Thoughts and reflections from the past week or so from my own financial independence campaign.

OK, it’s been two weeks… but I wrote a long form post, too!

Progress on my goals

Boat life

We should be putting the sails up today but Lady SierraWhiskyMike has gone for a nap. So no dice. No rush, though.

I’ve gotten fairly used to working from the nav station as my work-from-home desk. There’s one tiny lip on the corner that I’m tempted to remove for typing comfort, but it’s there for actual navigation and I’m not sure cutting it out would be a good idea.

Sun is very much out and boat life is now becoming easy for the season, which is how we like it.

Start-up work

Regulatory questions came in hot this week. On top of that we’ve had kit deliveries, supplier onboarding… busy week, with even more busyness to follow.

I basically work weekends now. Last weekend, we were in England for the 40th birthday party of one of Lady SierraWhiskyMike’s friends. We made some stop offs to friends and family, but I used the ferry ride to work on contracts (in both crossings) and managed to send out a contract template to a buddy of mine whose freelance business has basically been running on handshakes and random invoices for the last decade.

Anyway, that guy wants me to do things like draft the terms and conditions of his new micro-SaaS business. He offered me shares as payment, but then balked a little at the percentage I suggested and hasn’t come back to me. Yes, I did offer him a discounted cash rate too. Maybe something will come of it or maybe it’s a time waste, but that’s business for you.: kiss a few frogs and hope for a client.

I don’t technically need the money so if that happens it’s a nice side hustle but if it doesn’t then nothing lost.

Distractions and detours

Python coding

I’m on chapter 6 of Automate the Boring Stuff with Python. The book is online here for free at automatetheboringstuff.com.

It’s going OK? I’ve coded a lot of meaningless programmes, which I guess is good practice, and now we’re starting to get to the juicy data processing bit. I’ve learned how to define some simple functions and write chains of functions and loops for automation.

Boots died!

Remember last year, when I spent around £300 on boots that were meant to be multi-year footwear that can be resoled?

They catastrophically failed on the ferry back home last weekend. Like, epically. All the stitching of the upper to the sole on my right boot just fell apart.

I’ve written to Loake who have said that I need to send it back for their consideration.

Wow. Such quality, many value. Check it out below:

Non-FIRE goals

My guitar rock god quest (AKA learning to play)

I’d like to tell you I’ve made massive progress but I really haven’t these last two weeks.

Still working on Sultans of Swing and Under the Bridge.

Actually, I was quite happy this week when I played Under the Bridge and my teacher thought it had come out pretty good. Remember, this is the first difficult song I’ve learned as a self-directed project, so him saying it was OK is a big verification that I’m doing something right.

Fitness

I did get some rings in and have been walking quite a lot – turns out I average 12,000 steps a day now.

My physiotherapist has signed me off as good to go now, so I’m reconditioning my legs in earnest. Lady SierraWhiskyMike and I went for a nice 2 mile slow jog last night which was very pleasant. Not too arduous, we chatted our way around the loop. The aim is to get my knees and feet back into conditioning again now that the major injury has mostly healed.

I’ve been advised to stick to flat surfaces, like roads, for the time being. The physio thinks that compensating for the injury has let my stabiliser muscles and sense of balance go to pot, so I need to build that up over a few weeks before I try getting up to speed or doing real distances. I’ve also been told to put my ego aside and do maybe 1-2 jogs per week maximum for the first couple of months.

The ol’ injured knee started to feel a little sore by the end of 2 miles. That’s to be expected I guess, but 2 miles is an OK distance for a no-stress jog. Nothing to write home about, no real risk of lactic acid build-up or muscle soreness, yet enough to get some kind of cardio benefit from exercise.

Final thoughts

I don’t even know where my time has gone this last fortnight. Kind hours still and still enjoying the chase (for now!).

I get the feeling we’re making real progress on getting our startup licensed.

It was cool to be able to show off to a buddy that I can do freelance legal work, too. I don’t know if he’ll want me to work on his project, but that’s the start of getting word-of-mouth referrals: help someone out, let them talk to their contacts. Given that I only want the legal work as a side hustle, that’s probably good enough.

The highlights of my week have been the python coding and, in a somewhat pathetic way, going for that jog with Lady SierraWhiskyMike. It’s nice to be able to do something sort-of fitness improving together on a warm evening and it’s a sign that my knees are starting to recover. It was like a bit of playtime and a little victory all in one.

My financial independence campaign continues!