• Replace my side job income with a bonus I get from working in-office in my main job
  
• Pay off my home renovation loan in full (around €18400 after this month's upcoming payment)
  
• Contribute the maximum in my private tax-advantaged retirement account (Likely only about €2k. I'll only know the exact amount in April because employee retirement savings is so well organized in the Netherlands that self-employed retirement savings schemes have been allowed to devolve into a mess)
  
• Keep my emergency fund at €10k (no effort, just avoid emergencies!)
  
• Keep my apartment fund at €10k. It can go over, and currently is, awaiting renovation bills and furniture purchases
  

• Put anything left after this in my long term investment account
  

• Get all walls and floors done so I can move my bed into the bigger (now empty) bedroom
  
• Get electricity for that bedroom and the balcony done so I'll later be able to get an induction range in the kitchen (long story, stupid setup)
  
• Get plumbing for my washer and dryer where I want it
  

• Redo the entire toilet
  
• Get a custom made hallway closet
  

• Finish and launch at least one software project, even if it's only for me to use myself
  
• Help a friend finish and launch at least one project, probably a cookbook
  

• Finish a book every month. I used to be a book a week guy, I need to get back on the horse
  
• Cook for other people at least once a month
  
• Take two vacations
  
• At least four hours of exercise every week, measured in fitbit move minutes. Gotta turn that exercise bike into a GWM purchase
  

• Replace my side job income with a bonus I get from working in-office in my main job
  In office bonus was around 600, side job around 400. I'm ok with this, but I'm also seeing that hours at my side job are sliding, so I should go to the office even more often
  
• Pay off my home renovation loan in full (around €18400 after this month's upcoming payment)
  currently at 16789.89
  
• Contribute the maximum in my private tax-advantaged retirement account (Likely only about €2k. I'll only know the exact amount in April because employee retirement savings is so well organized in the Netherlands that self-employed retirement savings schemes have been allowed to devolve into a mess)
  nothing yet, waiting for the calculation of how much I can contribute (likely in April)
  
• Keep my emergency fund at €10k (no effort, just avoid emergencies!)
  still at 10k
  
• Keep my apartment fund at €10k. It can go over, and currently is, awaiting renovation bills and furniture purchases
  currently a bit over 18k
  

• Get all walls and floors done so I can move my bed into the bigger (now empty) bedroom
  going to get some painting done soon on the balcony door and some other stuff. Getting an interior door replaced
  
• Get electricity for that bedroom and the balcony done so I'll later be able to get an induction range in the kitchen (long story, stupid setup)
  electrical will be done simultaneously with the painting. The electrician and the painter are brothers
  
• Get plumbing for my washer and dryer where I want it
  no progress
  

• Finish and launch at least one software project, even if it's only for me to use myself
  Making progress on my time tracking website that has two users (me and a friend). Development is slowing down a bit because I spent too much time on the project below
  
• Help a friend finish and launch at least one project, probably a cookbook
  Cookbook launched, in more of a magazine form. If it works out, we're looking at doing one every few months
  

• Finish a book every month. I used to be a book a week guy, I need to get back on the horse
  I finished Sapiens (which I started late 2022), hated it. It's just Guns, Germs and Steel with a veneer of cultural philosophy, and a pointless chapter on transhumanism tacked to the end. Takes huge logical, cultural and historical short cuts. Zero parts of this book would stand up to scrutiny as a scholarly work on history, so it makes sense that it's being sold as pop sci. I can't believe this guy is held up as this huge intellectual
  
• Cook for other people at least once a month
  My guests had to cancel because their baby was coming. I'll make it up to them later.
  
• Take two vacations
  Booked the first one for early March, to see some friends in Spain
  
• At least four hours of exercise every week, measured in fitbit move minutes.
  Falling short of this goal due to medical reasons (intestinal issues that are going to take a few months to resolve and hopefully aren't bowel cancer) Also, my Fitbit isn't that accurate and will often not track my biking unless I specifically tell it I'm biking as exercise.
  

• Replace my side job income with a bonus I get from working in-office in my main job
  In office bonus was less than in January, due to sick days. Income from the side job similar to January. Still not getting the big numbers that will add up to what I used to make from my side job, but I'll get there and cut some other costs.
  
• Pay off my home renovation loan in full (around €18400 after this month's upcoming payment)
  currently at 15048.34. This is on schedule, especially with my vacation allowance and tax return coming in the Spring
  
• Contribute the maximum in my private tax-advantaged retirement account (Likely only about €2k. I'll only know the exact amount in April because employee retirement savings is so well organized in the Netherlands that self-employed retirement savings schemes have been allowed to devolve into a mess)
  Received notice that I can save a total of EUR 1469 this year, and have set up 11 monthly auto deposits to hit this number. First one hit last week, so 133.54 saved already.
  
• Keep my emergency fund at €10k (no effort, just avoid emergencies!)
  
• Keep my apartment fund at €10k. It can go over, and currently is, awaiting renovation bills and furniture purchases
  Made a change in how I'm doing this. I put my emergency fund and most of my apartment fund in a new high yield (2%) savings account. So that's a combined 24800 I've put there, with another 3k in my old apt account, so not much change there, all still above the limit.
  

• Get all walls and floors done so I can move my bed into the bigger (now empty) bedroom
  
• Get electricity for that bedroom and the balcony done so I'll later be able to get an induction range in the kitchen (long story, stupid setup)
  
• There was a delay in getting carpenter, electrician and painter in. New appointment made for mid March
  
• Get plumbing for my washer and dryer where I want it
  no progress
  

• Finish and launch at least one software project, even if it's only for me to use myself
  Making progress on my time tracking website that has two users (me and a friend). Made some great progress here, and am moving to more serious dev practices.
  
• Help a friend finish and launch at least one project, probably a cookbook
  Cookbook launched, in more of a magazine form. And we're getting ready for another launch in mid March.
  

• Finish a book every month. I used to be a book a week guy, I need to get back on the horse
  Finished Mastering the Market Cycle by Howard Marks. Picked it up from the communal building bookcase on a whim. Hated it. It's just 'be aggressive when others are fearful and fearful when others are aggressive' repeated at nauseam. You learn more about investing from an episode of Billions, however stupid that sounds.
  
• Cook for other people at least once a month
  Had to postpone yet again because of a lot of intestinal bleeding
  
• Take two vacations
  Flying to Spain on Monday, and I've arranged to work extra days later in Spring to get more time off later.
  
• At least four hours of exercise every week, measured in fitbit move minutes.
  Still medical reasons that kept me from doing this. Got surgery on a my bleeding intestines, so hopefully everything will be over soon.
  

• Replace my side job income with a bonus I get from working in-office in my main job
  Didn't get as much bonus because I took a vacation and was off for two weeks. In that time, I couldn't work my side job either. So things haven't been great on this front.
  
• Pay off my home renovation loan in full (around €18400 after this month's upcoming payment)
  currently at 14751.09. Haven't been able to make an extra payment this month between the vacation, healthcare costs and a reservation I've had to make for renovation stuff
  
• Contribute the maximum in my private tax-advantaged retirement account.
  Another 133.54 contributed automatically.
  
• Keep my emergency fund at €10k (no effort, just avoid emergencies!)
  It's at 10k
  
• Keep my apartment fund at €10k. It can go over, and currently is, awaiting renovation bills and furniture purchases
  Made yet another change in this, and moved the whole thing back to my normal bank. It turns out that the Spanish bank that did the HYSA (Santander/Openbank) loving SUCKED at pretty much everything, so I closed the account. I did get €15 in interest for keeping my money with them for two weeks.
  I have ~17k in the apt fund account right now.
  

• Get all walls and floors done so I can move my bed into the bigger (now empty) bedroom
  Got a quote from a guy who'll do five new doors and frames (including removing the annoying windows over my interior doors), do a lot of wall stuff, some painting and new windowsills. 6600 in total, including materials, so I'm just going to go with it. Made a reservation for it in my apt fund account, so that's why that number is high and I'm not making extra loan payments.
  
• Get electricity for that bedroom and the balcony done so I'll later be able to get an induction range in the kitchen (long story, stupid setup)
  Have an appointment with the electrician for tomorrow morning. I want to have this done before the other guy comes to plaster the walls, etc
  
• Get plumbing for my washer and dryer where I want it
  no progress
  

• Finish and launch at least one software project, even if it's only for me to use myself
  Still making progress. Got some stupid and super annoying bugs ironed out this month.
  
• Help a friend finish and launch at least one project, probably a cookbook
  Still working on the second cookbook.
  

• Finish a book every month. I used to be a book a week guy, I need to get back on the horse
  Finished Tobacco: A Cultural History of How an Exotic Plant Seduced Civilization by Iain Gately. It's not a good book. Interesting subject, but pretty badly written. Feels like an editor with a background in actual history would have been a good idea. There's so many careless statements, dodgy attributions, tasteless innuendo and casual racism.
  
• Cook for other people at least once a month
  Made a big salad for some friends
  
• Take two vacations
  Spain was nice. Took some nice mountain walks with my friends' dog, had lots of barbecue that was probably bad for my intestinal issues
  
• At least four hours of exercise every week, measured in fitbit move minutes.
  I'm getting close to the planed 240 move minutes a week every week, and it often doesn't detect me riding my bike until I'm doing it for at least ten minutes already, so I'm going to claim I've hit this one
  

• Replace my side job income with a bonus I get from working in-office in my main job
  Getting closer, but not quite there yet. Too many sick days and public holidays. Easter
  
• Pay off my home renovation loan in full (around €18400 after this month's upcoming payment)
  currently at 14453.84. More health care costs took a bite out of this month's possible contribution. But those should be behind me mostly now that my max out of pocket for 2022 and 2023 has been used up.
  
• Contribute the maximum in my private tax-advantaged retirement account.
  Another 133.54 contributed automatically.
  
• Keep my emergency fund at €10k (no effort, just avoid emergencies!)
  It's at 10k
  
• Keep my apartment fund at €10k. It can go over, and currently is, awaiting renovation bills and furniture purchases
  €15924.14 in the appartment fund, up from the previous month, but still lower than it should be since there's going to be more work in the near future.
  

• Get all walls and floors done so I can move my bed into the bigger (now empty) bedroom
  Got a step closer to this by having the electrician take care of the below. The floors still need some cement work to be closed again, but then the rest can start. I'm haggling with the carpenter over wooden windowsills, and I think I'm going to take those out of the contract since I want to be absolutely sure of what he's going to use.
  
• Get electricity for that bedroom and the balcony done so I'll later be able to get an induction range in the kitchen (long story, stupid setup)
  Mostly done: an extra outlet has been made in the bedroom, and there's now a 3 phase power line to the kitchen for my hypothetical future induction range. Due to the way we've done this, electricity for the balcony doesn't need to be changed, but I'm debating changing the location of the single outlet there. That's cheap and easy, though.
  
• Get plumbing for my washer and dryer where I want it
  no progress
  

• Finish and launch at least one software project, even if it's only for me to use myself
  Very little progress this month.
  
• Help a friend finish and launch at least one project, probably a cookbook
  We finished the second cookbook, but it was way too stressful to hit her desired release date. We're going to do things differently the next time around.
  

• Finish a book every month. I used to be a book a week guy, I need to get back on the horse
  Finished Money Men by Dan McCrum. First book this year I can recommend, and it's a very BFC book, about the downfall of Wirecard, the German unicorn payment processor who mostly made up their revenue.
  
• Cook for other people at least once a month
  For my birthday, I baked a cake for my neighbors
  
• Take two vacations
  No new vacations planned, so still at one for the year. I'm taking some days off later in May, but probably not going anywhere.
  
• At least four hours of exercise every week, measured in fitbit move minutes.
  I didn't hit my goal the last week of April (due to surgery), but the other weeks made up for it, so I'm going to allow myself to average it out and count this as a win.
  

• Replace my side job income with a bonus I get from working in-office in my main job
  Less bonus this month because I was already working home a bit more for my renovation. Side job income was better in May than in most other months, but it's still drying up.
  
• Pay off my home renovation loan in full (around €18400 after this month's upcoming payment)
  currently at € 14156.59. I haven't made any extra payments (from my tax refund or vacation allowance) because I'm prioritizing actual renovation expenditures first.
  
• Contribute the maximum in my private tax-advantaged retirement account.
  Another 133.54 contributed automatically. A law was recently passed that will 5x my max allowed tax-advantaged retirement contributions. It may come into effect later this year, but I'm not going to bother with this until next year, unless I have a lot of time to get all the details figured out later this year.
  
• Keep my emergency fund at €10k (no effort, just avoid emergencies!)
  It's at 10k
  
• Keep my apartment fund at €10k. It can go over, and currently is, awaiting renovation bills and furniture purchases
  I had to dip in a bit more because of the renovation. The contractor who had his guys do the doors and windowsills offered to also do all the wall and plaster stuff, so I decided to go for it. Otherwise, it would have been months, leading to delay with the floor and other stuff as well. The house account is still over 10k, though: 13809.95, and I've already paid 5k out of a total 10k for the current reno work
  

• Get all walls and floors done so I can move my bed into the bigger (now empty) bedroom
  Doors are now in place, awaiting finishing and painting. Floors in the bedroom have been closed again after electrical work. New windowsills have been cut to size but not yet fixed to the walls.
  
• Get electricity for that bedroom and the balcony done so I'll later be able to get an induction range in the kitchen (long story, stupid setup)
  Done
  
• Get plumbing for my washer and dryer where I want it
  no progress
  

• Finish and launch at least one software project, even if it's only for me to use myself
  No progress here.
  
• Help a friend finish and launch at least one project, probably a cookbook
  Working (slowly) on her third cookbook.
  

• Finish a book every month. I used to be a book a week guy, I need to get back on the horse
  Failed this one this month, because the book I'd chosen is just loving boring: Darwin's dangerous idea. I wanted to read it because it belonged to a friend who died last year, but I hate it as much as he did. I've now started reading Sallust's Jugurthine War, which is a lot shorter and is a fun story. It's a very old-fashioned translation, though, so the actual reading is a slog.
  
• Cook for other people at least once a month
  Failed this too. The reno work means my house is too chaotic to invite people to
  
• Take two vacations
  Planning to take a few days for myself when I travel to Lithuania next month, and planning to do the same when I need to go to Thailand. And then there's another trip to Spain after the worst Summer heat's gone. Maybe this year I'll finally go up a tier in KLM's frequent flyer program.
  
• At least four hours of exercise every week, measured in fitbit move minutes.
  Now that the weather's consistently decent, I'm biking to the office every day, and hitting this with ease.
  

• Replace my side job income with a bonus I get from working in-office in my main job
  Side project still slowly drying up, in-office bonus not quite at replacement level, but in general I'm happy with the combined income level.
  
• Pay off my home renovation loan in full (around €18400 after this month's upcoming payment)
  currently at € 13859.34. No extra payments because I've been putting the money into the renovation itself.
  
• Contribute the maximum in my private tax-advantaged retirement account.
  Another 133.54 contributed automatically. Nothing's going to happen here, this will just be what happens every month.
  
• Keep my emergency fund at €10k (no effort, just avoid emergencies!)
  It's at 10k
  
• Keep my apartment fund at €10k.
  It's at €1600. Yeah, almost depleted. I spent all of it on work on my apartment, and I'm kind of happy with it. It's going to take a few months to rebuild (I'm going to keep 3k in a current account and 7k in a savings account), and I've got my actual emergency fund for actual emergencies that may come up. I think this was money well spent.
  

• Get all walls and floors done so I can move my bed into the bigger (now empty) bedroom
  Doors are done and painted. New windowsills ready. Almost all walls have been replastered to get rid of the 1970s pattern that was on there:
  
  The old plaster wasn't really fixed to the wall in a way that made sense and broke off every time I drilled into it, so now it's all much better. I hired out the laying of the new floor, mostly because they included removal of the old stuff plus some other renovation garbage in their quote, and living on the 17th floor, that's an offer I couldn't pass up. There are now people in my apartment laying the new floor as we speak. They say it'll be done today, but I think it's going to take a few more days.
  
  
• Get electricity for that bedroom and the balcony done so I'll later be able to get an induction range in the kitchen (long story, stupid setup)
  Done
  
• Get plumbing for my washer and dryer where I want it
  I'm going to postpone this until I've built up a bit of a buffer again
  

• Finish and launch at least one software project, even if it's only for me to use myself
  No progress here.
  
• Help a friend finish and launch at least one project, probably a cookbook
  Working (slowly) on her third cookbook.
  

• Finish a book every month. I used to be a book a week guy, I need to get back on the horse
  I finished Sallust's Jugurthine War. Cool back about a cool period, and this war is usually kind of glossed over in favor of the civil war and germanic invasion.
  It was a horrible translation, though. Translated 70ish years ago by a guy who wanted to keep the Latin sentence structure intact as much as possible. The result is sentences that run a quarter of a page, punctuation that makes no sense and sentences that violate Dutch grammar or syntax completely.
  
• Cook for other people at least once a month
  Failed again. Dust, paint and no floor makes it hard to have guests over
  
• Take two vacations
  Still on track for this
  
• At least four hours of exercise every week, measured in fitbit move minutes.
  Moving around furniture in the Summer heat and biking to the office every day made this one easy to hit.
  

• Replace my side job income with a bonus I get from working in-office in my main job
  Getting there. Still a mix of side job and office bonus.
  
• Pay off my home renovation loan in full (around €18400 after this month's upcoming payment)
  Currently at 13562.09. No extra payments made because my renovation was super expensive
  
• Contribute the maximum in my private tax-advantaged retirement account.
  Another 133.54 contributed automatically.
  
• Keep my emergency fund at €10k (no effort, just avoid emergencies!)
  It's at 10k
  
• Keep my apartment fund at €10k.
  It's at 3k, and I'm building it back up.
  

• Get all walls and floors done so I can move my bed into the bigger (now empty) bedroom
  All done. My general contractor isn't happy about some things his subcontractors have done so he's going to change some things himself, but at least that's not going to cost me any more money.
  
• Get electricity for that bedroom and the balcony done so I'll later be able to get an induction range in the kitchen (long story, stupid setup)
  Done
  
• Get plumbing for my washer and dryer where I want it
  I've recently decided I'm not going to bother with a separate place for my washer and dryer and I'll move the whole setup into the bathroom where there's already plumbing. I don't have a ton of space, so I'm going to have to move my shower into the bath tub rather than have them separate like now. Anyway, those are future problems for now.
  

• Finish and launch at least one software project, even if it's only for me to use myself
  No news
  
• Help a friend finish and launch at least one project, probably a cookbook
  The third (tapas) cookbook is nearing completion.
  

• Finish a book every month. I used to be a book a week guy, I need to get back on the horse
  Finished The Fortune Men by Nadifa Mohamed. Good book. Sad (and true) story. I didn't know much about the diversity of Cardiff in the 1950s, and now I do. I'm still one book behind from a prior month, but I'll make it up sometime soon.
  
• Cook for other people at least once a month
  Renovation and then travel made this impossible
  
• Take two vacations
  I'm enjoying my business trip in Lithuania right now. Feels like I vacation and my days off haven't even started yet.
  
• At least four hours of exercise every week, measured in fitbit move minutes.
  Easily hitting this. Biking at home, doing a lot of walking in Vilnius
  

EricBauman fucked around with this message at 12:47 on Aug 3, 2023