I want to ride my bicycle: For health and wealth

The biggest change to my life since moving house three years ago is that I can ride my bike to work every day. Apart from saving a bucket load of money I feel so much better. And hungrier. And a lot more likely to die. And I sing a lot of Queen.

Before I became a bike rider, I was pretty terrified about the concept of riding on roads with cars, who are obviously jerks according to most of the comments on news articles. My route to work takes me down the main road of the CBD, which is also where the majority of the busses are picking up and setting down. The bike lane is almost permanently blocked down that road, which means easing around the busses and out into traffic.

There are a lot of people out there who aren't particularly fond of the idea of sharing the road with a cyclist. Riding down that particular stretch of road means constantly looking behind you for a decent sized gap to slide out into traffic, generally trying to pick someone who will graciously give you the road for a few seconds. Coming up to an intersection I'm more worried about the idiot next to me gunning it, pulling in front of me and then hauling on the brakes to turn left. The trip home through town means watching out for pedestrians who are so engrossed in their phone they don't think to check the bike lane before stepping out onto the road. Waiting for two pedestrian walk cycles because it is the only safe option for 'turning right' at one specific intersection gets me dirty looks from everyone. And I've been heckled by pedestrians.

Despite how much I whinge about my near death experiences, it's actually really nice riding to and from work, and people are mostly not jerks. It just doesn't make a good story to come home and say "Wow, over 100 cars drove past me today and gave me a decent amount of space". Whinging about that jerk who tried to kill you by screaming around a blind corner and then panicking and slamming on the brakes blocking the entire road is a much better story.

Before I started riding I only heard the scary stories, because they are exciting and memorable. It's not that interesting to tell your friends about the warm quiet burn in your legs and lungs that makes you feel alive. That you walk into work feeling awake. That you can leave the office tired, grumpy and ready for a nap and be energised by the time you get home. Or that the path home is slightly downhill and flanked by trees that shade you from the sun and the rain and just look so darn pretty. Those things happen to.

Source: http://www.n2e.org/problems/why-you-should-ride-a-bike/





Safety is sexy

I think what people miss when they think about the dangers of riding a bike, is that every single one of the issues I've faced could have happened in a car. I've seen just as many car-on-car near-misses as car-on-bike near misses. I'm not a scared rookie anymore, I don't ride with one curb-side earphones in, I check two or three times before pulling out into traffic, and I'm on the brakes at every intersection even when I know the cars have a stop sign. I also happily glare down drivers trying to enter roundabouts in front of me, and I'll swear at (and flip off) anyone who drives too close. It probably doesn't help the cyclist-driver war, but it makes me feel better when my heart is trying to leap out of my chest.

On my bike I'm aware of how fast I'm going. I feel the wind in my face, and I feel my bike start to shake a little bit or wiggle wildly if I try to pedal in low gear at high speeds. In my car the only indication of how fast I'm going is that little needle on the speedo. I'm also aware in my car that my accelerator and brakes are much more powerful and likely to get me out of trouble. On my bike my accelerator (legs) and brakes (fingers, and core strength that keeps me from going over the handle bars) aren't as great so I need to be more aware of my surroundings.

Since I am aware of my surroundings, I feel pretty darn safe. I'm a adult and I can take care of myself, and I am responsible for my own safety. Whether I'm in a car or on my bike I can't control the choices of people around me. That mentality has been the key difference for feeling safe on the road.

Burning all them calories

I'm also a lot hungrier thanks to riding. I've had to up the value of my meals to balance the fact that I'm riding over 16 kilometres every day. I've try to be thrifty about it by adding diced cashews to breakfast, but diced cashews are a slippery slope to porridge with strawberries, blueberries, chia seeds, honey and diced cashews. And trading toasted sandwiches for homemade chicken stir-fry twice a week. And homemade chicken Hawaiian. I've still kept a few tricks though, like adding lentils and grated carrot to pasta.

The thing that amuses me is that despite eating more, heavier foods to keep up with my appetite I still can't gain enough weight to kick over the magical 60kg. Since the weight on the scales isn't actually a measure of self worth I didn't bother buying a set when I moved out but I weigh myself every time I donate blood. I also know that according to the mirror I'm leaner, with better muscle tone in my legs, butt and even arms. According to my legs, heart and lungs I'm getting fitter because I don't feel like a shaky blob of jelly when I get home.

Hey wait, this is a personal finance blog

The best part about riding my bike to work is that I can now happily skip over that $22 p/week gym membership I was going to get. Considering I ride 80 kilometres a week I don't need anymore cardio. I even get to chuckle to myself as I watch people pull up to the 'fitness club' in their cars, and sweat on their stationary bikes and treadmills whilst I'm enjoying the outdoors and getting to work. 

On top of that $22 p/week I'm not spending, I also get to save $34 p/week on the bus, or $100+ per week (mostly parking fees) if I was crazy enough to drive. Any extra I'm splashing out on filling healthy foods is still less than I'm saving. Plus I really love food, so I'd probably be splashing out anyway.

Even after having my bike stolen back in January I'm much further ahead on my finances by riding than any other kind of commuting (well, except walking). I spent just under $800 on my new bike including accessories (and replacing the light that was stolen in the first week!). After riding to work for six months I've saved $816 on bus fare, so it's all money in my pocket from here!

Source: http://www.streamlinerefinance.net/cost-of-commuting.html

Finally, I feel better. Not just physically, but mentally. I don't feel like taking a power nap the second I sit down at my desk. I don't spend the bus ride home scrolling the meaningless Facebook posts, or succumbing to road rage. I still grump when people risk my life to shave five seconds off their commute, but I'm generally a little out of breath and I can't get properly worked up. When I was suffering through an hour long bus ride to and from work, I got to reflect on the time I was wasting and it was pretty darn depressing. I don't feel like my ride home is wasted, and I still have enough spare brain space to plan these soap-box soliloquies while I watch out for cars, and laugh at people failing terribly at golf. 

Even more than saving a couple of grand each year, having the appetite to really enjoy my delicious food and keeping myself physically and mentally healthy, I love cruising past cars. I've had cars and trucks overtake me multiple times in one trip because while they're stuck in traffic, or waiting at a red light, I'm sneaking down the bike path. It's just the icing on the cake, to know that my ride home takes about the same amount of time as trying to do it in a car would.

For health and wealth - you should get a bike. On the weekend I plan to ride mine to the bakery. It'll probably be bad for my wallet and my physical health, but I won't mind while I'm relaxing in the sun with coffee and a danish.

What's up with this 'Vanguard' thing

Have you heard of this 'Vanguard' thing? And you've maybe heard of index funds? If you've been around the early retirement sphere for a while you've probably stumbled across them. Unfortunately most bloggers seem to assume you know what that means.

I'm not going to pretend to be a tax expert, or a genius investor, but I'm going to give you a whirlwind tour of why I invest in index funds, and why I use Vanguard.

I heard about Vanguard way way back in 2013. I think. As a rough guess. I was reading Mr. Money Mustache blogs from start to finish (with the exception of the ones about the US tax code). After reading every post I was convinced I was going to retire by the time I was 30, that people in cars were clown, and that Vanguard was good.

I've since had to revise 30 up to 35, I'm willing to admit that cars are okay (although you really only need one in the house) but I still think Vanguard is pretty darn good. I started investing in it back in July 2015 before I really understood what I was getting into.

Pros: Low fees and a slice of every pie

That's one of the best parts about Vanguard - it's investing for dummies. You want to invest in the top companies in Australia (or the US, or the world?!) then Vanguard has you covered. Worried about stocks and you'd rather go for bonds - less volatility but a more secure return - you can do that with Vanguard. You want to invest in real estate but don't have the down payment for a property? With Vanguard you can buy into a massive real estate portfolio that includes residential and commercial properties for a measly $5,000. More than investing with Brickx, but you get actual diversification, a brilliant track record and really low fees.

Yay for Pie!

Investing for dummies? Pie?!

Yepp, investing through Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) is like getting a really big slice of the pie, without the tedious process of buying every single company listed on the ASX. You could also get a slice of the S&P 500 (America), a collection of Australian Government Bonds or a slice of the international market. For the sake of simplicity I'm just going to talk about buying a slice of the ASX.

When you buy a single unit of the Vanguard Australian Shares fund you buy a small piece of their portfolio. Each piece goes up and down in value based on the companies within it, and you receive a portion of the dividends from that company. It's just like buying a share in a company, but rather than buying a single company (say, Qantas) and having your investment fluctuate based on their successes (how many flights were made this month? how many planes fell out the sky?) you are buying a very large handful of companies. 

This means that if one company tanks terribly your investment doesn't take a big hit. If one company suddenly triples in value, you only see a fraction of that - because while you own part of that company, you also own a couple of hundred others.

While it sounds dull, it means you can't really screw it up. Investing in individual companies takes hours of research, and you never know what deals are being made on the golf course. You might think you have all the information to know that your speculative mining company is about to hit it big, but their competitor might move in and sabotage their equipment.

If this happened and you owned the little guy, your investment would tank. If you owned an index fund, you might own a little part of the little guy, but you'd own a big part of the big guy. You're investment moves in lockstep with the overall market, but isn't affected by booms and bust like the above scenario. It might be boring, but it's safe. A historic average 7% p/a after inflation kind of safe.

Low fees

Here's the biggest thing. When I was 18 and tried to buy property a broker told me I didn't have enough money. He then tried to sign me up for a managed fund. Like investment funds, managed funds own lots of companies, and you buy a piece of that portfolio. Unlike index funds, managed funds are trying to win!

An index fund simply buys the biggest companies on the market and holds them in proportions that match the market. That means that the Vanguard Australian Shares fund holds large amounts of Westpac, BHP, Wesfarmers and all those other big guys. Rather than trying to guess the winners, they just stick to what the market is telling them.

Managed funds try to beat the market by buying low, selling high and picking out those stocks that are going to boom. That means they spend hours trading stocks, researching, planning and monitoring. Sounds great, but historically most funds don't outperform the market. They might have a good year or two, but they don't run away with the trophy.

What makes all the difference is the fees. This fund was going to charge me 3.5% fees (from memory, it was a while ago.) If stock market has a historic average return of 7% then they would need to return 11.5% to break even after fees. I can tell you right now they weren't going to be able to pull this off. They were boasting 8 and 9% returns.

On the other hand, Vanguard fees for owning a slice of the ASX are a teeny weeny 0.75% per annum. If you're holding more than $100,000 then the fees drop down to 0.35%. They also don't charge fixed brokerage fees per transaction, they instead work on a buy-sell spread percentage. This sounds complicated but it simply means when you buy into the fund you pay 0.1% more than the current value, and when you sell you receive 0.1% less. It looks something like this:

Purchase 100 Units:

Unit Value: $2.0654

Purchase Fees: $0.20654

Cost: $206.74654

After one year

Unit Value: $2.209978

Holding Fees: $0.01657

Investment Value: $220.98123

Sell 100 Units:

Unit Value: $2.209978

Sale Fees: $0.2209978

Money in your pocket: $220.7768 (6.7% return after one year)

The teeny tiny fees are so small it's barely worth noting. There are fees, and you are paying a little bit, but honestly you'll be paying fees wherever you go. Having small fees making a massive difference in you investment over time.

Tiny disclaimer - when you invest you don't have to do this maths, you can throw $100 at a time at Vanguard and they sort out how much disappears to fees, and how much is invested. You'll never have to transfer them 74 cents to round out a purchase. It was just easier to demonstrate the maths the way I have :)

Cons: Big fat buy in, focus on financials, a terrible website, franking and quarterly distributions

Let's be honest, Vanguard isn't perfect. I work as a Web Developer / User Experience Expert and I just need to get this off my chest.

Vanguard has the ugliest, clumsiest website I have ever struggled with! I do like the product though (You can tweet that, maybe they'll upgrade it)

Mr FIRE is a networks engineer and would like to add that their APIs are terrible to work with, don't follow protocols and make at home data collection tricky (if you're not a nerd, you can ignore that part).

What that means for your Average Joe is that figuring out how to actually sign up is a pain in the behind, and digging around to find out what you're buying into is annoying. It's best to read other sites reviews the get an understanding, rather than trying (and failing) to figure it out from the Vanguard site.

Oh, and once you've opened a Vanguard account, you need to sign up for online banking separately. What a nightmare.

For your convenience:

• Sign up to Vanguard here.
• If you have an account, sign up for the online portal here.

You're welcome. I've done this before and it was still annoying to find those links.

Big fat buy ins

The thing that put me off Vanguard for a long long time was how much you need to get started. You need to be able to drop $5,000 in one go to open an account. When you're new to investing that is a lot of money, because you should never invest more than you're willing to lose. For investments in ETFs you should be willing to leave it there for years, not months, and $5k is a lot to put away in one hit. But remember for that you are getting a slice of many, many companies - so you know if one of them tanks, your entire investment won't go down the toilet. The only way to lose everything would be if Vanguard went under, and consider the size and history of the company, the odds on that are pretty low.

Once you've paid that first $5,000 you can add to your investment for as little as $100, which is much nicer. And with the ability to make deposits via BPay, you can easily set up a recurring investment - set and forget dollar cost averaging is a massive win in my book.

Focus on financials

One of the risks in investing in an ETF focused on the Australian share market is how much of the banking sector you end up owning. The top ten companies in the Vanguard Australian Shares fund are CommBank, Westpac, ANZ, NAB (the big four banks) then BHP, CSL Limited, Telsta, Wesfarmers (Coles), Woolworth, and Macquarie Bank.

Five of the top ten companies are banks, and they make up 28% of the overall fund. That means that if the banks take a hit, then your portfolio takes a massive hit. Given that the Australian government has just introduced an extra tax on banks, this is a very real concern for me at this time.

My personal solution to this is to also 'shop' outside of Australia - I hold three different Australian based ETFs (this one, another focus on high dividend yields, and another focusing on bonds) I also hold 35% of my Vanguard portfolio as the International Shares Fund. To buy another fund means another $5,000 buy in, but it allows you to diversify even further. 

Franking and quarterly payments

This is one more thing that bugs me about Vanguard. Quarterly payments of dividends mean I'm only seeing payments once every three months, even though I know the underlying shares are paying at random times throughout the year. I understand how this business model works, and it makes sense, but it's... boring. I'd like to see those dividend payments hitting my account more often, just for a little fun.

The more serious concern though is franking credit. Companies pay 30% tax on earnings, and if their dividends are fully franked, it basically means they're pre-taxed. When you declare them on your tax return, what you're saying is "This company paid me $70, and they paid you $30 in tax, so basically I paid $30 in tax". If a dividend isn't franked, you would get $100, but have to pay tax on it. For a more detailed (and really easy to follow) breakdown, check out this post by Pat the Shuffler.

For the sake of this argument though, Franking is good. Very very good.

And with Vanguard, you can't control what kind of Franking you get. If you bought the shares directly you could look at the history of the company, what kind of dividends they pay and what sort of franking credits they offer then make an informed decision based on that. Vanguard might be investing for dummies, but it also takes your decision making power away. You do end up with some franking credits, but it's not as much as you could get if you picked the shares yourself.

Conclusion: Do we buy it?

Heck yes we buy it! Okay, the website is ugly and hard to use, but once you're signed up you can set and forget your investments. Yes we don't have much control over the companies we buy into, but that's also the beauty - most managed funds rarely beat the market, so why waste time trying? Set, forget and move on, come back in a few years to find you're super rich.

The $5,000 start up is a tough pill to swallow, and if you are scared of diving it, you can dip a toe in share market investing with Acorns but the fees structure with Vanguard is far better, and they have decades of history, rather than Acorns few months. 

As an aside - you can also buy the same Vanguard shares without buying them direct from Vanguard. You can buy them in the same way you buy shares through the Australia Securities Exchange. Aussie Firebug put together a great article about how and why he buys that way, including a video where he steps through a purchase. Check out his guide to buying Vanguard, and happy investing!

Frugal Fooding

Have you ever tried being an adult? It's a truly terrible idea and I recommend that you stay a teenager for as long as possible. It's great to know everything!

But one horrible day you'll realise that you sort of need to adult. Generally when you realise that if you don't organise dinner, no one else will do it for you.

When I first moved out of home the part of my budget I felt the most unprepared for was the groceries. I'd lived alone for a week or two before, either while my parents were on holidays of when I was housesitting. I'd made food. I'd done some token grocery shopping.

What I hadn't done was be consistently responsible for stocking my fridge for weeks on end, and making sure I ate a healthy balanced diet. But thankfully it seems I obey most of the rules placed down by the internet food and finance gurus.

How to feed yourself

Kick the coffee habit

Take a breath, sip your latte and try not to lynch me. I'm not going to tell you to give up caffeine. That would be madness, society would collapse and we'd all revert back to living in caves because we just couldn't function. But, do you need to get a fancy coffee from that expensive café down the road from work every day? I used to buy a coffee every time I left the house. I've gone through various loyalty programs, love affairs with flavoured coffees and walked an extra 5 minutes to flirt with the nice barista.

The cafés within walking distance of my workplace charge between $3 and $5 for a coffee. In some cases they charge more, but $5 is the most I'm willing to pay. When I was getting a coffee almost every day, I was spending roughly $20 p/week on coffee. Here's some cheaper choices:

• Instant coffee - it tastes like mud, but it comes with caffeine
• Buy a coffee machine - a cheap one can cost less than $50. I get coffee beans for $14 for 500g that generally lasts 2 or 3 weeks at least 3 coffees a day. You'll need to pick up a travel mug for five or ten dollars. There is a bit of initial outlay, but after six weeks you'll be ahead and paying cents for coffee, rather than dollars. And if you make it yourself, it'll probably taste better.

See how that list doesn't include pod coffee? That stuff is the devil. It doesn't taste much better than instant, it's ridiculously overpriced, and the amount of rubbish created makes me physically ill. Avoid it like the plague that it is.

Eat less meat

Probably not a popular or exciting suggestion, and one I struggle to get past my boyfriend but meat is the most expensive part of your grocery bill. Unless you are buying nasty pre-packaged frozen meals. Be honest, they taste like cardboard and cost twice as much. Step away.

I try to keep my meat bill as low as possible, with most of the magic tricks the internet suggests. These ideas are great, because not only do you save money, but they actually make your food taste better.

• Mince and veg. - whatever kind of mince you buy and whatever you intend to use it for it will taste better with vegetables. My two favourite uses for mince would be burgers and pasta. Buy half that mince you normally would, toss it in the blender with onion, capsicum, carrots, onion, garlic and blend until it's one smooth and delicious. Add herbs if you're feeling inventive. If you are making burgers you probably want to toss in a couple of loaves of stale or toasted bread, and viola. Cheap, delicious and healthier than plain mince.
• Buy direct from the butcher - Every time products change hands, you pay more. If the supermarket buys from the butcher who buys from the farmer, you are paying all of their price hikes. Buying from the butcher is cheaper. Buying from a store connected to the processing factory is even better.
• Beans. Draw some inspiration from vegetarians and get your protein from beans. You can completely replace the meat in pasta recipes with beans, or you can mix meat with beans. Chicken and red lentils go really well in a cheese sauce pasta.
• Meatless Mondays - I think this is a great idea for coming up with more inventive ways to eat fruit and veg. My boyfriend thinks it's a terrible idea. Three years down and we still don't do meatless Mondays. Unless I just don't tell him ;)

Buy in bulk

I know this is a hard thing to start doing when you are on a shoestring budget but rice, flour, dry beans and toilet paper can be bought in 3 month supplies. I bought 90kg of kitty litter back in February and I'm only half way through it. Buying in bulk is always cheaper, you save yourself the trouble of buying more every week and less packing is environmentally friendly. Assuming you have somewhere to put 5kg of rice. I currently have 10 kg in my pantry. I pray every day that I don't get mice or pantry moths.

Don't pay for packaging

This follows on from buying in bulk. If you buy 5kgs of rice, you pay for one big bag. If you buy 1kg you pay for five small bags. Paying for packaging is just another one of paying for garbage.

Paying for packaging of rice or flour makes sense though. You can't exactly hold it in your hands, and most supermarkets frown on your pouring things into your own Tupperware containers, unless you live in Berlin.


Supermarkets are designed for convenience though. They like to sucker you in with things in shiny packages and cheerful stickers. Loose mushrooms consistently sell for $10 p/kg. Or you can buy them packaged and sliced from the shelf above, for $18 p/kg. An extra $8 a kilo! That entire mark-up is for the foam tray, the shrink wrap plastic (garbage and garbage) and for a machine slicing up your mushrooms. Buy a knife, sheesh.

Don't impulse buy

This is hard for me, and will probably be worse when I move out. But make plans of what you need to buy, and buy those things. Every time I have bought something because "That's great, I need that!" it generally goes to waste. Food rots, and things gather dust. I try to look at things three or four times before I buy them. Foods I balance up how many uses I have for it, versus how long it takes to rot.

Things in a supermarket are intentionally inconveniently placed to make you run back and forth. The idea is that you will either A. walk down every aisle to make sure you don't miss anything, or B. find yourself constantly doubling back because you looked for honey in baking goods, but actually it's located with the spreads. Supermarkets do this on purpose to make you spend more time there. More time spent means you are more likely to grab crap you don't need.

The concept of shopping the perimeter of a supermarket is a little shaky. Most of what you need is there, but you also need to duck into the aisles to pick up pasta, flour, toiletries, jam, vegemite, etc. Still, it is a good recommendation that most of what you grab should come from the bakery, deli and fruit and veg section. Personally I just avoid the chips, chocolate and coke aisle. That is where the big expensive impulse buys are for me, and generally I don't enjoy it anyway. I can spend $5+ on coke and a chocolate bar, or I can buy more bacon. Simple choice really.

Meal plan the weird things

Another massive pain for cooking is things like celery. Look at every single recipe you have the needs celery and I doubt you'll find one that needs more than 2 - 3 sticks of celery. But you can't buy celery in such small amounts (unless you want to pay some of the craziest mark-ups). 

Instead do things like meal plan around celery. If you're going to buy half a celery, you can make minestrone soup, jambalaya, chow mein and chicken noodle soup (great for winter!). With just one ingredient you can make the plans to feed yourself for 2 - 3 weeks, significantly cutting down on food waste and on your brain drain.

Sale Sale Sale!

Things should always be bought on sale. Avoid the brands that you actively dislike, but if you need to buy pasta packets buy the brand that is on sale. Actually I love dry pasta packets (milk + microwave + frozen veg = meal) because they are almost always on sale and if they aren't on sale, I don't buy them.

This goes double for making snacks, and triple for making muffins. Choc chips should cost me $4.20 a packet, but last time I made muffins they were 2 for $6, which is a huge saving for my hip pocket.

Grow your own food

I was collecting this many tomatoes every
week for 3 months

Last year I got over 5 kgs of tomatoes off one tomato vine that I grew accidentally in the chicken pen. I assume they had missed a seed when they were eating the tomato scraps. I haven't bought eggs in six years because I have pet chickens, that cost less than $15 a month to feed, and clean up all my kitchen scraps.

I have a silver beet plant that I woefully neglect, yet is always bursting out of the pot. My raspberry cane looked dead for over a year, and now produces fruit from December through to April. I grew beans over winter to attempt to revive the soil and nearly drowned in them. As a conservative guess I would say we went through 10kg in 3 months.

Right now we're heading into winter and my entire garden is overwhelmed with a wild cherry tomato vine. I go out every couple of weeks, lift 6 foot vines off the ground and drape them over the trellis and harvest what I can. The ground under the vine is absolutely covered in tomatoes that have fallen off the vine so I'm confident that next year we'll have another crop. Salsa anyone?

Eat leftovers!

I dated a guy once who wouldn't eat leftovers. I remember thinking "This bites, when we live together we are going to waste so much food. And we'll have to cook every night. Ugh". I did one better than cooking every night, I went and got a better boyfriend! Mr. FIRE is just as much of a fan of leftovers as I am.

Leftovers have got to be the best tasting food on this planet. Mostly because you don't actually have to cook them. Any pre-prepared food that takes a few minutes in the microwave/frying-pan/oven is my favourite. Especially in winter when my diet is mostly comprised of soup, stew and pasta.\

Avoid take-out like the plague, because it will kill you

I am quite proud of my take-out track record. I haven't visited a Hungry Jacks, KFC or McDonalds in 5 years. I don't miss it. I worked in fast food for five years, I'm happy to say that. It might be convenient, but it never really filled me up. It's addictive toxic junk that can kill you.

Nowadays I walk past and the smell makes my mouth water, but then I think about biting into that cheap nasty offal thrown together by a greasy teenager and I feel a little sick. I can actually tell you the exact last time I ate fast food from one of the big chains - late 2012 I needed a quick snack before the try-outs for roller derby. I skipped half of the practice test puking my guts up, but thankfully I still passed the real test!

Of course when I say avoid take-out like the plague, I am only referring to the cheap stuff. I still enjoy having someone else cook for me. I love trying out boutique burger stores (You should try Burger Foundry, they are a-mazing) and I'll happily eat pizza and Chinese. Occasionally. We can make much better pizza than that at home for a third of the price, and I get to hang in the kitchen with my boyfriend.

Before I moved out I had a bad habit of eating single-lady food. I once had grilled onion, tomato and capsicum on muffins for dinner three nights in a row. I ate way too many eggs and I was super reliant on pasta packets.

After three years of being the main food cooker (Mr. FIRE does all the cleaning, and sometimes he makes pizza) I feel like I have this food gig down. I make tortillas and salad dressings from scratch. I once threw together a ceaser salad from scratch (including the dressing) just from things in my cupboard / fridge without looking at a recipe. I've learned to keep 'panic' food in the house (frozen sausages and dried pasta anyone?) but I generally have a safe supply of pre-cooked delicious things.

I very rarely panic that there is no food in the house. But I'm still getting real tired of being a proper adult. Who wants to cook me dinner?

Bake yourself rich

There's currently a list on my whiteboard that reads like a dieters bad dream. White choc blueberry, Triple choc, Apple cinnamon, Banana Coffee, White choc passionfruit... These are all the muffins I am making or have made with my fancy new silicon bakeware.

Oh, and I'm getting rich doing it.

The cost of a muffin

Muffins pretty much fall into a big fat no go zone for me. The main place I see them in cafes in those little glass cabinets. They sit they looking all soft and delicious while I'm trying to grab a (rare) latte and run. I know buying lattes out is a terrible idea when I could make them at home for a fraction of the cost so I'm also suffering spending guilt, and then there are these muffins tempting me.

There are two things horribly horribly wrong with these cafe muffins - price and disappointment.

Have you ever bitten into a muffin to find that it's dry and kind of powdery? Muffins that stick to the top of your mouth? I'm not sure if these are old muffins or just poorly baked, but when you're excited to bite into a great muffin and then it's dry and sad it's heartbreaking.

This is my normal experience for buying muffins in stores (maybe I need to shop in better places?). The biggest kick in the guts though is when you pay $5 - $6 for these sad dry disappointments. Generally they're pretty big muffins which makes me feel like they could almost replace a meal, but I don't think I've ever enjoyed eating one, and for that price I want some happiness from my muffins.

Muffin wealth

So, time to get rich on muffins! I have two basic muffin recipes that I use, a sweet recipe and a savoury recipe. My basic sweet recipe costs me $2.50 for 12 muffins, my savoury recipe is a little cheaper around $2.15, but since I generally stack it full of cheese the price goes up quickly, haha.

Before adding delicious fillers to my muffins, I'm looking at muffins that are a teeny tiny 4% of the price of a cafe muffin. Let's be generous and say cafe muffins are double the size of mine, so I'm making muffins at 8% of the cost.

But of course, I don't want boring bland muffins. I want to make delicious amazing muffins! This weekend I made savoury muffins with zuchinni, tomato, cheese and salami and sweet raspberry and white chocolate muffins. Take a guess what that cost me? The savoury filling cost a little over a dollar, and the sweet filling? A mere $1 for the chocolate, and 50c for the raspberries. Grand total for two batches of muffins?  $7.50 for 24 muffins. 

A grand total of 30 cents each. The sweet muffins make a delicious late night snack with a hot chocolate. Two of the savoury muffins makes a great afternoon tea.

Muffin maths

Because this is a personal finance blog, I always have to look at the maths. My homemade muffins are 30c a piece, but let's say they're half the size of a cafe muffin (for generosity sake) - so for 60 cents I can make something that sells in stores for $5. I wish I was on selling these muffins, but I'm simply cutting out one expense for another (much smaller one).

Swapping one muffin for another saves me $4.40 in a day. But I have late night snacks and morning tea 5 days a week, so I'm actually swapping out 10 muffins a week - if I bought them in a cafe my little muffins would cost me $50, made at home I save $44.00 a week. And that's just my half, Mr. FIRE is eating these too, so as a household we save $88.00 a week, $4,500 a year. On muffins! (tweet that!)

I'm also ridiculously lazy so you'll note that this calculation doesn't include any kind of muffin pans. Because I bought silicon bake ware. This stuff is possibly the greatest thing I've ever bought. I used to spend half an hour gouging muffins out of dodgy old metal pans and losing half the muffin as I did it. Or if I by some miracle hadn't forgotten to buy patty pans the mix would still rise over and stick to the tray.

At this rate if I bake a batch of muffins every week I'll make my money back. Not the greatest financial investment I've ever made, but a great investment in my time and sanity.

Baking benefits - it's cold over here!

There is one more cost to making muffins though - the electricity bill for while the oven is on. I have a very old dodgy oven with a poor seal that leaks a lot of heat and it cost me *drum roll everyone* 20c for the hour. We have a smart meter that shows us exactly how much power is used every hour and the hours that the oven was on we used just under 20cents.

It was great because it was freezing cold on the weekend, but I was dancing around the kitchen barefoot in a t-shirt. I bulk baked a variety of snacks (mostly muffins!) and cooked chicken for Mr. FIREs lunches all while watching television. It was warm, my belly is full and I'm richer for it.

For the love of mortgages

“Word nerds will notice an eerie root word in ‘mortgage’ — ‘mort,’ or ‘death ... The term comes from Old French, and Latin before that, to literally mean ‘death pledge.'” ^ref and yet, despite this roughly 70% of Australians are living with a mortgage.^ref

In the personal finance sphere destroying debt is a common goal. Bloggers celebrate living debt free, and lament every dollar lost to paying back loans. Every dollar in interest repayments is a dollar out of your pocket.

There's more to it than that though, which is why I'm not actively paying down my mortgage.

The house buying story

In 2014 my father passed away. My brother had moved out of the family home a couple of years earlier, leaving just me and my mother in the family home. A couple of months later in June I scored my first proper adult job, 9 till 5 office work. After a few weeks I learned three things about myself - No way in hell was I working in an office till my 60's, winter makes me cranky and while I love my mother I cannot live with her. At least, not without any other people as a buffer.

While I was reading Early Retirement blogs, I hadn't yet stumbled across the concepts of House Hacking and Rent-vesting. I knew I had the money to buy a house rather than rent so I could bring my pets along, and I knew not to buy outside my means.

Fast-forward three years and I own a comfy, dated 2 bedroom home that desperately needs a renovation eventually. I bought this property entirely in my own name, for $60k less than the banks said I could borrow, and my partner pays 'rent' (which all goes straight to the mortgage), While the decor is horrendously outdated it's nothing that desperately needs fixing. We could DIY some renovations and make the value of the property soar by taking it out of the 80s and into the current decade.

The cost of a house

As it stands, we should be poster children for paying down our mortgage quickly. I bought for less than I could afford without accounting for Mr. FIREs contributions, but here's the tricky part I don't want to waste money paying my mortgage early. (tweet this).

I currently invest $500 - $600 a month while I'm trying to hit my $20,000 cash savings goal. If I threw that money at my mortgages instead I could save $107,000 and knock almost 10 years off the life of the loan. As I've posted before, shortening the life of your loan is a really good thing.

There is something even better though. Something worth continuing my death pledge with the big scary bank. Instead of looking at your debts in horror, look at your net worth. Your net worth is simply the value of your assets (cash, stocks, house, etc.) minus your debts (mortgage, credit cards, those kind of things).

You can grow your net worth in two ways - by having more assets, or less debts.

The cool thing about assets though - once you've set them up they grow themselves! If you have $1,000 invested, next year it's going to be $1,070 (assuming a 7% return). Through compounding it grows even faster each year. Paying down your mortgages is great because you pay less in interest every year, but it doesn't compound in the same way that your investments do (although if you aren't paying your loans compounding will very quickly run against you!)

Maths and graphs

Let's say, hypothetically, that I owe $300,000 on a 4% loan (I actually owe a bit more than this across two properties, but lets keep things simple, the rate is right). Over a 30 year loan it costs $515,610 once you factor in the interest, and assuming that you invest and save nothing else and your property value doesn't change, you end up with a net worth of zero.

How utterly thrilling. After 30 years you are worthless, break out the champagne! Well, you have the equity in your house, but you can't use that to buy champagne, or put food on the table so I've left it out of this argument. In every case your equity would be the same, so to simplify maths lets just ignore it.

Trying another tact, let's throw a bit more money at this mortgage. A 30 year, $300,000 loan needs $1,432.25 a month in repayments, but for a nice round number let's make it $2,000. Your mortgage will be paid off in just under 18 years, and you decide now is a good time to invest. Rather than taking that $2,000 a month and living the high life, you just shift it into a nice safe index fund investment with 7% annual returns. Then your graph looks more like this orange line:

Amazing! After 30 years this time you're worth almost half a million! For an extra $570 a month from day one, you've managed to squirrel away a very tidy sum, in fact your investment portfolio is worth 50% more than you bought your house for!

In scenario one you spent $515,610 over 30 years to be worthless. In scenario two you've output $720,000 on paying your mortgage and investing and now you are worth $488,500. That will definitely buy you a bottle of champagne, and a waterfall to drink it from.

But you can still do better without spending a cent more. Your mortgage is costing you 4% per annum and shares are returning 7%. Each year you aren't investing you are missing out on that 3% difference. So instead, you choose to invest from day one. You make the minimum repayments on your mortgage ($1,432.25) and invest the rest ($567.75). Then your graph looks like this grey line:

See that line surging towards the heavens? That's you with no debt and an investment portfolio worth almost $700,000. In fact your investments are so huge that you can safely drawn down $2,300 every month. You are earning more from your investments than you've been putting towards them. Break out the champagne! After 30 years you own your home completely, no more mortgage, no rent and your investments are huge. Many people have retired on less, pat yourself on the back! If you do your maths properly and don't buy into the retirement income myth, you might just be free from the rat race.

Surely you can't be serious?

So why is this possible? Interest rates. Purely and simply, interest rates on mortgages at the moment are crazy low. I'm paying a mere 4% on my mortgages, whereas the share market has been returning an average 7% a year since we started tracking it. While a 3% difference might not sound like much, after 30 years it makes a massive difference.

Many people hate the idea of paying a mortgage and would never ever go back into debt. Others carry a mortgage while holding massive investments because they know that the returns on their investments will well outstrip the costs of the mortgage.

Me? I love my mortgage. I've been given 30 years to pay back this debt, and my lender isn't hovering over my shoulder demanding the money now, now, now! They know that if I pay it back early they lose out on making money from me. Well I lose out too, on all those years of compound interest.

I could be paying back the banks, or I could be setting aside money for my future self. Which would you prefer?

unF*ck your budget

I am guilty of the same crime as every other personal finance blogger - a crazy over complicated budget with too many categories and auto-calculations and future projections. It can be pretty overwhelming even to me.

Thankfully you only need to do one teeny tiny thing to move your budget from panic stations to responsible adult.

The F*ck It Budget

Matt over at Finance Yoself outlines the "budget" that most of us use when we pick up our first job - the F*ck It Budget. Here's how it works, according to Matt.

The F*ck It Budget (FIB) is deceptive. At a glance it looks like normal behavior for most people:

1. Get paid 
2. Pay bills 
3. Spend what’s left (use credit if necessary)

At first this looks pretty responsible, after all our hypothetical spender is paying bills first, and since they earned the money they're entitled to spend it... right? As Matt says "Any decisions in step 3, whether good or bad, are met with a resounding F*ck It!"

You're entitled to do whatever you want with your money. But there's a good chance you'll regret those F*ck It moments when you have a surprise bill and don't have enough money leftover to afford a latte in an avocado shell (it was almost a thing...)

The F*ck It Budget suits many of us through high school and early adulthood when our biggest concern is not being able to buy more prepaid credit for our mobile phone. But once we start dealing with boring adult responsibilities like paying rent, saving for a house or a holiday, paying for car repairs then the money dries up quickly.

The Oh F*ck!! Budget

Sometimes the equation works, and sometimes it doesn't - on a big month with rent, car repairs and a trip to the dentist your bills could easily outpace your income. When this happens many people turn to credit cards and suddenly find themselves behind the 8-ball. Now you have an extra bill each month, and less left over to do whatever the f*ck you want with.

When ignored, the F*ck It Budget can quickly lead you into a spiral of debt with no idea how you got there, then it's the Oh F*ck!! Budget. However, I promised you a really super simple budget that doesn't require elaborate spreadsheets, tracking your expenses or any of that other nonsense (that I absolutely love).

Here it is, one extra step and a tiny alteration and we're going to fix the F*ck It Budget, without ruining your ability to say F*ck It. In fact, you'll be able to spend to your hearts content without that nervous, sinking feeling.

The unF*cked Budget

1. Get paid 

2. Pay bills 

3. Hide money from yourself 

4. Spend what’s left (use credit, but pay in full every month)

And that's it, you're done! Now you can spend what's left and say F*ck It to your hearts content. You can do it with confidence knowing that even if the amount left hits zero, there is some money hidden away so you can feed yourself tomorrow.

The unF*cked details

So how do you hide money from yourself? In a high interest savings account. If you really don't trust yourself it's best to have it with a different bank than your usual money so you can't see it easily and it takes a little longer to move it to where you can spend it. When I was young and hid money from myself if I wanted something while I was out shopping I had to call my Dad to move some money. 

If you're looking for an account to open, look no further than ING Direct. They're currently offering 3% interest if you deposit more than $1,000 a month, plus $100 sign up bonus with my referral code: EBB062. You won't pay any fees, at all, ever. Not even ATM fees. Plus, having to deposit $1,000 a month to get the great interest rate will help keep you on track with your savings. Don't worry about being penalised for removing money when you need it, you only need to deposit $1,000 to get the bonus, what you do with the money after that is up to you.

As for spending whats left, the only caveat I have to add it not going past your limits. Spend what you have and not a cent more. Credit cards are a powerful tool when used correctly, but spending more than you have is a recipe for a debt disaster.

That's it. In one tiny step you've saved your budget and can graduate to 'responsible adult'. You can start by hiding $50 from yourself each paycheck and work your way up, or you can go all out and hide half your paycheck from yourself then slowly ease back to a comfortable level. Find what works for you to inspire you.

Remember that hidden money is for a rainy day. There's nothing wrong with spending it when you need it. Emergency car repairs? Check. Out of sick days and down with the flu? No worries. Stolen bike? You've got this covered.

Invest in the Movies!! (Yes, Really!)

Movies have giant budgets and giant earnings, not just from theaters but from spin-off books, kids toys, terrible terrible video games, and less-terrible, sometimes-good mobile apps. When I was contacted to have a look at reviewing a crowd-funded movie investment, I assumed it was a spam message because investing in movies is for multi-millionaires in Hollywood. But it's not a scam, it's open to the little guy and now you can now invest in a movie. How cool is that!

Lights, Camera, Investing!

The deal

It's kind of like Kickstarter, but instead of being one of the first to buy a product, you're one of the first to buy a share of the profits from the product. Specifically a movie called I'll Be Next Door For Christmas that has a joke density to rival Big Bang Theory.

The premise is simple, teenage girl has out of state boyfriend visiting for Christmas. Teenage girls family are christmas loving nut-bags who go ridiculously over the top. So our plucky young lady hires the empty house next door and a bunch of actors to pretend to be her real not-crazy family. What could go wrong? Obviously everything.

Motion Activated Santa, what could go wrong?

Laundry list of accolades

While this is being pulled together by an indie film company, there are plenty of great names that you may or may not have heard before, you've definitely heard of their work though. The guys (and girls) behind the movie are also the ones behind The Simpsons, Fraiser and School of Rock.

The have writers, directors, producers, marketers, the whole hog. What they don't have is crazy high-paid A list celebrities on screen. Which as an investor suits me just fine.

Didn't Baywatch just flop horribly?

Yepp - even the power of a huge franchise backing wasn't enough for them to compete when sharing an opening weekend with Pirates of the Caribbean, which also performed poorly at the US box office. Which doesn't actually sound a death knell for high earning movies. Both Baywatch and Pirates are chasing a huge income from international sales, and can almost guarantee that they will see another round of income when they make their way to DVD. 

The Pirates franchise has the weight of the first movies success dragging it along (got to finish that DVD collection) and Baywatch can almost guarantee it will be watched by everyone eventually, even if it's just so they can say they gave it a go. 

I'll Be Next Door For Christmas isn't even aiming for the mainstream cinema market. Firstly, let's be honest how many of us actually got to the cinemas these days? The chairs are uncomfortable, the drinks and snacks are stupidly overpriced, there is something on the seat, and there is always someone who insists on talking through the movie. Plus, you can't pause it for a mid-movie bathroom break and snack top up. No thanks.

Secondly, cinemas take a big slug of profits. So do the distribution guys. So does anyone who get even a sniff in. It's crazy how much of the profits are sucked up by the middle man. So the team behind I'll Be Next Door For Christmas are planning on avoiding as much as possible by distributing through Netflix, Hulu and the like. They are still doing some cinema releases, but through some of the lower cost options, they anticipate cutting middle-man fees by 35-40%.

But really, a Christmas Movie?

Yeah, I know, I feel that way to. I'm not a Christmas person. I haven't even seen Elf because Will Ferrell's high pitch childish squealing in the trailer irked me. But on the other hand I still watch The Santa Clause movies every year, and let's be honest the first one is great, the second one is okay, and the third one is truly terrible. 

I am a fair bit of a Grinch in that I don't decorate, I hate pointless gift exchanging and I honestly just want to spend some time with my family without all the stupid requirements of Christmas (I'm sounding a bit like the main character of this movie at this rate...).

The thing about Christmas-based movies is that they tend to do pretty well because people are just so caught up by the spirit of the season. Does anyone remember Rise of the Guardians? That movie was brilliant. And I would never have watched it normally, but t'was the season for a festive movie and I adored it. People of all ages get a bit of family-friendly movie nostalgia around Christmas. Put in a brilliant script and some wonderful comedy and people will keep coming back to it.

Let's be honest, this is terrifying!

Potential returns, is it worth it?

Maths time! Let's assume that the movie does break even. If you can't afford to lose your investment forever this isn't for you. Let's me be entirely honest, this movie could be a terrible flop and you won't get your money back. I personally believe it will succeed and I'll be throwing a little money in. But I'm also nervous about it, so I'll only be throwing about $200 in. I'm keen to get a royalty check forever, but I'm not so flush with cash at the moment that I can risk much more. 

Many Christmas movies have made two, three or even six times their budget. Home Alone made sixteen times it's budget. There is potential to make a lot here. 

The minimum investment is $100 (pretty reasonable) of a grand total budget of $850,000. Most movie budgets are in millions - this movie won't be choc full of ridiculously high paid actors driving the costs up. Any money made by the movie immediately goes to paying back investors. Once your original investment is repaid (and assuming the movie is successful) investors receive 50% of the profits. 

This means that for $100 investment, for every $1,000 the movie makes, you receive a whopping 6 cents. But considering that many Christmas movies make triple their budget in the first year, and keep earning for years to come you can imagine much bigger numbers. Imagine this movie returning triple it's budget in the first year. You would receive your original $100 back, plus another $100, amazing.

How likely is it that the movie will make triple it's budget? Well as I said I'm a Grinch, so I have my doubts (even though The Grinch made almost triple it's budget). I do anticipate the movie will cover costs and start sending some money back to investors. I don't think I'm going to fund my retirement on it, but I'm willing to throw a bit of money at it and see where it lands.

The campaign has hit it's first funding goal and needs to raise another $16,000 in a month. If that target is hit they still need a minimum of $200k more and will use the first bundle of money to fund advertising and scoping out some more investors. Reading the comments they have many many plans to use more traditional fund-raising methods if they don't see enough via crowdfunding. 

Doom and gloom aside - is it worth it?

I think so. Commit an amount that you're willing to lose and let the chips fall where they may. If you're trying to crawl out of debt this is not the platform to do it. But if you're comfortable and want to try a slightly off-the-beaten-track investment, this could be for you. The movie has a great list of writers and producers with plenty of experience between them. They have fall back plans for raising capital and multiple avenues for generating revenue. 

Just like investing in any business it could tank horribly, blow everyone away or just limp along dribbling in small amount of royalties every year. While 'dribbling' isn't a fun word, getting a royalty check every year will be. As I've said, my inherent Grinch isn't excited about a Christmas movie, but my investy-sense thinks that there is a great team with a decent business model.

I'm throwing some money behind That Christmas Movie - if you'd like to as well, head over to their funding page.

Update: I just went to invest and discovered I need a passport. Last time I set foot outside the country I was in primary school, so that passport is definitely expired. Looks like I'll be missing this opportunity. In the last week they've absolutely smashed their $100,000 funding goal. While I'm disappointed I'll be missing out on this movie, I'm really excited to see how this project goes and what they do next. Hopefully I'll have a passport sorted by then.

Update Again: That Christmas Movie didn't meet it's first round of funding goals and has moved to WeFunder.com. They've also pushed back the movie release from 2017 to 2018. I'm actually not surprised because they seemed extremely ambitious the first time around, and by pushing it back a year I feel that they will be able to produce a much higher quality product.

Date night: Gon' Fishin'

Give a man a fish and he'll eat for a day. Teach him to fish and he'll sit in a boat and drink beer all day. Teach a FIREy Lady to fish and she'll inside on dragging you out to the beach on a sunny afternoon to catch a million tiny fish, throw them all back and call it a brilliant date.

I remember going fishing with my granddad as a kid. As a very small kid. I'm sure my memory is pretty skewed by I remember sitting in a little tin boat smaller than your average car with my pop, mum and brother. Four of us, teeny tiny boat. It was dark, the waves were big, and the rod was huge. I remember pop trying to get me to balance the rod on my finger, but I was A. too scared to let go of the boat, and B. convinced the rod would fall in the water.

In short, my first fishing experience was not exactly positive.

For years after that I told all the typical fishing jokes about sitting in a boat and drinking beer, and imagined that 'going fishing' was an excuse to sit on a beach with your mates. Or a boat. It was definitely something men did that pissed off their wives, and the running joke for taking a sick day.

I was wrong. So very wrong. Fishing is awesome. Here's the post about fishing as a great date that I promised to write way back at the end of March.

There are a few things you need to know to go fishing, and it really helps to have someone with you that has done it before and knows their way around a tackle box, how to attach fish hooks and weights, how to pick the right bait. I'm that green at it that I'm sure I've got all the terminology wrong, but I'm still going to take a stab at walking your through your first fishing trip. For me, it's an excellent excuse to go out in the sunshine (or rain), it's both really exciting and really relaxing, and you absolutely never have a hand free to drink a beer.

First, get some gear

Mr. FIRE and I own one fishing rod. Between two of us. We can still have a kickass fishing date, because I use a hand reel. It's literally a coil of fishing wire with a hook and a weight on the end. Give it a swing and toss it in the water.

Of course, you probably want a real rod right? Fair enough, I don't blame you. Swing by your local and ask for a basic, beginners rod. Put your foot down and don't let them sell you anything specialised or fancy, you're new to fishing, you just need an ugly stick with some line on it. 

You can also pick up a tackle box - it should come with some weights, hooks, a few bits of line, maybe even a knife. Again, ask the nice person at the shop for a beginners kit.

If your tackle box doesn't come with a knife, make sure you grab one. You'll need it to cut up your bait, and maybe your fish! In fact, grab two knives, a cheap one for messy work, and a top notch filleting knife for cleaning your catch.

Finally, grab a measuring tape and a big bucket - you need to know how big your fish are, and you need to be able to carry them back!

Second, find somewhere nice

Remember this is a fishing date! Don't go to your mates secret spot under the bridge by the burnt out cars (no seriously, someone suggested a place... that's what we found). Anywhere the river meets the ocean can be nice, or a bay, or a river. Ask google, or your friends, and check it out on google maps before you go there. Try and find somewhere with a low mosquito population.

Third, go at the right time

Fish don't just hang out waiting to be caught. Turns out that if you go around high tide as the water is rising the fish will be coming in to have a feed. This is how Mr. FIRE and I ended up pulling fish in constantly. 

Fourth, shop again

So you've got all your gear, you know where you're going and you're about to walk out the door. Now is the time to get your bait - no point in buying it earlier when you don't know where you're going and what type of bait you need! Mr. FIRE and I use cockles for beach fishing, and you can generally find a bait shop on your way.

Now is also a great time to find a phone app that lists the species of fish where you are going and the size limits. If you can't find an app, you can generally find a website devoted to fishing in your area that you can load up on your phone. Otherwise, popular fishing places tend to have signs detailing the common fish you can catch in that area and your size limits. Snap a picture with your phone on the way past and you're good to go.

Okay, I'm here, now what?

Fish! Squish some bait onto your hook and toss it in the water. If you're fishing for small stuff you'll want to get a little bit of tension on your fishing line. Then you need to zone out for a bit, find a zen space, and feel what is happening on the line. If you're using a rod, slide your finger along the line near the reel, if you have a hand reel, just run the line through your fingers. If you're fishing somewhere quiet, you'll very quickly start to feel the difference between the hook moving in the current, and little fishey's nibbling at your bait. If you're fishing in the ocean or on a windy day it takes a bit longer to get the feel for it.

Mr. FIRE and I mainly fish using cockles as our bait. They're cheap, easy to find, work for most little fishey's and are easy to thread onto the hook. But they fall apart, so you can't just wait for the fish to swallow the hook. When you feel the fishey's having a good nibble (not a gentle nibble, but a good nibble) give the line a quick tug. If you're lucky, you'll have a fishey!

Reel him in, and pull out your phone app to figure out what he is, and if you can keep him. Mr. FIRE and I went beach fishing and caught a fish every few minutes, we only kept one. Everyone else was too small to take home. That's okay though, actually getting dinner is a bonus! Fishing is fun!

A few things to keep in mind - fish aren't super keen on being pulled out of the water with a hook in their mouth. First thing you need to do when you get them out of the water is take that hook out. Check your fish you spines before you grab him, and make sure you have a good grip when taking the hook out. I once caught a puffer fish... It took a couple of minutes to safely get the hook out and flip him back into the water using the flat of our bait knife. I was not touching him with my hands.

If you have picked a good time and a good spot, you won't really have a moment free to drink a beer. And your hands will smell like fish pretty much straight away, so unless you like Eau Du Fish permeating your beer, just skip it.

But seriously, date night?

What makes a great date? Spending time together, enjoying beautiful weather, engaging in a shared activities, celebrating each others successes. Fishing does all these things.

Fishing also forces you to do something we don't often do in our high-speed high-tech world. It makes you slow down, focus, and stop fidgeting. In a world of fidget spinners and endless mobile phone games and apps fishing forces you to disengage from those things. Your hands are busy the whole time. You can also to talk to your partner for added entertainment. Isn't that the definition of a great date? No one is playing with their phones, everyone is relaxing and you are talking to each other.

And if you're lucky you'll also be having a wonderful seafood dinner after.

Goals Update: May 2017

What a month. Record income, low expenses and bonus mortgage payments all came together to mean the dial didn't shift much. We also had a trip to the emergency room resulting in surgery, and I flew out to Queensland for a couple of days.

Do physical fun stuff 4x a week

Well, this started out really well. Really really well. Then Mr. FIRE decided he wanted some more attention and tore his meniscus, putting himself in hospital. To be technical the tear is about 9 months old, but while he was halfway up a rock wall he managed to flip the back half of his meniscus to the front half of his knee. Thankfully private health insurance means he injured himself Tuesday and went into surgery Friday. Looks like climbing is off the cards for a while though.

Grade: B

Create something each month

If this blog counts, I did great, I almost cracked 3,000 views in a month. It was worth a whole 7cents a day! If we aren't counting the blog, I made nothing else. Well, nothing outside the kitchen. I love cooking.

Grade: C-

Apply for one freelance task a week

Winter has definitely kicked in and my enthusiasm for extra work is waning. I made about $60 in the first half of the month and then I started knocking back offers of work. I don't function without the sun and I very much want to snooze.

Grade: B

And now, the money!

May Totals

Income

Salary	$4129.98
Sidegigs	$2.50 (Acorns) + $187.19(Upwork)
Home	$600
Investment Property #1	$1649.25
Investment Property #2	$0
Bank Interest	$12.56
Cash Dividends	$0
Total	$6578.98

Salary

Nothing exciting here. I work, I get paid.

Side gigs

I received $2.50 in referral bonuses from Acorns - shout out to you random reader! Acorns doesn't tell me your name, but thanks, and I hope you're enjoying it. I also cashed in my UpWork earnings - just under $150USD converted to Australian Dollars (roughly $1 / $1.30) then lost a $1 in service fees. The fees on UpWork are insane.

Home

I bought home entirely in my name, but my partner lives here. He pays half of all the bills, plus $300 a fortnight in rent. Pretty sweet deal.

Investment property #1

My tenants pay fortnightly and this month happened to have 3 payments. Happy days!!

Investment property #2

I started including this in March as we had expenses start.Then our valuations came in $50,000 under the asking price. Because it was a new building there weren't many comparables at the start of the purchase, but I had another look when the valuation came in and both rents and sales were below expected. We ran from this deal, cost us $1,300 in legal fees and paperwork, but better than throwing good money after bad.

Bank Interest

I bank with ING Direct, pay no fees and receive 3% p/a interest. If you're looking for a kickass new bank, sign up with promo code EBB062 and we'll both get $100 bonus (thanks ING, you're a bit alright).

Dividends

Zip, nada, nothing. Boring.

Investment performance

	Deposit	Reinvested Dividends	Annual Return
RateSetter	$100	$83.60	6.85%
ASX	$0	$0	7.63%
Vanguard	$700	$0	4.63%
Acorns	$43.97	$0.03	9.811%

Disclaimer: I'm definitely calculating my returns in a weird way. Current Value divided by Amount Invested equals Overall Return. The number is then adjusted to be annual. It means if I dump in a huge sum of money my return appears to go down. Therefore the return quoted here is a conservative number and I'm okay with that.

Acorns returns are still sitting over 9%. How long can this magic last? Only time will tell. It's all from the Trump Rally and given his ability to string a sentence together what goes up must surely fall. I did leave the $2.50 referral bonus in the account - it basically pays 2 months worth of fees.

Expenses

	Spent	Budgeted	Annual Average
Home	$1582.82	$1,250	$1,346.83 (up $27.86)
Investment Property #1	$682.72	$1,250	$1,580.62 (down $32.98)
Investment Property #2	$20.20	$0	$36.81 (down $42.74)
Personal Bills	$146.91	$147.08	$116.33 (up $6.82)
Groceries	$175.28	$200	$196.64 (up $5.64)
Pets	$10.00	$30	$23.91 (up $0.83)
Roller Derby	$219.14	$100	$112.67 (up $11.54)
Travel	$0	$108	$131.19 (no change)
Other	$254.60	$250	$208.78 (down $324.73)
Total	$3091.67	$3,333	$3,753.78 (down $385.41)

Home (Over $332.82)

Bills bills bills... what fun. You know what else is fun? Accidentally paying the water bill twice. Yeah, woops. At least I won't be paying it again for six months *sigh*

Investment Property #1 (Under $567.28)

No bills, woo!

Investment Property #2 (Over 20.20)

No property, very little spend (paperwork...). We're looking though. As I mentioned above the place we had three-quarters bought came in way too far under valuation for us to accept. I have a zero budget here and will probably remove this category until there is something to report.

Personal Bills (Under $0.17)

This is my phone bill and health insurance, it should never change. The average is low because I upgraded my health insurance to include hospital cover in January. So the average is reflecting the old, lower cover and will steadily come up across the year.

Groceries (Under $24.72)

We did a bulk 'celery cook' which stacked our freezer full of delicious cheap meals. Even with the expensive roast as a reward for saving and buying a pile of comfort junk food for Mr. FIRE and his injury I'm still stoked with the spend this month.

Pets (Under $20.00)

Another quiet month of just cat food. Back in February I bought 3 of kitty litter and in March I bought 2 bags of chicken feed, I'm about halfway through the kitty litter and I've just cracked the second bag of chicken food. Life is good.

Roller Derby (Over $119.14)

So this month we had 3 home season games and a weekend away. Which means I spent on a lot on food and beers :D you could argue that the food is a 'grocery' cost, but I wouldn't be eating these pub meals except for derby bonding time, so I'm counting them here.

Next month we're headed to Queensland for five days so this will go horribly over budget again. Derby is the one blowout I never complain about, I do my best to be smart about the spend but when I get old and creaky I'll have to hang up my skates, so I'm doing it while I can!

Travel (Under $108)

No travel, no spend. Easy peasy :) Any travel for derby is counted in the derby category. The average isn't dropping because I also spent nothing this month last year.

Other (Over $4.60)

So... we went to the medieval fair. I dropped $35 on tickets, and then walked straight to the mead stand and spent $125. Absolutely zero regrets because I've been looking forward to this for months. The atmosphere is great and my hands itch to pick up a bow again or ride a horse. Oh the things I will do once I'm FIREd and actually have the time!!

I was still going to come in under budget but we spent a lot on parking at the hospital (ridiculous!) drinking Hudsons coffee in the waiting room (oops) and I paid for a tank of petrol because I drive the car very occasionally, so I chip in.

Savings Goal

High Interest: $4800.82
Offset Balance: $9,381.34
Owing on Credit Cards: $737.53
Total: $13,444.63

Increase from last month: $991.86
Amount remaining: $6,555.37 - in one month!

Well, the amount I need to save in June is higher than my regular income. I'm not disappointed, because as I said last month this was a really ambitious goal.

I'm going to spend June getting as close as I can and nailing down my next set of goals. This will mean a complete overhaul of these goals reports, so if there is more or less you want to hear about, let me know! One thing I'll be making clearer is my mortgage repayments, if you look closely at this update I only list my interest payments, not the principal payments - so it looks like $1,000+ each month is disappearing without a trace!

I pay my mortgage fortnightly so I can get ahead, and this month I had 3 payments go through which is the main reason that while my income is up and my spending is down, it appears my savings haven't gone up significantly - it all got absorbed into my mortgages payments.

Check out this handy-dandy chart to see how well I'm (not) doing.

Check out the history of this goal:

• December 2016 - $6,992.39
• January 2017 - $7,088.91
• February 2017 - $8,735.62
• March 2017 - $11,804.82
• April 2017 - $12,452.77