Thoughts and reflections form the past week or so from my own financial independence campaign.
Progress on my goals
Boat plan
I’ve finally gotten round to replacing all of the switches/ circuit breakers in our switchboard and can confirm that our domestic electrics now work like a dream.
Hooray!
I’ve also connected the new radio up to the SeaTalkNG network. What this should mean is that when I’ve fitted the Chartplotter I can push the man overboard button and instantly get a distress signal sent out with GPS data to anyone in radio range.
In English? It means I can send an emergency signal that will be rebroadcast automatically by anyone who has a semi-modern radio, so there’s a chance of a rescue.
I’m also hoping that this means I will be able to get AIS data (I.e. location and identities of other vessels) on the Chartplotter screen. That would be pretty cool.
It’s a wet day and the Chartplotter needs to be mounted outside, so I don’t know if I’ll get around to that today. Might be a job for next weekend.
Anyway, the super essential wiring is done and we’re living like kings. For my next trick, I’m going to connect up some USB charging sockets so that I don’t have to keep using plug-in chargers for phones, the iPad, Kindle (etc). It will mean we can charge off the 12-volt batteries in anchorages, which is cool, but most importantly it will get rid of the nest of charging cables we currently have on our bookshelf.
See photo below.
Reflections on the half-year point
Regular readers will have spotted that I published a half-year review for the 2025 campaign last week.
My main objective moving forward has to be to find a way to earn money while travelling. We’re at CoastFI, but if we want to sail out in a few years time we’re probably not going to cover our expenses entirely from our investment pot, so we’re definitely going to need some way of bringing in living expenses (and maybe adding to the investment pot…) so that we don’t just burn through our chances of ever retiring.
So this week I’ve been looking at ways to find time to do more stuff on the Odin Project.
I’ve been a big fan of the course, which is free. I’d gotten past the basic modules on HTML and CSS a few years ago (it helped me set up this website) but I kind of stopped because, well, I work in law and the law is time-intensive. Learning more about web development just wasn’t a priority. Now, though, I think it might be a gateway into being able to earn money by remote working.
You could ask – and I often wonder – couldn’t you just be a lawyer remotely? Well, I’ve looked into it, and the answer is basically no. I can practice law remotely but only if I stick to limited activities (the kind that ChatGPT can do), work without insurance (seriously – no insurers are keen) and somehow recruit clients in England and Wales when I’m somewhere else and probably won’t meet them. I’m keeping my eyes open for remote jobs but I’m not optimistic.
Conversely: developers can easily freelance from anywhere in the world, I have an advantage in that English is my first language, their industry is geared up to allow freelancing and remote work, and there’s no regulatory or insurance requirement. Layoffs are coming to the wider tech industry but I could always sell micro-services on Upwork or Fiverr or build something myself.
And, if nothing else, it’s another skill.
So my plan is to start by trying to revive my 2016-era laptop by replacing the Windows operating system with Linux in the hopes that it will stop overheating. If that doesn’t work, I might be replacing the old girl. Windows 11 made the user experience so poor that I switched to using an iPad for blogging a year or so ago and haven’t really picked the laptop up except to buy MP3s for the iPod.
Distractions and detours
I got published by the Oxford University Press
This week was pretty awesome at work because an article I’d written about digital assets got formally published by an OUP publication.
Can I wear a tweed jacket with leather elbow patches now? Maybe smoke an academic pipe?
That’s pretty cool.
I hope one day to be referenced as a last-minute inclusion into an undergraduate essay that hasn’t actually been read to support a point that my article doesn’t make. Inspiring the yoof of today!
Work drinks
We had a “summer drinks” event for my office this week. Everyone is friendly, but about two bottles of beer later conversations started to go around in circles and I realised very quickly: I don’t have a lot in common with my colleagues.
So I snuck out about 2.5hrs in.
I did feel a bit like a killjoy. Living on a small island, your work colleagues are like 90% of the people you know. But, being the ex-military guy who lives on a boat, I’m something of a novelty to them and not really relatable. That’s not meant as a slight: we’re just very different people and our only connection is, er, corporate law, that famously riveting topic that’s so interesting you have to throw money at people to get them to read it.
Maybe if I didn’t do something so all-encompassing like law the vibes would be different? Or, maybe, you bring your own vibes with you, and I’m just a grumpy bastard.
Who knows? I don’t!
For now though, I’m probably going to lay off the alcohol for a couple of weeks. There’s a chance it’s a mood thing and having a drink while grumpy is rarely a good idea. Just going to chill out and do my own projects for a bit.
Non-FIRE goals
My guitar rock god quest (AKA learning to play)
We’re still doing Wake Up by Rage Against the Machine. Got a little further, but now have to write a four-bar solo and play it at this week’s lesson.
Tasks like that are getting a little less intimidating over time.
Fitness
Got my important sessions in. Having work beers doesn’t help, but I drank from small bottles so the damage was pretty minimal. Maybe 2-3 pints.
It’s confirmed: I can do a set of 10 pull-ups pretty much every time now. I’m quantifiably stronger than when I started!
Handstands still suck. I think it’s a mix of not having room to practice kicking up in the gym and being a coward about falling over. I’ll have to face my fears some time, though! Facing a wall for support, I can hold a handstand for something like 10-20 seconds, so it’s a mixture of co-ordination, balance and core strength that I’ll need to build up.
No rush!
Final thoughts
Electronics are going well and the boat is going back to being more comfortable. As she should be!
I’m not 100% sure that learning to code again will have direct benefits, but I need to pick a direction of travel and try something and I enjoyed the HMTL and CSS bits of the Odin Project before. It’s free to learn, even if I end up replacing the laptop (hopefully not…) it’s quite a small outlay in the scheme of things, and learning new skills is rarely wasted.
Apart from being a grumpy unsociable bugger this week, which could be the booze to be fair, it’s been a pretty good week! Lots of mini-achievements, some cool stuff happened.
If the weather clears up I’m going to try the Chartplotter today. If it doesn’t? Probably going to chill out with that guitar.
My financial independence campaign continues!
