August is a week away, which means I'm on the cusp of three distinct yet overlapping seasons: portfolio, primary, and tomato. Meditations ensue.
Like a good Boglehead, I rebalance my portfolio once a year. I do mine in mid-August.
I...guess?...you could call my approach to my finances "barista FIRE," except I'm not (yet) withdrawing anything from my nest egg. I call it "insurance." The goal is to have my investment income be capable of replacing my earned income, so that I don't have to worry about What Happens To the Job Market. I'll keep working as long as I want to work, but I don't NEED to sell my labor to survive, is the goal.
I use the mid-August rebalancing every year to learn something more about finance, as I'm still a baby at this. This year, I decided to properly understand bonds.
I don't know why, but I've always found bonds hard to wrap my head around. About 30 percent of my portfolio is bonds, but I don't really understand bonds? I don't like buying things I don't understand. And since I'm about to spend An Amount of Money With a Comma In It on bonds, I figured it was time to understand them better.
I understood bonds when I understood the emotional appeal of them for my generation.
A bond is a loan. Except instead of taking out the loan to fund college or a house or a car, the US government/a corporation/someone else is coming to YOU for the loan. You loan them the amount of the bond. They pay you interest. At the end of the bond's term, they pay back the rest.
As an elder Millennial who carried student loans for decades before her spouse's untimely death made it possible to pay them off, I love this, emotionally. Finally, capitalism owes ME something.
Bonds are rated according to how likely the other guy is to pay you back. If they are very likely to pay you back, you get less interest, but you're very likely to get your original cash back, too. If they are not at all likely to pay you back ("junk bonds"), you get more interest, but your original cash might vanish like Mitch McConnell. Ratings tell you how much a bond is a gamble.
(Ratings are not always entirely trustworthy - a thing I learned from watching The Big Short.)
There's plenty more, but that was the part I cared about. The "bond" section of my portfolio is the "finally, capitalism owes ME something" part. That helps me plan.
bogleheads.org
Barista FIRE
Investopedia: how bonds work
TIPS Ladder tool
I live in Michigan, where our Democratic Senate primary is a hot mess garnering national attention/meddling right now. For the uninitiated, our choices are Abdul El-Sayed, a doctor running on a highly progressive platform (Medicare for all, money out of politics), or Haley Stevens, a current US Representative whose ad spending was covered almost entirely by AIPAC until last week.
I did not realize how well I'd insulated myself from ads until I started talking to other people about this primary. I don't see political TV ads. I don't hear radio ads. I don't get anything other than the flyers sent to me by campaigns or other special interest groups.
Apparently, Stevens' campaign is throwing everything they can find at El-Sayed to see what will stick. "He's mean to women" didn't stick. Neither did "there aren't many Black people at his rallies" or "show us your tax returns" or "he's not the hometown choice" (he and Stevens were both born in Rochester Hills, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit).
That SC Rep Jim Clyburn feels the need to weigh in on a Michigan Senate race is wild to me. Clyburn is the one who tried to lowkey accuse El-Sayed of being unpopular with Black voters. Sir, it's clear only one of us has spent any time in a historic Black Detroit neighborhood recently and it ain't you. Sherwood Forest is wall to wall El-Sayed signs, with nary a Stevens in sight. Go home to your state that is now somehow first in line for primaries.
Yesterday I got a flyer accusing another local progressive candidate of being "too progressive" and "too extreme." Their "evidence" was a social media post from the candidate that I would have called "based." I hadn't given much thought to this candidate, but thanks to this flyer, I sent him some money. The flyer was "paid for by the Integrity in Government Fund," which according to CauseIQ is just one guy in Novi. He doesn't even go here!
This is the first time I've sent money to political candidates. I'm backing every downballot progressive who isn't taking money from AIPAC. It always felt pointless to donate to candidates before; they all had big corporate donors, so what did my $50 matter? These candidates don't feel pointless. For the first time in twenty years, I feel excited to vote FOR someone.
And I genuinely think El-Sayed can win the general, not just the primary. He keeps saying the same things I hear my rural Trump voter relatives say, in the same words they use. "It shouldn't be this hard. We need to get the money out of politics."
Meanwhile, I'm not shedding tears about watching the establishment Dems fall apart over their DSA neighbors. They are perhaps the ONE cohort that doesn't get it: Something needs to change. The MAGA right and the DSA left disagree somewhat on what needs to change, and they disagree significantly on HOW it needs to change. But they see that something needs to change. It's just the center that's like "what is happeninnng!?!" bro, look out a damn window.
Seriously, what is up with this growing season?
Most of my plants are acting like it is currently September. They're going to seed and dying back at 70 percent of their usual size. Tomatoes aren't ripening, just going from green to rotten. The tomatillos have given up. The basil is turning brown despite only being six inches high. The corn and amaranth are tasselling out at four feet high instead of eight.
Our temperatures have been below average for most of July, except for one week in the 90s. I can only assume the plants thought that one week was all of July and August and it must be fall now.
Really glad I stocked up on canned goods when the Iran exploding started. I was counting on a better crop this year. Even my squash are lagging. Impossible.
Between the state of the garden, the news headlines, and the cold hard numbers in my spreadsheets, I can confidently say I am doing worse than I was a year ago. Yeah. That's definitely affecting how I vote.
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