Lazy Man and Money

Putting the “F IT” in Frugal-IT-y

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For years and years, I’ve been writing about saving money. Save money, invest money, say hello to financial freedom.

I still believe in all of that. The math checks out. People have done it.

When you put aside money and math, there’s this thing called life. As a personal finance blogger, I focus on writing about the money and math towards financial freedom.

Since you are reading this, I’m going to presume you focus on financial freedom too.

What if we took a break from the money and math? What if we focused on a different M-word… “moderation”?

Yesterday, Joe from Retire by 40 wrote about his expensive artwork. As I was reading it, I felt almost like he was being apologetic for his splurge years ago. It also felt like he was trying to justify it.

Maybe I read it wrong. Maybe I superimposed some of my own thoughts into the article.

Whatever the reason, it made me think, “Let’s look at the big picture here.”

If you are meeting most of your financial goals, perhaps it’s worth setting aside some money each year to create a “happiness fund.”

My “happiness fund” would be about no-questions-asked spending. The more frivolous the better (as long as it stays in the budget.)

Why not put a ball pit in your house?


My “happiness fund” this year went to buying a ridiculously expensive television. I’m not sure it was “ball pit happiness” but I do enjoy it. I’m certainly “happy” that I didn’t pay the $7,000 – $10,000 that it cost in the past.

“How much should I put in my happiness fund?”

I tried to come up with some kind of formula of what would be responsible. I couldn’t come up with a good guideline. At first, I thought it should be a percentage of your net worth, but then I figured it very small or even negative for some people. Then I thought it could be a percentage of your annual income. This is more promising, but it doesn’t edge cases like Joe who could make nothing this year and still be fine financially overall.

Finally, I realized that like most things in personal finance… a happiness fund is personal.

It doesn’t make sense for me to tell you how much to put in it any more than it does to tell you what to spend it on.

Instead, let’s flip this question around. Leave me a comment below about how much you put in your happiness fund and what you are spending it on. You might want to leave a good email address, because I plan on surprising at least one commenter with $25 towards that happiness fund.

A Man, A Van, A Plan

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Yesterday I met the second happiest person* on earth. It’s Billy from Affordable Glass. I needed a windshield replacement and that’s what he does. Greeted me with a smile shook my hand and thanked me for the business.

Two days earlier, I had told my wife to book the cheapest guy who could the job. Windshield repair is not something that you do very often… and it’s not like we’ll be crossing paths again. She insisted that Billy was really nice. I went on a mini-rant (the Patriots were losing, so I wasn’t in the best of moods), about how it doesn’t matter if he’s close friends with the Pope. Nonetheless, Billy’s prices were competitive and in hindsight, I should have trusted her woman’s intuition. Customer service does matter, even if it’s only for a 45-minute job.

He said he’s been replacing windshields for 20 years and that it is the best job ever. I wonder how many would believe him, but he sold it well. He said that he gets to travel all over the state and meet all these interesting people. I originally thought he was an employee of a big corporation, but I was wrong. He’s literally a man with a van. His wife does the scheduling and internet advertising. She comes with him on some calls. I imagine that she can do most of her work with a tablet or cell phone on the road.

We talked about many things. He ask how I found him and I told him that my wife found him on yellowpages.com (I miss San Francisco’s use of Yelp.) He told me that they spend thousands each month to appear in such directories. Then he went into something up my alley, advertising on search engines. He said that Google was the most expensive and his competitors would purposely click on his links to deplete his budget (this is commonly known click fraud that I thought Google had figured out). He said that Bing and Yahoo were a much better value for his advertising dollar.

We talked about his son and daughter and their career plans, what my wife does, what I do (I didn’t mention the blogging thing). We talked about the Patriots and other teams around the NFL. I feel like I could have brought up complex software algorithms and he’d be able to speak intelligently on it.

At the end of the visit, I thought to myself, “The American Dream isn’t home ownership. It’s lifestyle ownership.” Billy had that figured out long ago.

* Who is the happiest person on earth? My son. Just smiles for days. No one can believe that he is this happy. Yesterday he got four shots for vaccinations and screamed from the pain for about 80 seconds and then resumed his laughter. It’s almost like the reaction my dog gets when we go to the dog park, but all the time… lottery-winning level joy.

Five Thoughts To My Future Children…

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I got the latest edition of Money Magazine yesterday, and Pat Regnier in his The Bottom Line column used the letter to his children as a literary device. It’s not unique (I’ve even written a letter to my high school self in the past), but nonetheless, I thought the idea was worth stealing flattering Mr. Regnier with my own letter to my own children. [Note: I probably wouldn’t use bullets and bolding in a real letter to my children, but I think you’ll find it easier to read.]

Dear Xetra and Dax,

  • Your Names – Sorry about the names. They seemed cool at the time. I didn’t think your mom would take my bet. Even so, Matt Cassel himself didn’t expect to win the Super Bowl.
  • Your Education – I’ve seen a lot of specialists make a lot of money. I was a specialist myself – one of a dozen or so people in the United States who could program a computer in a very propietary computer language. However, like me, a lot of specialists lose their jobs when that specialty goes away and have nothing to fall back on. There’s something to said about doing one thing and doing it well, but there’s also a lot to be said for networking well, writing well, speaking well, and knowing technology well. There are a lot of other valuable skills as well, but that’s a fine start.
  • Your Time – It’s the most valuable commodity you have. Right now, you probably view it as an infinite resource. It gets more finite with each passing minute. Look for ways to do something well once instead of having to do repetitive work. Many mistake your Dad as Lazy, but it’s more about being efficient with your time.
  • Your Money – If you haven’t learned it by reading Dad’s website by now, money is important. It buys you freedom from doing things that you don’t want to do. It buys you freedom to do the things that you do want to do. It also buys you the ability to help friends and family in time of trouble.
  • Your Happiness – I don’t have it quite perfected yet, but I’ve been working on a recipe for this. Beyond that, I’ve found four factors of focus: family, friends, freedoms, and fitness.