Month: April 2018

College is optional. Education is not.

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(FinCon and the Center for Financial Services Innovation are sponsoring the #FinHealthMatters writing/podcasting contest. Here’s my entry.)

A recent Facebook post about college featured a couple of 20-somethings. One was a slacker dude lamenting, “I spent $60,000 on a worthless degree and no one will hire me.”

The other was a clean-cut young man happily announcing, “I spent $6,000 at a trade school and make $85,000 a year.”

Obviously things aren’t that simple. Some high-cost degrees immediately lead to high-paying jobs, and not every skilled tradesperson automatically rakes in the bucks.

But its core message is one I’ve been espousing for years:

There is more than one road to postsecondary education.

If you’re unsure what you want to do with your life, college might not be a good fit. And even if higher education is in your future, it might not look the way you imagined.

 

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April is the cruelest month.

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What the poet says, but for different reasons. For me, April is the month with the most unpleasant associations.

Tax day, for sure; I always panic come IRS time, even though I haven’t done anything wrong. (My tax guy at Block Solutions says his experience is that the honest people are the most nervous, whereas the push-the-envelope or outright sleazy types are completely fine with the annual forms.)

But April is also the month of my ex’s birthday and also our wedding anniversary. His birthday is April 1 – insert your own punchline here. (I certainly have.)

Our anniversary is much more troubling. That was the day I entered into what would become 23 years of gradually unfolding torment. As I was getting dressed for the wedding, my sisters and my mom joked that there was still time: They had fast cars and could sweep me and my daughter out of there.

Now I think maybe they weren’t joking.

On the other hand, if I hadn’t married him I would never have made it to Alaska – which changed my life on several levels.

 

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15 things I like to do.

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My blogging buddy and former* Get Rich Slowly boss J.D. Roth recently posted an article called “How to find purpose in your life: 12 powerful exercises to help you discover purpose and passion.”

Among those exercises was one called “20 things you like to do,” which is just what it sounds like: Make a list of 20 things – and it must be 20 – that you like to do.

With those items you’re supposed to create a chart with columns like “when did you last do this thing,” “is it free or is there a monetary cost,” “solitary or social,” “planned or spontaneous” and several other descriptors.

J.D. admits he could list only 16 things he likes to do. Even better: “Playing computer games” was the first one he thought of, whereas “sex” was the second thing to come up (as it were).

Not only does he admit it (not sure I would have!), J.D. pokes fun at himself before the readers had a chance: “Kind of sad (and hilarious) to note that this list is in the order I thought of things.”

I decided to bounce off his post and give a list of 20 things I like to do. Trouble is, I couldn’t make it to 20 things either. Maybe that means my tastes are refined, or maybe it means that I’m a pretty boring person.

Note: These are in no particular order. In fact, one of the most important things I like to do is found at the end.

 

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Giveaway: “Frugality For Depressives.”

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Greetings from sunny Phoenix! I’m visiting my daughter and meeting some deadlines. While I do have to finish the paying work, I also wanted to put up a new post. Yet why come this far south and spend my non-work hours writing?

The solution came to me this morning: Do a giveaway post! Haven’t done one in a while, after all.

And why not make the prize a copy of Abby’s book? That’s a hostess gift she can really appreciate. #virtualetiquette

One lucky reader will get either a paperback or Kindle copy of “Frugality For Depressives: Money-Saving Tips For Those Who Find Life A Little Harder.”

Of course a mother would think her kid’s book is awesome. But I’m not the only one who thinks the book can help depressives and the chronically ill (and maybe others — more on that below).

 

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