The Month Of New Hampshire: Early Retirement Month 9 (June 2021)

by A Purple Life, posted in Early Retirement, Early Retirement Updates, Finance, Fitness, Food, Hobbies, Keto, Net Worth Update, Travel
This post may contain affiliate links. For more info read my disclosure.

Before we get into the topic today, I have a quick aside. After I failed at my goal of not being afraid to ask for self-recognition for two years in a row, I’ve decided that the streak won’t continue. So for the first time, I will mention that nominations for the Plutus Awards are open and will be closing soon.

If you haven’t heard of the Plutus Awards before – they’re basically the Oscars of Personal Finance. If you think I’m worthy of being nominated, feel free to fill out a nomination form here. And if you want to use that link to nominate other people that’s cool too 😉 . Contributing to these nominations at all would be awesome so we have a more well rounded pool of people to give recognition to in this wild finance space! Anyway, spiel over. Let’s get into the topic of today’s post!

We Moved To New Hampshire!

Our slow travel nomad life continues! We’ve moved from Maine to the coast of New Hampshire and I am living my best beach life. For example:

I don’t mention online the exact city I’m in when I have family that lives in that place, so all I can say is that we’re “on the coast.” However, because I have family who has lived here for a long time, I’ve visited a fair amount throughout my life and I was seriously shocked that I’ve never really seen this place until now. I didn’t think school and work put that amount of blinders on, but I stand corrected.

I’d never noticed the abundance of gorgeous birds around here, that there are different types of seaweed and that there is PURPLE sand on the beach (I explain why further down below). I keep being surprised with how much I am changing as a person without the fog of work. Now, instead of conference calls, this is what my day looks like:

Further, my goal of following my natural rhythms and those of the world around me, has never been so relevant. Instead of being annoyed that I am awakened by the sun at 5am or my bird friends announcing that a new day has dawned, I get out of bed and enjoy it (while knowing I’ll get to nap later 😉 ):

I’m really enjoying beach life and think I’m going to increase the frequency of living near the waves going forward. It’s so incredibly calming and inspiring.

We Booked All 2021 Nomad Travel 

Yeeeah I fucked up again y’all:

I should really just stop trying 🙂 . I am a planner at heart and at this point we know where in the US we will be for the rest of 2021 and bought plane tickets accordingly. It makes me feel good to know that I have that all done and settled and now I can be fully present in experiencing where we are instead of thinking ahead. This ability to contemplate led me to this revelation:

I’ve heard many (valid) concerns that having a nomadic retirement will cost more than living in one location and that all that travel will have a worse effect on the environment than when I was working, but so far neither of those have proven to be true:

And that cost portion holds up even if I go against my own slow travel rules and randomly fly across the country to see a gorgeous art installation with my Mom before it’s decommissioned:

In case you’re curious where I’ll be the rest of year, here’s the plan:

July: NH, MA, NY
August: Saratoga Springs, NY & CA
September: Catskills, NY, NYC & Austin, TX
October: NM, AZ
November: Santa Fe, NM
December: CT, NY

Now, after all that planning, let’s end on a self-deprecating note 😉 :

I Read 4 Non-Fiction Books

  1. Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies by Jared Diamond
  2. The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate by Peter Wohlleben
  3. Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City by Matthew Desmond
  4. A World Without Email: Reimagining Work in an Age of Communication Overload by Cal Newport

Guns, Germs and Steel is a mammoth at 480 pages for the regular hardcover book and clocks in at 148,046 dense words about history so I am ecstatic with this amount of non-fiction reading! I’m still overall behind my goal of reading 52 non-fiction books in 2021, but I have already read 18 non-fiction books this year, which is 12 more than I read in all of 2020! The goal of learning more in my retirement than I ever had the brain capacity to do while working is going well 🙂 .

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 5 posts

In case you missed it, I published the below posts in June:

  1. The Month Of Portland, Maine: Early Retirement Month 8 (May 2021)
  2. How Being A Nomad Helps Reinforce What’s Actually Important
  3. Slow Travel Review: Portland, Maine, USA – The Land Of Deliciousness
  4. Why Rest Is The Key To Creativity
  5. My Favorite Restaurants And What To Order In Portland, Maine

In addition to all that, I was also interviewed by a Toronto journalist for an upcoming book about love and money, featured in an article on Real Simple that was picked up by Yahoo, mentioned as one of the Best Blogs About Investing and one of the posts above was chosen as the best article of the week by All Star Money.

Phew! That sounds like a lot, but luckily I didn’t have to do basically anything for all that to happen 🙂 . I guess when it rains it pours because I also recorded a podcast and another podcast I had recorded in a previous month went live. Check it out here:

I Hung Out With People!

With everyone around me being vaccinated, my goal of spending way more time with loved ones is in full effect!

And in addition to cool finance peeps I hung out with my partner, some of my family in NH and my Mom! This wild crew and I also got our watch on and perused:

  1. Bo Burnham: Inside – My review here
  2. Lovebirds (Rewatch) – My review here
  3. Eurovision (Rewatch)– My review here
  4. Winged Migration
  5. Community: Season 6

In addition to those real life hangs, I also continued with my weekly college suitemate movie nights. We watched:

  1. Along with the Gods: The Two Worlds
  2. Bad Teacher (Rewatch)
  3. Freaks
  4. Almost Famous

After writing all that out, my main thought is: Damn! No wonder I’m sleepy. That’s a lot of socializing for this introvert!

Physical

Sleep

Sleep was great this month. I accidentally shifted my schedule to get up with the sun most days at 5am. If it was low tide, I would take a walk on the beach and if it was high tide, I’d watch the sunrise and my birds. This shift in schedule (I usually get up at 8, 9…or 10am 😉 ) led me to be sleepy soon after it got dark, which hilariously was my OG retirement plan for my schedule.

That plan didn’t end up working out because that would mean I barely see my partner since he gets off work near when I would be going to bed, so I scrapped that idea for now. However, this has been working while we’re at the beach and he’s been waking up earlier (though not 5am unless there’s a solar eclipse 😉 ).

Food

Food has been rocking! After a delicious time in Maine, my clothes were feeling a little tight so it was time to get back on the keto, calorie counting and intermittent fasting train. I’ve been doing 16:8 IF, keeping my calories below 1200 and my carbs under 20g to stay in ketosis and it’s been going really well…after I made a time adjustment 😉 :

I changed my eating window from 12-8pm to 10am-6pm to match my new early bird lifestyle. Overall this month I’ve lost 11 lbs and 3″ around my waist. Not bad at all!

Lack Of Headaches

I used to get headaches daily when I was working. I suspect it had something to do with staring at a screen all day on top of stress headaches and hunger headaches. However, I got a headache the other day after reading a really dense book for an hour and realized that I can’t remember the last time I had a headache. Another accidental win for retirement! Also here’s some work-related things that made me laugh this week:

Coloring

My aunt writes children’s books to celebrate my baby cousin and reads them to him on milestone days. For the last few, my Mom helped her out by being the Senior Colorist on the ‘project’ 😉 .

Well now I’ve been roped into this situation and am the Junior, Junior Colorist (the Junior Colorist is the HP printer – I guess I have to prove my worth). I’ve been helping my Mom color these children’s book pages and having a great time. I was sad to let my coloring pencils go when we started on our legit nomad life, but those skills are being put to the test now!

In response my Aunt said (jokingly) that they shouldn’t hire union workers and I said they should read the books I’m reading above because it proves that rested workers are actually better workers 😉 . Everyone wins!

Hair Cutting

My quarantine skill is becoming a real life skill! For the last year and a half, I have been my partner’s only hairstylist. Before last spring, I had never cut anyone’s hair besides my own…and I don’t think that really counts since I have curly, forgiving hair that I just lopped off in a straight line.

We used clippers and styling scissors on my partner’s hair and thanks to his family’s tips, I am using multiple techniques for how to shape his hair. Pandemic skills are still improving on the tail-end of the pandemic!

Singing

I taught myself to sing the OG version of the winning 2019 Eurovision song, Arcade. I practiced the song over and over until I could hit the high notes (I’m an alto) and now I think I sound pretty good! I don’t usually belt music because I don’t want to bother people, but while we were in Maine, I went outside to hangout in our hammock and thought no one could hear me so I went all out.

Unfortunately, I didn’t realize that the windows were open and my partner (who was trying to work) could totally hear me…and asked me to stop. My bad! Maybe I need to rent one of those soundproof rooms next time.

In addition to that debacle, I also belted Josh Groban and Andrea Bocelli for hours while making pasta from scratch with family. It made me realize that my Italian is still hella rusty, but my voice goes well with those songs! I guess this means they should be my go-to karaoke ballads when I’m comfortable going again…and that I need to brush up on my Italian 😉 .

Mental

Puzzles

My partner loves scrabble, crossword puzzles and actual puzzles while I dislike them all 🙂 . Basically I don’t like any game that makes me feel stupid 😉 . Well now he’s into a new kind of puzzle and it’s unfortunately sucking me in. It’s the NYT Spelling Bee and it makes me so angry to see what words we missed the previous day 🙂 .

As a result of this reaction, (and the fact that I started dreaming about spelling bee word combos) I have tried to take a step back though it is a fun activity to do with my partner. Ugh – hopefully I can find a balance of the two soon.

Learning

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

New Hampshire

When we move to a new location during our nomad travels, one item that’s always on my to do list is to read up on the new city and state. The US is vast and I keep learning that I don’t know the nuances of places I haven’t lived before 🙂 .

So here are some cool things I learned about New Hampshire:

History

  • In 1828, the first women’s strike in the nation took place at Cocheco Mills in Dover, NH!
  • Portsmouth is the largest city in the seacoast region of New Hampshire and was once one of the busiest ports in America In 1814 a fire destroyed lots of Portmouth’s buildings, which led to a law that requires all buildings to be brick with slate roofs creating a charming historical feel to the downtown area
  • In 1833 the Peterborough Town Library was the first public library in the world that was supported with public funds
  • The first trans-Atlantic telecommunications cable between Europe and America was finished in 1874 and stretched from Balinskelligs Bay, Ireland, to Rye, NH
  • In 1908 the nation’s first credit union, La Caisse Populaire, Ste-Marie (The People’s Bank) was created in Manchester. It was built to help mill workers save and borrow money (I love credit unions so much 🙂 )
  • On May 31, 2007, New Hampshire became the first US state to recognize same-sex unions “without a court order or the threat of one”!

Current

  • New Hampshire has no general sales tax or income tax (other than on interest and dividends – good to know for my investment accounts!)
  • The New Hampshire primary is the first primary in the US presidential election
  • The state motto is “Live Free or Die” (ok – calm down) and their state nickname, The Granite State, references its large granite formations and quarries
  • The state bird is the Purple Finch, which I obviously approve of 🙂
  • New Hampshire is the only state in the US with no law requiring that people wear seat belts. They also are one of three US states that do not require that motorcycle riders wear helmets…”Live Free or Die” indeed

It’s so fascinating to go through the northeast because the states are relatively small and yet completely different. As I mentioned in a previous post, Maine had a requirement up until a few days before we landed there in May, that you had to be masked even when walking outdoors with no one else around.

In contrast, when we got to NH and my partner went into a coffee shop the first day, he was the only person masked and an older male regular told him “you don’t need that”. This prompted us to look up what the mask mandate was in this state.

From NYT

We found that the governor of NH relaxed COVID restrictions in March and allowed retail businesses to operate at 100 percent capacity. Then he allowed a statewide mask mandate to expire on April 16 and remaining business restrictions were lifted May 8. So basically, NH has been living mask and mandate free for a months before we got there. It’s a whole different world!

Birds

Ah my beloved birds – I like to use this section to mention the different species I find in new locations. So here are the additional birds I saw in Maine:

Eastern Phoebe, White-breasted Nuthatch, Brown-headed Cowbird, Black-capped Chickadee (The State Bird of Maine 🙂 ), Tufted Titmouse, Downy Woodpecker, Scarlet Tanager, Red-breasted Nuthatch, Northern Cardinal, Red-bellied Woodpecker, Ruby-throated Hummingbird, Tree Swallow, Northern Harrier, Bank Swallow, Nelson’s Sparrow

And here are the new friends I found in New Hampshire!

Song Sparrow, Mourning Dove, American Robin, Herring Gull, House Sparrow, Cedar Waxwing, House Finch, Purple Finch (The State Bird of NH 😉 ), Red-Winged Blackbird, Black Guillemot, Barn Swallow, House Wren, Glaucous Gull, American Goldfinch

The TL;DR is that the sparrow supremacy continues. They are EVERYWHERE in Maine and New Hampshire, which is a change from the southern yards I’m used to. Something else I learned this month is that there are different types of seagulls! Now I’m trying to learn to differentiate them. Also above I mentioned these two badasses below (who knew American birds were so pretty!):

Cedar Waxwing’s gorgeous yellow tipped tail
The metal Red-winged Blackbird

And this Dinosaur lookin’ motherfucker:

The Double Crested Cormorant by Daily World

The Ocean

I was walking along the beach one morning during sunrise and was shocked to see: PURPLE SAND! I was sure my eyes were deceiving me or (more pessimistically) that some chemical leak had happened nearby. Luckily neither was the case! It turns out that there is a place nearby called Plum Island that has purple sand.

Hilariously the island is named after the beach plum bushes that are around the barrier island and not the plum colored sand. When scientists investigated what could cause this purple sand phenomenon, they found that it was actually rare pink sand intermixed with darker grain that was damp from rain or sea water that causes the sand to appear a purple color. It’s a long explanation, but I’ll take it!

Being at the beach has made me very aware of tides. Instead of just checking the weather before I step out the door I now also check the tide schedule. By checking those schedules, I realized that the high tide and low tide times changed by about an hour every day and wondered why.

Well, fascinatingly, a lunar day lasts 24 hours and 50 minutes and this happens because the moon revolves around the Earth in the same direction that the Earth is rotating so it takes the Earth an extra 50 minutes to “catch up” to the moon.

Since the Earth rotates through two tidal “bulges” every lunar day, we experience two high and two low tides every 24 hours and 50 minutes. If you’re curious about how tides work in general, check out the below awesome and short video that made me laugh at its morbid jokes:

I also learned a few things about the ocean that are specific to New Hampshire and helpful for me to understand. One is that there is a two color flag system here that explains how dangerous the waves are.

If a yellow flag is out that indicates a medium hazard and a red flag means your shit is about to get wrecked….just kidding 🙂 . But seriously, it means high hazard so you should probably go inside. I also learned that lifeguards here have fun looking ATV vehicles that ride over the sand easily. I want to ride around in one of those!

The Sky

Some really cool shit happened in the sky this month! Namely:

The Ring Of Fire Solar Eclipse

Basically on June 10th I lost my damn mind.

I learned from this awesome site from my fav free tools post that we would be able to see 74% of the solar eclipse where we were so we got up before 5am, walked to the ocean and stood huddled for warmth because I forgot it was technically nighttime and could get cold 🙂 .

In case you’re into nerd facts, a solar eclipse happens when the Moon goes between the Earth and the Sun and blocks sunlight from reaching the Earth. This can occur only during the New Moon phase when our natural satellite blocks out only the center of the Sun’s disk, leaving the outer edge visible.

This creates a glowing ring (also known as annulus…which I can only read as anus for some reason…) around the Moon’s silhouette. This is called the “ring of fire” phase of the solar eclipse and it can last from less than a second to over 12 minutes.

The Summer Solstice

The summer solstice also happened this month, which basically just means that “winter is coming.” Days from here on out are going to get shorter so I guess it’s almost time these snowbirds head south before it gets cold up here.

The Strawberry Full Moon

This month’s full moon was gorgeous as usual and of course has a random name I had to investigate. It’s called the Strawberry Moon because it’s the first or last Full Moon of the season, which marks strawberry picking season in North America. Alternatively it’s called the Rose Moon, which denotes the harvesting of roses in Europe, or the Hot Moon, because it comes with the beginning of hot summer weather in the Northern Hemisphere.

Astronomy

I’m still getting used to the new constellations in the summer sky and am starting to recognize Virgo, Bootes and Draco and keep being able to see the star Vega despite staying in populated areas with a lot of light pollution.

Rainbows

This happened:

We originally thought it was a quadruple rainbow because of the number of blue and purple bands we could see, but it turns out this type of rainbow has a different name and a quad rainbow is a whole different thing. Who knew?!

But let’s start with the basics that I also didn’t know. A rainbow is created through reflection, refraction and dispersion of light through water droplets and rainbows caused by sunlight always appear in the section of sky directly opposite the Sun.

Apparently on planets with rain and two suns, quadruple rainbows are common, but since we only have one sun, they are not 🙂 . Instead what we saw was a Double Rainbow with Supernumerary Rainbows on the inside of the primary arc.

A Supernumerary Rainbow is when you see faintly colored bands bordering the violet edge of a rainbow (usually inside the primary arc). These extra bands are called supernumerary rainbows or supernumerary bands and together with the rainbow itself are known as a Stacker Rainbow. Fascinatingly, Supernumerary Rainbows cannot be explained using classical geometric optics and historically were one of the first indications of the wave nature of light!

Fun fact: the colors in a double rainbow are not in the same order! In a primary rainbow, the arc has red on the outer part and violet on the inner part. In a double rainbow, a second arc is seen outside the primary arc and has the order of its colors reversed (with red on the inner side of the arc)! This is caused by the light being reflected twice on the inside of the water droplet before leaving it. You can see that in the video above 🙂 .

Flora

I think the theme of this year should be “There are different types of that?!” because I’ve once again learned everything is more complicated than I knew because there are different types of seaweed!

After spotting a Multiflora Rose I became obsessed with identifying the seaweed that washed up on the beach. I saw: Fennel-Leaf Pondweed, Knotted Wrack and Broad Leaf Sea Lettuce!

Fauna

I didn’t see any wild looking animals in New Hampshire, but I did learn that some of the critters I take for granted are not all the same. Here are a few I spotted and things I learned about them overall:

Eastern Chipmunk: I spotted a few of these, but didn’t realize there are different types of chipmunks, but I shouldn’t be surprised by this point. I’ve been on this earth 31 years and still don’t know dick about it.

New England Cottontail Rabbit: Apparently New Hampshire has two species of rabbits: the New England cottontail and Eastern cottontail rabbits (which look almost identical)  and one species of hare (the Snowshoe Hare).

Eastern Grey Squirrels: New Hampshire has ground squirrels (the Eastern Chipmunk, and the Woodchuck) and Tree Squirrels (Eastern Gray Squirrels, Northern and Southern Flying Squirrels, and the American Red Squirrel.)

Words

When I’m reading and come across a word I don’t know, I always look it up. Whether or not I retain that new information is a whole different matter 😉 . So I’ve started writing down a few words that I definitely want to remember. Here are those words for this month:

Tilde – It’s that squiggly accent over n’s in Spanish. I remember it by thinking of Tilda Swinton. Why does that help me? I have no idea 🙂

Skinflint – My partner called me this, I didn’t know what it meant and looked it up only to discover: It means a miser. How dare he 😉 !

Elucidate – It means “to make clear”

Prosopagnosia – This is a neurological condition characterized by the inability to recognize the faces of familiar people. I wonder if this exists for names because I SUCK at them and would love to be able to blame a condition for it 😉 .

Cool Shit

My partner saw this video on reddit in a thread talking about how figure skating is even more impressive when the camera is on the ice with them and I must agree! It was hella impressive to start with, but DAMN this ice dancing (as the video description calls it, which is apparently a subset of figure dancing) is super cool!

I’m pleasantly shocked by what humans can do sometimes. Also the fact that they skate to some of my childhood favorites (Evanescence and Linkin Park) makes it next level! I keep getting way too pumped after watching this.

And here are some other random things I learned this month:

  • There’s a jelly that is essentially immortal (also heads up they’re called jellies now, not jellyfish because they’re not fish – who knew?) It’s called the Turritopsis dohrnii and it’s found around the world in temperate to tropic waters. When this jelly undergoes physical damage (or even starvation), it takes a leap back in their development process and transforms back into a polyp (aka it Benjamin Buttons itself). In a process that scientists say looks remarkably like immortality, the polyp eventually buds and releases new jellies that are genetically identical to the previous adult
  • A study suggests that outer ears could be better identification mark than fingerprints
  • Hippos don’t really swim. They actually walk underwater along the bottom until they reach shallow water and then they come up for air. Apparently, hippos can hold their breath for minutes at a time
  • My sister-un-law gave me a flowy dress from Cameroon and I called it a “muumuu” because I thought that’s what that kind of dress was called. Well, my Aunt corrected me that a muumuu is only a piece of clothing from Hawaii and that it actually has a racist history (that I obviously don’t want to perpetuate). Apparently in the 1820s, British Protestant missionaries introduced this dress (called Mu’umu’u there) to the people of Polynesia to cover up as much skin as possible and therefore ‘civilize’ them…in a hot as hell climate. Don’t you cover people up because of your personal ideals AND give them heat strokes in the process – that’s messed up! Anyway, I’m just called it a dress now.

Creativity

I wrote an entire post about this in June, but in essence: creativity is still better than ever. I’ve been letting myself rest after an exploration and social time filled May and as a result, words and ideas have been flowing out of me almost nonstop. It’s amazing what staring at the ocean for an hour can do 😉 . For example:

And for an example of what I’ve written (outside of this post):

Emotional

Introvert Time

We stayed with my partner’s sister and her husband for 2 weeks. To be honest, I thought the situation would be tough because while they are wonderful people, I am out of practice being around others. The idea of having contact 24/7 for that long is usually something I can’t do without a lot of serious downtime, but shockingly – I didn’t need it! I might be recouping my introversion meter after a year of isolation with my partner 🙂 . That’ll come in handy if I don’t need equal or more downtime for every hour of socializing I do!

Less Pressure

I was looking out at the ocean on a rainy day and realized – if this weather had happened when I was working I would have been PISSED. And that’s because I usually had 2 weeks of vacation and if I took a day or two to go to the beach for a long weekend and one of my precious days were rainy, I would have thought of the day as “wasted” since I couldn’t actually go do the activity we planned to during vacation.

And yes, I realized how ridiculous that is – I’m not Storm and sadly I cannot control the weather, but it’s how I felt. I’m going to add this as another pro to my nomad, slow travel life. Now we spend an entire month in most locations and as a result, have a mix of sunny and rainy days and I plan my activities accordingly and never feel like a day is “wasted.” I’m no longer mad at Mother Nature for giving the ground the water it needs 😉 .

The Slow Life

In addition to taking time to recoup from social activities, this month I found myself doing things I’ve never done before, such as reading the back of tea labels and actually steeping tea for as long as they recommend (my Yogi Egyptian Licorice Mint takes 7 minutes).

I also found myself reading the little sayings on the tag of each bag. After realizing I’ve never done any of these things before with regularity, I realized it’s just another indication of the awakened curiosity I have now and the time I have to indulge it…and discover what fully steeped tea tastes like (aka delicious!).

Morbid Thoughts

Speaking of the slow life, I don’t know if it’s because I’ve basically just stared at the ocean and birds all month and reading about ancient history, but I’ve had more frequent thoughts about death than usual. Not in a concerning way, but in an academic sense. For example:

This might have been exacerbated by watching Bo Burnham’s: Inside special as well. I’ve found myself contemplating the end of all things more than usual and I put this in the emotional category because I’ve been having an emotional response to it instead of an intellectual one like I usually have, and I find that really interesting.

Feeling this way has also been cool to experience because while contemplating the end so frequently, I can’t even fathom caring about the work-related nonsense I cared about so deeply when I started my job.

Through my current lens that stuff matters a negative amount – it was great in that it allowed me to pay my bills, but beyond that and beyond saving the amount I did, I now think that if I had extended my career, it would have been a complete waste of the precious time I have left. I’ve felt this way abstractly before, but never to this passionate degree. I guess that’s what happens when I have the time to just calmly think for a month straight 😉 .

Music

I’ve continued to look forward to and listen to the new 1.5 hours of music that’s curated for me by Spotify every Monday in my Discover Weekly playlist. I really enjoy branching out and learning about new artists instead of just having my 500 favs on repeat all the time.

The below song is currently my anthem that I’ve been listening to on repeat for days. Also surprisingly it applies quite well to financial independence:

In addition to that banger, my Aunt introduced me to the Congolese-Belgian singer Lous and the Yakuza and I’m now obsessed with this song:

It makes me want to refresh all that French I studied for 7 years and then somehow forgot 😉 .

Money

I don’t officially call a new net worth milestone until it includes all my liabilities, but I got really close to $700K earlier this month. To me, $700,000 sounds like a ridiculous amount of money for 1 person to have – especially less than a year after retiring with $500K invested and $40K in cash, but here we are. I’m glad I didn’t try to time the market and just let it ride. Also as a result of the ridiculous market, me not spending a lot and accidentally making money, I calculated something wild:

Your portfolio withdrawal rate is usually locked in at the net worth amount that you quit your job if that’s when you also start withdrawing money…but since I am not withdrawing anything until mid to late 2024 at this point, the clock hasn’t stopped yet. I’m basically doing a weird coasting thing with my portfolio and that fact made me curious what my actual withdrawal rate will be when I start taking money out. This was the result. Life is so ridiculous I can’t even stand it 🙂 .

And finally, drumroll please:

Conclusion

So that’s everything I got up to in June! This month we’re moving a little west and hanging with loved ones in Massachusetts and New York State. I’m excited to explore more of the Northeast while the weather is agreeable to my Southern sensibilities 😉 . To July!

Also, 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)
  2. The Month Of Birds: Early Retirement Month 5 (February 2021)
  3. The Month of Change: Early Retirement Month 6 (March 2021)
  4. The Month of Atlanta: Early Retirement Month 7 (April 2021)
  5. The Month of Portland, Maine: Early Retirement Month 8 (May 2021)

How was your month?

21 thoughts on “The Month Of New Hampshire: Early Retirement Month 9 (June 2021)”

  1. Very interesting update, Purple! Congrats on the honors, and you should totally win something for the Plutus Awards–I may or may not have nominated you 🙂

    Lots of interesting facts as well–some I already knew, some I didn’t. Learning is fun! Kinda mad that I missed the solar eclipse though…

    I belly laughed at this part: “Live Free or Die indeed…” Also had a good chuckle at the miscommunication with your Seattle friend about visiting in June 2022. Keep up the great and fascinating work!

    Reply

    1. Thank you so much! And oh myyy 😉 – that’s so kind of you. I’m so glad I could spread some new learning – is it indeed the best. I’m sorry you missed the solar eclipse. I didn’t even know it was happening until my fav Astronomy app Star Walk 2 sent me an alert, but it was awesome and another one should be happening soonish. And I’m glad I’m not the only one that laughed at that haha and will do!

      Reply

  2. I enjoyed the detailed post. So inspiring to read about your slow life!

    A couple of things I am curious about if you have time to answer:

    1. I know many nomads spend less than if they were living in one city but they mostly balance expensive cities with cheaper ones (international). Are you able to do that in the US? It looks like you were able to stay with family for a couple of weeks. Then of course you eat out more. Cost of living across the US have gone up so much in the last couple of years.

    2. It sounds like your partner is still working – is that right (remotely?) So how does that affect scheduling / planning? Is the job full-time hours? Do you find that the schedule limits you or you probably like to stay home anyway? Can the job be performed in another country? I’m curious because I know I will retire before my partner or at least have a remote job while he may be working in the office.

    3. Which state do you use as your “permanent address” for tax purposes? How is that determined? We always consider the tax implications of investments.

    Thank you!

    Reply

    1. Hi Charlotte! I’m so glad you enjoyed it. Happy to answer:
      1. Short Answer: Yes 🙂 . Longer Answer: I created my retirement spending estimate as if I still lived in the middle of Seattle, which last I checked was the 5th most expensive US city. The US can be very cheap especially for nomads since we can go anywhere 😉 . I went over budget in Maine intentionally and then literally searched for “anything in the NE” and found the place we’re staying in that’s lovely and way under budget in August in the Catskills. There are many, many places that are cheap to live even as nomads here. I did stay with family for 1/4 weeks we where in NH (which I didn’t factor into my plan either), but I don’t think that was make or break for this month 🙂 .

      2. Yep – My partner’s job is fully remote and can go anywhere. He works for a great company that treats him as an adult so didn’t hinder us at all scheduling wise. I go out during the day or don’t as I feel like and he joins when he can or wants to. I am trying to mostly stay within close by time zones while he’s still working to help with that so international destinations in North and South American are preferred for now.

      3. I was a Washington State resident before I quit and that’s still my permanent address.

      Good luck!

      Reply

  3. I loved watching that ice skating /ice dancing. Super talented. If you enjoyed that, maybe look up Scott Moir and Tessa Virtue- Canadian ice skating couple, now retired, they did some amazing routines !!! Really amazing. I love watching that stuff.

    Good to hear you’ve had another great month. PS I did have to smile at you discovering there’s more than one type of seagull –
    There’s so freaking many different types! And the good thing about birding is, every time you travel somewhere near there will be new birds to discover !!

    Reply

    1. Ooh will do! Thank you 🙂 . And haha yeah it’s ridiculous how little I know about the world or just assumed (like that there was one type of seagull), but I’m learning! So true about birds too – even just going from the SE to NE was a complete change. I’m excited to explore the rest of the world!

      Reply

  4. Really enjoying your contemplative journey! Looks like a fun itinerary for the rest of the year. Have you been to Santa Fe before? It’s definitely in our top 5 favorite places in the US.

    We spent June seeing family for the first time since the pandemic started. It was a bit jarring to our introvert sensibilities after over a year of not seeing anyone at all, but nice to finally expand our bubble a little.

    Happy trails!

    Reply

    1. Thanks! I’m enjoying following y’alls adventures 🙂 . I’ve never been to Santa Fe before, but have high hopes since I’d never been to Portland, ME either and it was bomb. That sounds like a fun (though draining haha) month. I hope y’all are recovering nicely in Mexico City! Keep those awesome pics coming 😉 .

      Reply

  5. Okay that is crazy and you just made me realize that I missed my June 30 quarterly update so I hope my results are just as positive! Although I have been laying down a small fortune on the arts this week now that shows and concerts finally got the ok to restart on the 1st. Woohoo!

    Reply

  6. Can’t wait to meet you in Austin TX and for me to attend my first ever FinCon ever!! I’m super excited. I just gotta not forget to fill out the scholarship application that ends in five days..

    Plutus awards definitely sounds like the Oscars of personal finance. I also have to nominate someone through that. I have so much on my personal finance blog plate to do, Purple!!!

    Reply

    1. Yeah it should be fun! Just a reminder that you might want to use that Calendly link soon. I only have a few spots left for hang outs (we’re in Austin for other reasons so I don’t have a lot to spend with PF peeps sadly). Good luck with the scholarship! And haha yeah on the Plutus awards 🙂 .

      Reply

  7. Purple!! I live in Albany, NY! If you’d like to get together when you’re visiting Saratoga, please let me know. Would love to show you around the area (if you’re not familiar with it) and/or grab coffee or just say hello. You’re one of “my” bloggers my husband knows by name, lol: “Babe, Purple is gonna be in Saratoga!” 😂

    Reply

    1. Oh wow! That’s awesome. I’d love to hang out and grab some food in Saratoga or something. I’m there from August 15-22 and am currently flexible the whole time. Feel free to email me at apurplelifeblog@gmail.com and we can schedule something! And that’s so cool about your husband 🙂 – I feel like a celebrity or something haha!

      Reply

  8. Purple! I love your posts so much and look forward to them every Tuesday 🙂 I hate to be this person, but as someone with a lot of family members who struggle with diet culture and eating disorders, I feel obligated to say something–<1200 calories seems like way too few for you! 1200 is the absolute minimum I've ever heard being recommended for adults and even then it's only for very short women under 5' who are trying to lose larger quantities of weight. Maybe you do fall into that category, but I want everyone else reading this to know that eating that little is really not healthy for the vast majority of people. I recommend the dietician Abbey Sharp as a good resource for this kind of thing, she has a blog and YT channel.

    Reply

    1. I’m so happy to hear that! And thank you for the info. My usual maintenance calories are around 1500 so a 20% deficit seemed appropriate based on keto calculators and myfitnesspal. I’m always open to increasing that amount if I’m hungry after entering ketosis, but I usually feel good so I keep that goal. For comparison, my Mom who is my height was told she should eat 1000 calories a day by her doctors. Getting older = sighhh lol 🙂 . Anyway, just eating keto and eating when hungry sadly doesn’t work for me (neither does just eating ‘regular’ food – I puff up like a puffer fish) so a combo of keto and calorie counting keeps me on track. I’ll check out that resource though – thank you!

      Reply

  9. I somehow missed reading this last week and I’m not sure how! Lovely post on RE life and living slowly. Really great to read.

    Musing on death always throws me into an existential spiral. It happens periodically but I never resist it. Keeps me on track, grateful and humble. One day the next thing I do will be to die, and there is no predicting when or how that will happen, but it WILL happen. It’s a guarantee. Sometimes that’s a scary thought, but mostly I find it motivating. Gotta make the most of life!

    From a practical point of view, it’s useful to consider death and try to plan for it – wills, expenses for hospice care and the funeral, making wishes known to friends and family, and back-up plans in the event of a terminal or degenerative illness (for example, if I get diagnosed with Alzheimers or dementia, I’m putting my affairs in order then bowing out). I’m sure plenty of people would rather not think about it, but preparation (within reason) can smooth an already rocky event and even be a source of comfort.

    All that being said, I REALLY don’t want to be around for the end of this solar system or the heat death of the universe :S hell no.

    Congrats on the 700k milestone! Keep beasting life, Purple!

    Reply

    1. Uh oh! If you’re not getting my subscription emails or something please let me know and I can investigate. Regardless, I’m so glad you enjoyed it!

      And fair on the existential spiral lol. You speak so much truth 🙂 . I completely agree people should think about and plan for the inevitable. It’s definitely something that our cultures seem to ignore because it’s unpleasant and I’m not about that haha. This is reminding me that I should write about my process of creating a will and all my other death planning so thank you for that as well! And yeah the death of the solar system doesn’t sound like a fun way to die at all 😉 .

      Thank you – will do!!

      Reply

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