Living life – Page 35 – Physician In Numbers

The YOLO Chair

In the corner of my parents’ living room sits a large armchair, Louis XV style. It’s my father’s chair, generally speaking no one else sits in it, unless one of the cats sneaks in. It’s quite handsome, and guests frequently remark on it.

My mother tells the story of how they acquired the chair:

One Doctor’s Retirement, 20 years later

In my prior post, I wrote about my father’s career and retirement preparations. He retired just over 20 years ago, and from what I can see, had a pretty good time.

Over the years we have talked about finances, and though I haven’t announced firm plans to retire early, I think he can tell I am thinking about it. He has been giving more advice recently, mostly to keep working.

I thought I would share some of his recent advice, and some of my observations of his two-decades-long retirement, which I hope will go another decade more.

When Are You Rich?

As Thanksgiving approaches, it seems time to pay special attention to the blessings and riches we enjoy.

Not Quite What I Was Hoping For

I may have mentioned that I am taking a pay cut to reduce my hours. The plan is that with a slightly shorter day, I can finish earlier, and spend some time on my life outside the office, maybe working on future me.

Today was my first day with the shorter schedule. I had lots of patients who need extra time, but were scheduled for 15 minute visits. The electronic medical record wasn’t cooperating. Despite the supposedly shorter schedule, I finished at same time I used to finish, and went home just as late (actually, later) as I did before the change.

I can tell myself thank goodness my schedule was truncated, otherwise I’d have been in the office even later; but right now, I’m just not feeling the love. We’ll see how things turn out going forward.

Thoughts on “The Italian Job”

In our house, we seldom watch network TV, at least not live. We watch a lot of movies–usually old ones, that we can watch for free, or get from Netflix. We enjoy discussing them later, and I may post some of our thoughts from time to time.

On Good Citizenship, or Don’t be a Pig

One of the issues have with some of the frugality blogs out there–and don’t get me wrong, I love reading them–is the excitement? Pride? Exhortation? to take advantage of free things. It especially bothers me when I know that the author is no longer struggling financially.

I should point out that as I write this, I have just taken advantage of free admission to a museum while staying (for free) at a relative’s home in another city. So I get the appeal of the cheap/free treat.

Ten Steps to Future Me

Last week I rambled a bit about finding something to retire to, rather than focusing on retiring from. Also about (re)building a life that I can enjoy now, rather than waiting until . I also mentioned that I am taking a small pay cut, to get a little more time back in my life. The big question is: how will I use that time well?

Figuring Out Future Me

There’s lots of talk out in the FIRE blog world about retiring to something, rather than from something. Finding your passion, something you not only don’t mind going to do, but are excited that you get to go work on it.