Favorite Reads This Month ☕

Welcome to a brand new month!

Here are a bunch of awesome articles for your perusal, which you’re ONLY allowed to read once you update your ol’ net worth ;) A fun small treat to go along with all the other fun small treats from last night, haha…

And let me tell you, there’s some good nuggets in here this time around… The Internet’s upped its game!

(PS: In case you’re wondering, I’m still tracking my net worth over here too!! It may not be public anymore, but it’s still my #1 habit keeping The Dream alive 💪💪)

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wallet squirrels

The Fake Wallet via The Wine Squirrels — “Years ago I started collecting old expired credit cards, kept my expired license and some fake money. I bought one of those cheap Velcro wallets. I put everything in there so it looks and feels like a real wallet. When I travel, I make sure to grab the fake wallet. Now, if I get mugged and the jerk asks me for my wallet… guess what!? I give him the FAKE wallet. He’ll run off and never be the wiser.”

What We Flipped To Make $21,105 In One Month via Flea Market Flipper — “Do you love flipping used items? We do! I don’t think I will ever be able to have a ‘real job’ ever again… Today we are going to dive into what we flipped last month (which includes our largest flip of the year!)”

The Best and Worst Thing About Financial Independence via Mad Fientist — “If you’re unhappy when you’re working and you blame your job for all your problems, you may struggle after FI if you’re still unhappy. What do you do when your biggest scapegoat disappears?”

goodbye candy heart

Breaking up With Costco via CRNA on FIRE — “If I could trust myself to be around you, if I thought I could continue to love you and repel your temptations I would stay. But I can’t. I know that you’re better than the other store in town. They aren’t half the store you are. They don’t have free samples or clothes or patio furniture. They don’t tempt me like you do. I can walk in and walk right out. I feel stronger when I’m with them, my bank account growing by the day.”

Benjamin Franklin’s Experiment with Compound Interest via Money Master –“Benjamin Franklin died in 1790, however one year earlier he left the equivalent of $4,400 each to the cities of Boston and Philadelphia in his will, under the condition that the money be loaned and invested to young apprentices that had proven worthy of a loan. He stipulated that the cities would have access to a portion of the funds after 100 years and receive the remaining funds after 200 years. When the cities received their balances after 200 years, the combined bequest had grown to $6.5 million!”

One on One with Arianna Huffington, Founder and CEO of Thrive Global via NY Times — “Arianna worked around the clock on her company HuffPost until she collapsed on the floor. This “wakeup call” launched a new mission: To help people avoid burnout.”

nameless joys

A Million Nameless Joys Await via Raptitude — “In an era when it feels as though we’ve somehow seen everything already, or at least photos of it online, it’s comforting to know that out there, just beyond the boundaries of our own routines, await subtle flavors of joy we can’t conceive of.”

Why Some Think It’s a Smart Move to Give a 6-Year-Old a Debit Card via Money.com — “The piggy bank is so passé – get your kids some plastic. That’s what supporters of a growing group of tools aimed at teaching kids money skills claim. The new products – debit cards designed specifically for joint parent and child accounts – were created as a solution for parents who were bombarded with requests for money from their kids and who rarely had cash on hand to pay weekly allowances.”

Forgetting to pay your bills on time may be a warning sign of Alzheimer’s via DailyMail.com — “Forgetting to pay your bills on time may be an early warning sign of Alzheimer’s, a study has suggested. Researchers have found an inability to keep on top of finances strikes many patients shortly before they are diagnosed.”

And lastly, this hilarious skit by Victor Borge on “Inflationary” Language (video) — (Shout out to Clyde Forsland for recommending this! Super clever!)

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Have a twoderful weekend!

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13 Comments

  1. Stephanie T November 1, 2019 at 12:57 PM

    Oh YESSSSSSSS! Breaking up with Costco-something I did during my last no-spend month. When my renewal came up I just said no to it, and haven’t looked back. I’ll admit I miss those “free” samples but they just weren’t FREE anymore. So, temptation be gone! It might be a tiny monthly fee when I break it out over a year for the renewal, but the savings from not spending on things I didn’t really need are massive. CRNA on FIRE, you nailed this!

    1. J. Money November 1, 2019 at 3:17 PM

      Haha… Well done ;)

  2. Meg November 1, 2019 at 2:29 PM

    Victor Borge is an incredible comedian – some amazing content there.

    1. J. Money November 1, 2019 at 3:20 PM

      Yes!! Didn’t know about him until now but super brilliant!

  3. Heather November 1, 2019 at 7:33 PM

    We love using Greenlight cards for our four kids. The problem we were looking to solve is that often, they wanted to spend their allowance on online games like Steam or Roblox. We’d hand over a cash allowance, then we’d have to take the cash back and pay for the purchases using our debit or credit card online. I didn’t love them having my card loaded in their online accounts, plus all the moving money around was messing up the budget. Now they have cards of their own. I like how the kids can manage their accounts on their devices. When they set up a savings goal and move money into it, they can’t move it back to the “spend” side without parent approval, sparking a conversation with me about the decision.

    1. J. Money November 4, 2019 at 12:52 PM

      Very interesting!!

  4. grettman November 2, 2019 at 7:44 AM

    Its early November and I miss J’s NW updates already. :(

    …but I understand…

    1. J. Money November 4, 2019 at 12:53 PM

      It was a good time while it lasted :(

  5. Journeytoretire November 2, 2019 at 10:03 AM

    Like many millenials, I have a love / hate relationship with my subscriptions (Amazon, Netflix, etc). Living in a mid-size city, shopping at costco is unrealistic – traveling to a store isn’t easy and we don’t have much room in our condo for the oversized costco items. I have many friends / family that also cut out their costco membership.

    However.. Amazon has become our guilty pleasure.. The ease and convenience of prime delivery / purchasing quality products delivered to our doorsteps we find worth it. But it FOR SURE leads to extra spending!! If I had a nickel for every time we needlessly browsed Amazon…

    1. J. Money November 4, 2019 at 1:00 PM

      They totally changed the game, didn’t they? ;) Imagine what shopping will be like in 10 or 20 years from now?! I bet they’ll just be teleported right over! Haha…

  6. YoungandFinance November 4, 2019 at 2:02 PM

    So much good content in one space. Thanks for sharing. I look forward to reading these articles/posts.

  7. Benny Squirrel @ The Wine Squirrels March 8, 2020 at 4:09 PM

    Thanks for the share! Love your site, and glad you enjoyed the Fake Wallet story. Real life is better than anything I could make up

    1. J. Money March 9, 2020 at 6:40 AM

      Haha, totally…