The $76K Project: Reboot

Since this is my blog and I can write what I want to (even if it isn't about money), and because I'm signed up for several running events this year (including a long-distance stage race that I may be completely unqualified for), I've decided to log my training on a weekly basis. Last week was relatively high mileage for me: Monday, 3/21: 5 mile run Tuesday, 3/22: 2 mile walk with weighted pack (explained below); strength training Wednesday, 3/23: 5 mile run Thursday, 3/24: 5 mile run Friday, 3/25: 3 mile walk with weighted pack Saturday, 3/26: 14 mile long run (after which I devoured an enormous veggie calzone) Sunday, 3/27: 4.5 mile walk with weighted pack Total miles: 38.5 This week's top songs on the running playlist: Sia - The Greatest GAYLE - abcdefu Alicia Keyes & Nicki Minaj - Girl on Fire M.I.A. - Paper Planes Weezer - Beverly Hills House of Pain - Jump Around  9 to 5 - Dolly Parton It's Tricky - Run DMC As part of crosstraining/strength training,

Work update: I've been at my current job for 15 months now! For those who used to read The $76K Project, you might recall that my job history consists of short stints for companies I mostly despised. Between 2015 and 2021, I quit five different gigs. The longest I've worked at one place since 2014 is two years (and that was out of nothing but sheer determination to keep going in a horrid working environment - I should have walked out after the first year but thought if I just tried a little harder it would get better. It did not.) My favorite job ever was as a research and teaching assistant for four years during grad school. It was intellectually stimulating and never boring. I was surrounded by other people who were completely invested in our subject of study. Sometimes I wish I'd dragged it out a while longer. I'll never have another job like that one, but given that it paid peanuts and was tied to my graduate degree, it wasn't exactly sustainable.  Anyway. Fifte

Housing update: our management company offered us a new one-year lease and we've accepted it, so I suppose that answers the rent-or-buy question for now. Like pretty much every other tenant in 2022, we got hit with a substantial rent increase. In our case, it ramped up by about 8%. It's not ideal but it's also not horrible, and luckily we can manage it without too much stress.  Some of the pros of staying where we're at: We live in a great location, and my partner and kid can walk to work/school. Thus, we don't pay the price of commuting. We don't have to deal with the off-the-rails circus that is the current house-buying process. We don't have to move our stuff to another part of town, which always takes more time and costs more money than it's supposed to. Some of the negatives/things that annoy me: Our house is small. I used to think I'd be happy in a tiny house, but living here, in a house that is not tiny but definitely space-limited, has convin

While I’m sitting in my car waiting for my kid’s after-school activity to wrap up, I suppose I may as well write a blog post (on my phone), and it may as well focus on our finances, seeing as how this is supposed to be a personal finance blog. As I think (?) I mentioned in an earlier post, our money situation has improved since last summer. My partner and I both recently received promotions and associated raises. Granted, my raise was more like a “raise,” but still, it boosted our overall income and we were/are thrilled. With more cash coming in, we started delving into the possibilities: We can finally buy a house! Or pay off our student loan! Or max out our 401k accounts! Naturally, we hemmed and hawed and deliberated and crunched numbers and ultimately chose option D: NONE OF THE ABOVE. Why?  Because even with more moolah, everything is so expensive right now that it’s hard to make any big financial moves. Buying a house: I had some hope that we could actually make this happen. We e

I deleted my Twitter account today, and this time, I hope it’s for good. I’ve been struggling with my Twitter habit? addiction? obsession? for a while now. When I first joined the bird app back in 2017, it felt like a pretty great place to be. I quickly found my way into the personal finance community, a community that enthusiastically cheered on my family as we blogged about reducing our debt. I made real friends, and we made real financial progress. Lately, though, Twitter feels like The Bad Place. Scrolling for more than five minutes leaves me with the queasy sense that we’re all doomed and that also, I’m a loser, baby. Professionally? I suck. Financially? I’m screwed. Personally? I’m meh at best.  When was the last time I felt GOOD after closing my social media apps? Not in recent memory. And yet somehow I keep coming back. I was blaming myself for all this until my son reminded me that the modern purpose of social media is to manipulate us, including our worldview and our sense of