A year from now my daughter graduates from college. Here’s the early life path I suggest to her: Avoid debt. Nothing is worth paying interest to own. Avoid fiscally irresponsible people and certainly don’t marry one. Spend the next decade or so working your ass off building your career and your professional reputation. Spend that… [Continue Reading]
Dining with the Ghosts of Sarah Bernhardt and Alfons Mucha
The lobby of Hotel Pariz, Prague For the jlcollinsnh family, so far 2013 has been a very good year. The house is finally sold, freeing up some capital. The stock market has been on a tear. Our daughter had her milestone 21st birthday April 1st. Unfortunately, for that last, she’s in Rennes, France and we… [Continue Reading]
Storage, Moving and Movers
Despite what felt like a relentless and merciless disposal of our stuff, our new apartment is overflowing. We’ve rented a storage locker. Too much stuff! The snow tires were the first thing to go in, but only because the space was there. My pal David had offered them sanctuary at his place. Kind of… [Continue Reading]
Wild Turkeys, Motorcycles, Dining Room Sets & Greed
Wild Turkey painting by Don Balke This morning the wild turkeys came out of the woods and on to the back lawn for a visit. The last time was in the Fall when they were in the front yard with a small herd of deer, so it’s been a while. While I am very much… [Continue Reading]
Roots v. Wings: considering home ownership
“Sold” now hangs below the real estate sign in front of our house. All the contingencies have been cleared and it should be smooth sailing until the closing date about a month from now. In the next few weeks we’ll be going thru the myriad of chores involved: Packing, finding a mover, switching services, dropping… [Continue Reading]
The Blog has New Clothes
Waves painting by Sergey Gusev* Well looky here. Little ol’ jlcollinsnh is growing up a bit. With this post you’ll notice three big changes. We could have done them separately, but just seemed to make sense to plunge ahead. Before we get into all that, let me start with some well deserved “Thank You” shout outs…. [Continue Reading]
High School Poetry, Carnival, cool ads and random pictures that caught my eye
I’m an old English major. I don’t much like poetry. Go figure. But this is a whole ‘nother frame of reference. Be warned, this is a bit erotic: Sucker for Spanish Speakers My pal Fran is her coach. Yeah. I didn’t know poets had coachs either. If you like that one, you’ll find a couple… [Continue Reading]
Fighting giraffes, surreal landscapes, dancing with unicorns and restoring a Vanagon
What better advice than this? As I mentioned last time, this whole retirement thing has turned out to be a bunch busier than I would have guessed. Or have planned for. Like a kid dishing out his own ice cream, I’ve heaped far too much stuff into my bowl. At least for the first part… [Continue Reading]
My plan for 2013
Late last night I finished the IRS certification process for VITA: Tests in Basic, Intermediate, Advanced and Ethics. It was bit easier time around as it is my third year. Still, travel and other play put me behind the learning curve and the deadline was closing fast. Our site opens next Tuesday and Thursday night I’ll… [Continue Reading]
VITA, income taxes and the IRS
I wasn’t planning to do it again this year, but in the end I signed up. If I had been planning better, the work for my re-certification would be mostly done by now. But I’ve yet to begin. Too much traveling and playing. I knew this of course. It is the reason I wasn’t planning… [Continue Reading]
- « Previous Page
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- …
- 7
- Next Page »