The Month Of Birds: Early Retirement Month 5 (February 2021)

Another month of early retirement down and another intro where I express disbelief that time is flying so fast 🙂 . 2021 also seems to be going by faster than 2020, but maybe that’s because I’m used to pandemic quarantine life now…or maybe I’m just inviting the gods to prove me wrong in March – Please no 🙂 ! Anyway, fingers crossed this March is lightyears better than the last one. In the meantime, let’s get into what I got up to last month.

What Did I Do In February?

I Did My Taxes with Credit Karma Tax

I just filed my tax return with @CreditKarma Tax like I have the last 3 years. They’re completely free for federal and state (not bait and switch ‘free’😒, but actually free🙌🏾). I thought I would owe $600, but instead I'm getting a $600 refund thanks to their advice. Sweeeet🤑! pic.twitter.com/8oDgBlSoFZ

— A Purple Life (@APurpleLifeBlog) February 12, 2021

I was accidentally productive this month. I had planned to do my taxes in April, but on the first day that tax returns were accepted, I decided to poke around Credit Karma Tax to see if my estimate of owing $600 proved correct. Before I knew it, my tax return was all filled out, Credit Karma told me that actually I was getting $600 back and my finger couldn’t resist pressing the “Submit” button.

Since then, I have already received my refund and put it in my budget to go towards the next monthly Airbnb we’ll be booking for June. In case you’re looking for an easy way to submit your taxes that is LEGIT free for state and federal returns. I’ve been using Credit Karma Tax for the last 3 years to file my taxes and I can’t recommend them enough.

They are not like TaxAct or TurboTax that I’ve used in the past in that they do not bait and switch you, claiming it will be free to file until you get to the last page and suddenly it’s $30-50 and the mental sunk cost fallacy makes you pay it (or it least that’s how it worked for me). There’s none of that nonsense with Credit Karma Tax so I’m going to keep using them indefinitely.

I Read 4 Books

So, I’m aiming to read 52 non-fiction books in the 52 weeks of 2021.

This month I read the below books:

1. The Thing with Feathers: The Surprising Lives of Birds and What They Reveal About Being Human by Noah Strycker
2. The Field Guide to Dumb Birds of North America by Matt Kracht
3. The Case for Keto: Rethinking Weight Control and the Science and Practice of Low-Carb/High-Fat Eating by Gary Taubes
4. Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery

And the first 3 count for my 2021 non-fiction challenge so I’m up to 7 non-fiction books read so far in 2021. That’s almost as many as I did in all of 2020 so I’m quite proud of this fact 🙂 . It’s also 58% of my usual goal for an entire (non-pandemic hellscape) year. Retirement is indeed allowing me to have more time for the things I love, like the written word 🙂 .

If you’re curious about what I’m reading and my ratings of these books, I have a Goodreads account you can check out here.

I Wrote 4 Posts (And Recorded 1 Podcast)

I’m going to keep this section in these updates because upon reflection – this is a fairly large portion of what I actually do week to week 🙂 . Writing posts and responding to y’alls awesome comments is a highlight of each month, so I’ll be recording that here.

I published the below posts in February:

1. The Month Of Rest: Early Retirement Month 4 (January 2021)
2. No, I’m Never Having Kids.
3. How I Negotiated A 25% Salary Increase Over Email
4. From Frugal To Fuck It: The Evolution Of My Thoughts On Spending Money

On a related note, I was also featured in a new episode of the Bigger Pockets Money Podcast:

In case you’re curious my previous episode with them is here and my Mom’s only podcast appearance was actually with them as well and is here.

I Tested New Features In My Favorite FIRE Calculator!

My favorite FIRE calculator is cFIREsim because it allows you to tweak way more variables than the standard calculator. And tweaking variables is exactly what I need for my weird 70 year retirement 😉 . I actually met the creator of this website at FinCon 2019 briefly and completely fangirled out 🙂 .

She recently joined Twitter and I was so excited to see her asking for volunteers to help test a new feature for the site. I was all over it! It is SOOOO insanely cool to be a part of this community and meet my heroes and the people who have created tools that made early retirement for me and so many others possible.

I Did A Facebook Live For The Women’s Personal Finance Group

In case you didn’t know, the amazing Angela from Tread Lightly Retire Early created a Women’s Personal Finance Facebook Group that is now over 25,000 members strong. She and her mods run an awesome ship over there and she along with Regina from That Frugal Pharmacist actually have expanded their efforts into their own community – check that out here.

Anyway, someone shared my Business Insider article in this Facebook Group and I was told about it through the grapevine. The thread quickly racked up almost 500 comments including questions and discussions about how the fuck I retired at 30 and accumulated $600,000+ dollars.

Most of the comments were very kind, but some made me laugh out loud. My favorite include assuming I am only retired because I have a trust fund (I wish), that I was a scammer and that I will end up destitute in short order. Other fun name calling was thrown around as well, such as that I’m dumb, reckless and short-sighted. Such helpful comments 🙂 . Maybe I should make a greatest hits of these and put them on a shirt like the one I made for FinCon with my first troll comment on it.

Anyway, all this internet conversation led to Angela asking me to come on a live chat and answer people’s questions and I did! We had 45 people on the call, which was wild to me. It was a great time. I love this community so much and it’s lovely to connect with y’all in that way.

I (Re)booked Our Spring Nomad Travel

It’s not life without drama right 😉 ? So I mentioned this briefly in my previous post, but after booking a month stay in Portland, ME for the month of May, I got a message from the Airbnb host saying they needed to cancel. Basically they have a friend of theirs who moved from NYC into the Airbnb and they now want to stay through the spring as well. So they asked me to cancel the reservation. I refused because doing so would not give me all my money back and I requested they cancel instead. They did.

So then we had to find a new Airbnb, which wasn’t an enormous deal but took a bit of time since it’s basically an island during the high summer season. In the end, I found an even nicer place and we booked it. Rolling with the punches over here! We also decided to fly up to Maine in May. Previously I was thinking about taking the sleeper train again and then renting a car, but we think life will be a little better in May and we have plenty of time to follow Maine’s rules of testing once we land and quarantining until we get our results.

I (Virtually) Hung Out

I told myself I would book less hangouts this month…and I don’t know what happened 🙂 . I’ve had weekly movie night with my suite mates from college. This month we watched the below films – reviews for all are incoming on Instagram…at some point 😉 :

1. Spree – My review here
2. Cinderella (1997) – My review here
3. High Life
4. Aquaman – My review here

I also had my weekly video chats with my ex-college roommate who lives in Argentina, have started watching a garbage reality show with my Mom weekly while she’s still in Connecticut, watched Palm Springs with an old colleague (my review here), and had general hangouts with my commune, such as the below. It’s getting ridiculous over here 😉 .

To honor Christopher Plummer we're rewatching the amazing Knives Out tonight🎥. I'll probably just cry the whole time. #RIP pic.twitter.com/toYjUom4JN

— A Purple Life (@APurpleLifeBlog) February 6, 2021

I Rested

I can feel change a comin’ 😉 . February was our last full month living in a tiny house and having a chill existence. After 2 weeks in March, we’re heading back into the world to be nomads who live in Airbnbs. We also have plans to see a few family members along the way. My Mom gets back from Connecticut in April, we’ll be seeing my partner’s sister when we’re in Maine in May and my fingers are crossed that after that we might be able to see a few others while we bop around the Northeast.

So I can see that I will have more human interaction than I have in a while and as a result, I wanted to recharge my batteries and enjoy having nothing to explore and nowhere to be before nomad life and my curiosity takes over. When we live in different locations, I want to be able to see and eat and do whatever’s covid possible to understand that new location and I know that will take a lot out of me (yes I’m a serious introvert).

All this upcoming excitement requires energy so I don’t break down and need to become a hermit for days to recover 🙂 . So that’s what I’ve been doing. Mostly chilling, hanging with the commune, reading, watching my birds and enjoying a relaxed life before we take off into the world.

Physical

Sleep

Sleep was weird this month. A few nights I couldn’t fall asleep for hours so I slept in until like 11am the next day (LUXURY!!!) Other times I was reading something so good I couldn’t put it down and stayed up late finishing it. That however, I was happy to do since it felt like a wonderful perk of being retired.

I would do something similar while working and it threw off my whole week basically. I also got a cold from our nephew who started daycare recently so probably affected my sleep as well. As a result of all that, I used my Melatonin a few times, which was unusual – but also good because my last bottle expired with 90% of its contents. Waste not right 😉 ?

Other than those anomalies though, sleep is still awesome overall and still way better than when I was working. I feel like a Minecraft character who gets in bed and then feels like I instantly open my eyes and it’s morning most of the time. It’s awesome!

Food

Food is still going well. I’ve continued doing 16:8 intermittent fasting and breaking my fast at 12pm and not eating after 8pm. I’ve also stayed keto except for the days I was feeling too crummy to cook. It’s going well overall though – I feel awesome and am very rarely hungry. I also lost 3 pounds this month, which is good because I need to make sure I fit into the few clothes I’m bringing on my nomad travels 🙂 . Suck it quarantine 15!

Here’s insight into what I’ve been eating:

Nail Painting

This silly little hobby is still going strong. I continue to improve my nail painting technique and decided that I’ll bring my 1-2 nail polishes on my nomad travels with me. Picking up a small thing of nail polish remover sounds like a fair trade for lots of painting fun!

Singing

Practicing my singing has been going well with a toddler in the house. We’ve belted “Into the Unknown” from Frozen 2 by Panic At The Disco (Fun Fact: I once flew from Atlanta to Portland for 24 hours to see Panic At The Disco in concert with my bestie 😉 ). We also have been enjoying some hits from the lovely Moana.

Mental

One With Nature

I feel connected to our world in a way I never did when I was working. I used to sit inside and stare at a screen all day only to turn off my laptop and…stare at my personal laptop to decompress 😉 . I feel different now. If the weather is nice, I’m outside most of the day.

I tailor my daily activities to the weather. Sunny? Birdwatching, tanning and chilling. Rainy? Reading, napping and snuggling. I also notice way more than I used to and really enjoy timing my activities with nature, such as the sunrises and sunsets I enjoy watching. I notice the position of the stars every night it’s not cloudy and try to guess the phase of the moon. I’m a changed woman 🙂 .

Learning

It’s time for my favorite segment: Fun Facts Nobody Asked For! Here’s what I learned and explored this month:

My learning this month revolved around two things: Stargazing and Birds! And the birds part is legit out of control so it gets it own section now 😉 . In the meantime, let’s go to the stars:

• It was still winter so we had more cloudy days than usual in Georgia. As a result, my stars were not out most nights 🙁 , but when they were, I took full advantage! I kept looking up to orient myself with Mars, Orion’s Belt and The Big Dipper. I also watched the beautiful full moon this month (called a Snow Moon compared to the Wolf Moon in January). The January Wolf Moon is named that because the howling of the wolves can be heard in this time of year more often than at any other season. February is called the Snow Moon because typically there’s heavy snowfall in February. I also learned that it’s not actually accurate that the moon is full for a few days – astronomically speaking, it is only full at a particular moment when it lies directly opposite the Sun.
• Chinese New Year also occurred recently and I learned about its origins. Apparently, the Chinese New Year is at times incorrectly called the Lunar New Year because they have a lot in common, but it turns out that these are not the same events. The Chinese New Year is the first day of the first month in the Chinese calendar (vs the Gregorian calendar we use in the west). The Lunar New Year is the first day of the first month in any moon cycle based calendar.
• My new astronomy knowledge has also come in handy with my partner’s latest hobby: crosswords! I was able to tell them the star at the foot of Orion (Rigel) and help complete the puzzle! Talk about practical applications 😉 .
• And finally, I watched the Mars Rover Landing!! My Mom actually planned to watch it with me, but had to go take care of my baby cousin so I watched it while my partner was on a work call and tried to keep my cheering and fist pumping to a minimum…it was hard though 🙂 . SO cool to see years of work culminate in a successful landing and new images and sounds that are already coming back from Perseverance! Here’s the replay if you’re interested:

Birding

Ah my beautiful burbs 🙂 . My Twitter has basically become a bird account and I’m cool with that 😉 . My bird feeder continues to provide hours of endless entertainment. That paired with the 2 books I read about birds this month made this a bird filled time.

On the drama front, we had a few fun encounters, such as a bird dive bombing our tiny house (it was fine), a woodpecker enjoying pecking on our wall instead of the feeder 10 feet away and hundreds of Common Grackle parking it on our lawn before flying away in what looked like a scene from The Birds.

I also saw some new birds this month! I thought I was familiar with all the locals, but I guess we either have new neighbors or some migrants that are passing through for a while. New birds that came to my feeder included American Goldfinches, House Finches, a White-Breasted Nuthatch and an Eastern Towhee. For a full list of the usual suspects check out my January post.

Within those two bird books I read, I learned some wild stuff. For example, The Thing with Feathers taught me that pigeons can sense infrasound (the low frequency noise of oceans and air currents) and it’s one of the ways they find their way home (in addition to landmarks, the sun, the stars, polarized light, magnetic fields and smell)!

In fact, there have been experiments where researchers block their other senses and take them somewhere they’ve never been and they still find their way home. It’s amazing. I also knew that a group of crows was called a “Murder“, but learned that a group of owls is called a “Parliament” and a group of starlings is a “Murmuration” – COOL!

I’ve also been getting better at bird songs. I knew the Carolina Wren’s calls, but now can identify Grackle, Tufted Titmouse(s), a White-Throated Sparrow and BlueJays. It’s awesome to be able to know what kind of bird is making a ruckus in the mornings 😉 .

Now I just need to figure out how to create a bird feeder wherever I go in a way that doesn’t disturb someone’s Airbnb. I’ve seen examples of water bottle feeders, pine cones and even contemplated just getting one of those fancy camera-filled bird feeders on Kickstarter and carrying it with me 😉 . I want to figure out a way of bringing this hobby with me if possible. Or maybe I’ll become badass enough to feed birds out of  my hand like I see some people doing on Bird Twitter.

I just bought 3lbs of Protein Powder💪🏾 and 20lbs of Birdseed🐦. What even is my life🤣? pic.twitter.com/rjvKfKI1Sk

— A Purple Life (@APurpleLifeBlog) February 15, 2021

Creativity

Creativity continues to crank! I’ve got post ideas coming out of my ears and more creative energy to write than I ever did while working. I also think my hours of birdwatching are seen as a time for quiet contemplation because thoughts usually emerge fully formed instead of scattered like they used to. It’s fascinating. I also have been writing film reviews like a fiend:

Money

My entire post last week was about my changing thoughts on money and they continue to be in the “Fuck It” category. On a related note, I hit another net worth high this month…I feel like I’ve said that every month for a while 🙂 . My money topped off at over $653,000 for a bit…130% of my OG FIRE Number:

I continue to not be worried about or really think about my money despite the fact that we’re pre-booking so much lodging that won’t happen for months down the line. I guess this is just who I am now 🙂 .

Also in case you don’t know, I do monthly net worth recaps at the end of every month on Instagram. Here’s the latest:

Emotional

Lack Of Stress

The type of stress I experienced during my career continues to be nonexistent. Maybe I’ll label that type “constant and inescapable stress” 🙂 since it followed me wherever I went and wasn’t silent even during weekends or holidays.

Now I feel a sense of calm basically all the time. I’m literally “chill” and just take things as they come. If I don’t want to do something that day or ever – I just don’t. It’s the complete opposite of my job where I imagined that every decision and action could compound and effect my next position, promotion, whatever. I just do what I want and that feels so freeing. It feels too good to be true sometimes 🙂 .

Conclusion

And that’s it! It’s been a wild month full of fun and learning. We only have 2 weeks left in our tiny house until we set sail and become Airbnb nomads once again. Wish us luck 😉 .

If you’re interested in the other weekly and monthly retirement updates I’ve written, they’re all here:

Weekly

1. Early Retirement Week 1: The Freak Out
2. Early Retirement Week 2: The Vacation
3. Early Retirement Week 3: The Whiplash
4. Early Retirement Week 4: The Heartbeat
5. Early Retirement Week 5: The Election
6. Early Retirement Week 6: The Trophy
7. Early Retirement Week 7: The Train
8. Early Retirement Week 8: The Challenge
9. Early Retirement Week 9: The Question
10. Early Retirement Week 10: The Game
11. Early Retirement Week 11: The Recharge
12. Early Retirement Week 12: The Holiday

Monthly

1. The Month Of Rest: Early Retirement Month 4 (January 2021)

How was your month?