We learned a few cruising experience secrets recently… the ones that “those fat cats on Wall Street don’t want you to know.” (I always cringe when I hear statements like that. It is usually some “click bait” trying to get you to read a sponsored site about a service you didn’t realize you needed—or even […]
Happiness
A Picture Can Be Worth More than a Thousand Words
For more than a hundred years, people have used the expression “A picture is worth a thousand words.” While the origin of the phrase isn’t entirely clear—it was likely an advertising slogan—the saying itself has staying power, because it’s true. Even a simple picture can tell a story. Professional photographers understand this concept and create […]
Three Things at a Time
Does it ever feel like you are trying to accomplish too many things at once? It’s a common feeling—we rush from one task to another, sometimes leaving things half done or, if completed, done with less than our best efforts. In my reading, I happened upon an interesting concept: if we want to do things […]
Leaving it all behind: Cruising into our Vacation
Today is a real milestone for me – I turn the big 55. I keep thinking about the Sammy Hagar song “I can’t drive 55”, wondering how this age will be for me. I know it is just another year and number, but “dag nab it”; all those young PF bloggers out their retiring in […]
Do You Have the Travel Urge?
I was born with the urge to travel. My German-born mother met and married my father when he was in the U.S. Air Force, stationed in Germany. A few months before I was born, they moved to the U.S., where I have lived entire my life (so far). As a child, I traveled with my […]
Here’s $25K. Now Go Spend It!
When the Powerball jackpot recently surged to $1.5 billion, “Powerball fever” swept across much of the country. On the news and across social media, many reported on what that much money (even after taxes) could buy, and the extent to which it could change a person’s life. I believe this helped people escape from the […]
Update: Finding Some Unexpected Downsizing Benefit
For about four years, Dianne and I had been considering downsizing from our single-family home to a smaller townhouse. We felt that living in a smaller footprint would limit the need for remodeling as well as give us less room to accumulate more stuff. We imagined that we would be living a simpler life. Since […]
Retirement Dream of Not Working on Monday
Do you find yourself fretting every Sunday evening, hating the idea of having to go into work the next day? I find when Sunday night rolls around each weekend and the reality of working on Monday sets in, it is both frustrating and motivating to refocus on accomplishing my early retirement dream. This is the […]
Do we have a case of the New Year Blahs?
I have noticed the last couple of weeks have been quiet in the PF blogging world. What I mean is it seems like there is less engagement and dialog with our readers and other sites in general, resulting in far less comments. Our blog site is a good example of that. Is it because of […]
Slow Travel: Giving Me Time to Reflect
I had a great trip last Friday on Amtrak traveling to Colorado. The purpose of the visit was for a mixture of work, pleasure, and simply experiencing a change of pace. The pace of the JOMY (Just One More Year) household has been nothing but frantic over the last few months. The train trip has […]