Finance – Page 7 – Physician In Numbers

Don’t Wish Your Life Away

This is a phrase I have been repeating recently, as my current situation has not been so awesome.

Working long hours with no days off for several weeks: I can’t wait until I get some time off at the end of the year!

Faced with obscure tournaments or–gasp!–reruns on the Tennis Channel in December: I can’t wait until the Australian Open in mid-January!

Closing a book by a favorite author (especially if a cliff-hanger is involved): I can’t wait until the next book comes out!

Despite the fact that I am very much looking forward to these events, I try to remind myself that living in these difficult, or boring, or tedious days is a privilege that many of my patients wished they could have more of. That, at my age, accelerating time isn’t necessarily a great thing.

So I keep reminding myself that I shouldn’t wish my life away.

Leafless trees overlook a frozen lake while birds fly overhead. — Winter is not my favorite season, but still has a beauty I should learn to appreciate.

Mr. PiN notes that I had used to say this a lot several years ago.

Revisiting Grocery Delivery

This week winter hit our area, with bad roads and cold temperatures.

I also saw a huge uptick of COVID cases (likely Omicron spread by gatherings at Christmas and New Years).

Between one thing and another, when Mr. PiN announced we were out of eggs, I asked him if he would please arrange a grocery delivery instead of spending time battling traffic and tons of shoppers (who aren’t necessarily masking).

Winter Scene in Moonlight. Henry Farrer. Courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. — Not a true representation of our local roads, if only because the painter didn’t add all 120 cars that would be there now.

Since we haven’t really done this since the end of 2020, it was a somewhat different experience for us.

Future Me, January 2022

I started this series of posts at the end of October 2018. I had just cut back my hours, and wanted to use my new free time wisely. Some of that time was to relax, but I also wanted to improve my fitness, make my home a more pleasant place to stay, and work on becoming a more well-rounded human being.

My last update was in August 2021, with a number of wins, and several misses.

I had plenty of non-hospital months since then, which should have meant that I could hit most of my goals; however, between parental hospitalizations and a death in the family, my time was definitely not my own.

With all that, how did I do with my goals over the past 5 months?

2021 Is In The Rearview Mirror

Early January is when people about their resolutions for the next 11 to 12 months. Usually there is talk of losing weight, saving more money, getting ahead at work.

Before I consider resolutions (or plans) for 2022, I would like to review some of the highlights of 2021. I find it is healthier for me to pay attention to things that have gone well, rather than always pointing out what needs to improve.

Low Clutter Gift Giving

It’s that time of year: Giving Tuesday, Hanukkah, Christmas, family birthdays. A girl’s mind turns to giving.

I’ve already written about giving to charity in various ways, including–most recently–via donor advised fund.

In this post I am thinking more about the gifts we give to family and friends.

This year, I was more interested in more ephemeral gifts: what with inflation, supply chain issues, and more discussion about decluttering, I thought it might be a good year to think about gifts that won’t linger in a closet for years.

Monday Melange December 2021. Giving, Saving, Preparing, Traveling.

Every day I read a lot (a lot) of blog posts in the personal finance space. I have also been known to read in other subjects. Sometimes I even remember to save some of my favorites. Today I want to share a number of posts that tickled my fancy.

A woman holding a bouquet and reading a letter. — She looks like she is enjoying her day’s reading

Doing Well By Doing Good: Setting Up a Donor Advised Fund at Fidelity

For the past 2 years, I have written about giving money to charity (see here, here, and here).

After several years of thinking about setting up a donor advised fund (DAF), possibly with a little trepidation, I finally started mine this month. It was pretty darned easy, though a few details were a bit tricky for me.

I thought I might go over my reasons for finally opening a DAF, and then go through the steps. Of course, I can’t help commenting on some of the small print that I found interesting or amusing.

Planning For Funerals

An astute reader may have noticed my post a few weeks ago, mentioning the 4-parent problem. Unfortunately, the PiN household now tops out at a 3-parent problem. The family situation being what it is, we had to help plan a funeral.

This got me started thinking: I talk all the time at work about advanced planning–for medical decisions, that is. CPR or no CPR. Keep going back to the hospital or stay more comfortably at home.

Personal finance writers discuss money management for a surviving spouse periodically, usually talking about lists of accounts, passwords, and directions on what to do once they are gone (see: here and here).

I see fewer discussions about the difficult middle: what to do once your loved one is gone, but before everything has been settled.

As we (me, Mr. PiN and his family) dealt with planning questions, I thought it might be useful to go through some of the issues we struggled with. It may not help the families of those who refuse to contemplate their mortality at all; but for people willing to plan, these are the things we wish had been thought about earlier.

My Money Week

Life has been pretty busy at the PiN household for the past few weeks. My thoughts have been a little too scattered to compose a lengthy and coherent post, but as I have been trying to decide what to write about, I have noticed that money touches just about everything we do.

Instead of a unified essay, I thought today’s post might just touch on six of the financial stories that have come up in the past week.

Soon To Be: Debt-Free

It’s been a busy week or two in the Physician in Numbers household. I think this will be a much shorter post.

My big excitement is that, one day after this posts, our last car payment will be sent in! That’s right, no more mortgage, no more car payment. Our only debt will be whatever we charge that month to our credit cards; we pay that off every month, so I would consider us debt-free at that point.