How has it been for us lately?
I’m in the midst of a very eventful week… a few things are afoot and life is becoming a bit more interesting for me and my family. I’m not in a position to divulge all the details at the moment, but I can offer some hints. Some fun tidbits:
- Blog traffic crossed 700,000 uniques this week!
- I’m mulling over possible changes to the blog, but nothing set in stone just yet. But I’ve started the ball rolling.
- I’m scheduled to walk out of my corporate IT job by the end of the month. Yay freedom! Boo to “forking out for health insurance premiums”! Bye to commute and lunch expenses, but Hi to COBRA ($1100 a month more!!) or self insurance. Tradeoffs, tradeoffs, I know….
- I’m touring a bunch of preschool “campuses” for my second child. We’re this close to getting him into our number one pick, which is a HUGE deal. Why? Preschool in our area often requires long waiting lists and you need to sign up many months, even years in advance, for those that are the most sought after! Crossing fingers here.
- Maybe meeting a distinguished journalist/editor next week who has worked for the LA Times and the Wall Street Journal. He’s writing a piece on “Bay Area Wealth”. That should be interesting!
- Do you know who you’ll be voting for? We’re still weighing the options.
And finally, I’d like to announce the winners of the H & R Block Tax Software Giveaway. I want to thank all of you who have participated and left so many thoughtful comments. I learned something new — including the fact that you can get advances on your refund. I mean, where have I been? The concept never struck me before.
From a random drawing, the winners are: Aryn and Alan. I’ll be emailing you guys shortly for details on how to access the TaxCut online application.
Hopefully I get to run more contests like these so that more readers can win; so if you’ve got something you’d like to promote to our financial community, drop me a line!
It’s busy, hectic, tiring, multi-tasking, crazy… life hasn’t yet changed for me. But I aim to survive the rest of February without going out of my mind.
Image Credit: Simpson Trivia
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{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
Yay! I actually won something! I never win!
Congrats on the unique visitors.
Good luck with the preschool…I’ve heard those can be as hard as college. Which is kind of sad, actually.
Congrats Aryn!
Mrs. Micah, preschool and Kindergarten are no longer how it was when we were that age. I’ve visited quite a number of schools and kids now seem to be much more precocious than how I remember them to be
. There’s evaluation and testing done to enter some of the popular schools with questions like “can you name all the colors of the rainbow?” and “what is the largest ocean in the world?” Ummm… nice questions for a 5 year old eh? 
I couldn’t believe that they were already making distinctions between odd and even numbers at the age of FOUR!
With these advancements in our kids’ education, maybe we’ll solve the global warming, world peace and superbug problems in the next several decades.
Wow, I had no idea you were that close to retiring from your job–congratulations!
I’ll raise my glass of champagne to you and me both at dinner on February 29th then!
Good for you!
Sydney
700,000 uniques… are you kidding me? That is awesome. Nice job
Incredible all the way around. Glad to see great things happen to great people!
All the best!
SVB,
Congratulations on retiring four months before your original target date.
A former colleague told me a recently retired friend told him that “Retirement is way under rated.” I have to agree with him
@RetiredSyd and Super Saver
Thanks for the wishes! I’ve caught myself unawares here as well. I had wanted to quit in the summer, but circumstances at home has prompted me to do it sooner! I’m starting to see that there’s so much to be done “on the other side of the fence” that isn’t getting done when everyone’s out at work on a full time basis. It’s a tough call, but the weekends are no longer enough to fulfill these other obligations!
Again, it was a choice of letting go of my entrepreneurial aspirations or my job; a decision to seek out further balance in my life and to relieve myself of built up stress over the years.
Then again if the “perfect job” ever came along, I’d probably take it. But it would involve a lot of “flex time”.
@theWild1 and RacerX,
Thanks for the kind notes! I really appreciate your visits and cheering me on here. It means a lot!
THANKS AGAIN ALL.
700,000 uniques – you blew me out of the water there. Time for me to write something Diggable
.
Have you seen the Frasier episode where Frasier and Lilith try to get Fredrick into the premium preschool? It’s a lot of wining and dining the top decision makers. That’s what I’m envisioning.
Hi Silicone Valley Blogger,
I thought you were delaying your retirement a little bit. But it’s great move! I wish to be able to do as well that in the years to come.
My niece is entering grade 1 next school year and I was quite surprised with the requirements. The schools are quite advanced now. In the old days, reading and writing is only taught in grade 1.