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  • The Finish Line is Murky

    Hi FIRE Flowers! Lately when I’ve been reading FIRE blogs I’ve been feeling impostor syndrome creeping in because other FIRE people have crystal clear numbers, plans, and goals. They know their, well, everything, with so much more clarity than I feel like I do. I started this FIRE journey following a classic technical path with a finish line of $1.5M that will generate the $60k/year we need. Clean, clear, concise. But just over a year ago, I started to prioritize quality of life over full fire and began dabbling with coast FIRE concepts. I run scenarios and numbers and change…

  • 2025 Year End Wrap Up

    Ah my favorite post of the year is here! Time to see how 2025 shook out. Taking a moment for a personal look back – I was a pretty big fan of the year. Our first full year as Baltimoreans. We experienced every season of the city! It was fantastic. And I feel more knowledgeable on how to structure plans in the coming year. We’ve signed another 15 month lease at our place! Big items of personal accomplishment this year include: Okay – let’s get back to the business. Topics covered will be: Expenses To summarize: I am not freaking…

  • Solo Traveling

    I love to travel by myself. I have always enjoyed trips with friends, and I love traveling with my spouse, but a passion that I never imagined for myself was traveling alone. So I’m going to write about it! How it started Let me set the scene: It’s 2021. COVID is the whole thing. We wear masks when we leave the house. I am working fully remote. I am lonely. I discover fountain pens! I order a couple online! I love them! I decide it would be really cool to buy them in-person at a stationary store. A stationary store…

  • I Negotiated a $15k Raise!!

    FIRE Flowers! Welcome back!! Today’s post will focus on the numerator of the FIRE accumulation equation: Income In my 2024 year end wrap up post I mentioned that I had negotiated a raise for myself and was awarded it at the very tail end of the year. Now that I’ve been cashing those thiccc new checks for a couple of months, I decided it is relevant to our FIRE journey and thus deserving of its own post! The Backstory Throughout my employment history, I’ve always applied to jobs slightly above my skillset. Which puts me in weak negotiating positions. So…

  • Coffee Calculations

    Happy April to all my FIRE Flower blossoms 🙂 Spring is in the air, and I can smell it already! I have been in a fantastic mood because of it lately. I can officially declare our transition to Baltimore complete (with the exception of the sale of our condo). We are fully unpacked, we have new routines, and we have really settled into life. Included in that is getting back to writing quality FIRE posts so let’s goooo! Today I am going to talk about: COFFEE I have an affinity for coffee. I wouldn’t consider myself to be a cannot-live-without-it…