part of the recipe for a good life is to love the place you live. Although you can compensate for almost any living conditions with a strong Stoic attitude and some training, it sure is nice to be surrounded by an environment that truly agrees with your constitution. After all, all five of…
It’s definitely late fall here in Colorado, and the trees have dumped most of their leaves onto the ground. In my neighborhood, this invariably triggers a flurry of lawn contractor activity. A pickup truck pulling a long trailer full of equipment pulls up, a fleet of young guys gets out and each picks up a…
Yesterday, we had a second crazy fall snowstorm here in Colorado. The first one struck one week ago, and while it was fun at the time, I welcomed the warm sunny week that followed and returned us to normal conditions. But then, another storm came along and, DUMP, there were about seven inches of fluffy powder…
I’ve got a big money-saving tip for you that will be completely obvious for long-time readers, yet is still completely necessary for me to review because there are new readers here every day who don’t have time to go back to the old Bicycle post.. and looking around on the city streets, I can see…
It was a beautiful evening in my neighborhood, and I was enjoying one of my giant homebrews on a deck chair I had placed in the middle of the street, as part of a nearby block’s Annual Street Party. I was talking to a couple I had just met, and the topic turned to the…
(note: this is a dated article that referred to a sale so the links stopped working. I updated them in April 2012, but they’ll surely change again someday) Hello there. I don’t really have an article for you today, but I stumbled across an interesting-looking sale at one of my preferred bike stores, Nashbar.com. They’ve…
Oh, hello there. I just noticed it’s July 8th, which means we’re already about two weeks into the annual MMM family vacation. It has certainly been reflected in the wimpy blog posting schedule, even while readership seems to be on a growth spurt due to the influence of Frugal Dad. There have been times in…
