Tag: bbq

Independence Day On A Budget: A Little Less Boom, A Lot More Fun

Dave Johnson1 Comment

190708

Turns out that hanging out with friends and loved ones is the key to a good time. It’s not how much you spend on fancy steaks and kebobs to BBQ. It’s not about getting far-too-up-their-own-butts microbrews that are infused with guava and honeydew. It’s really just about enjoying a warm night and laughter with those you love.

_______________________________

Blog Update: As a quick note, I am traveling to New York City this week on business. It’s a short 4 day trip, which means it will be long days in the office. Don’t count on posts all 5 days but if I do miss, I’ll try to make up for it with a zinger on Friday.

Also… I should probably mention now that I took last Friday off to recover from a 4th of July beer hangover, and to spend the entire day reminding myself why I don’t regularly consume beer.

_______________________________

I live in the United States, and every year on the 4th of July, my fellow patriotic citizens celebrate our hatred for tea by blowing our own fingers off in between chugging beer and eating processed meats.

I’m not sure that summary is entirely accurate, but it’s pretty damn close.

Now I’ve never been a big fireworks person. As a kid I found them boring, and as an adult, I can think of around a billion other things I need to be doing than staring up into the air to watch colorful lights.

My Dad was big into M-80s, but I really think it was more for the story of being able to tell his buddies he had illegal fireworks. I really don’t see how he could take any real pleasure in lighting a fuse and then sprinting in the exact opposite direction with his fingers buried up to the second knuckle in each of his ears.

At Disneyland when the fireworks would go off, my family and I saw it as an opportunity to get quickly to where we wanted to be. All we had to do was dodge a bunch of people staring up into the sky, and we could zip around the park with ease!

The point is that I’m not big on the booms or the bangs or the pows.Read More »

Living the Lake Life Lavishly… for Two Days

Dave JohnsonLeave a comment

I could not be more focused on digging out of my financial situation right now, and these types of stories are exactly why. I want to get to a point in my life where not only am I financially secure, but I’m actually so secure that I can share with my friends and family.

Starting Credit Card Debt (01.01.19): $126,310.77
Current Credit Card Debt: $109,045.60
Total Paid Off: $17,265.17
Income Going to Savings: 2%

We had the pleasure of being invited to a house this weekend for a 2 day get-together of several families celebrating the end of our lacrosse season. The house itself was modest to say the least, but the lakeside location was not.

We spent hours on the lake yanking kids around on innertubes, grilling hot dogs in the backyard as we watched the wake lazily lap the dock, chasing frogs, and drinking (far too much) beer as we watched the sun set over the distant pines.

As the weekend progressed and I began to ask a friend about the dude graciously let us borrow his pad for the weekend, I found out it’s not even his main home.

“He’s got several properties,” I was told, “He’s a single guy, so he doesn’t worry too much about keeping them spotless, which is why this place is in need of a coat of paint. It’s also why it’s perfect for 15 lacrosse boys to goof around in without worrying about them wrecking the place. This is really just kind of like one of his bachelor pads, so he often lets us use it to take our boat out.”

Several properties? One of his bachelor pads? Of course my next question had to be, “What does he do for a living?”Read More »

A Boy’s Blog About Being A Broke Buffoon

Dave JohnsonLeave a comment

I’ll keep making the posts as entertaining as possible if you folks continue to share the blog with people you think might enjoy or find value in it.

Starting Debt (01.01.19): $126,310.77
Current Debt: $109,710.00
Total Paid Off: $16,600.77
Income Going to Savings: 2%

January of this year was a rough month. I didn’t feel like doing much of anything other than wallowing in my own sadness of stupid mistakes and financial misfortune.

Let’s keep in perspective just how bad the shock was that I had received: I literally thought I was going to lose the house I had bought less than 1 year prior.

So if I wanted to wallow for just a bit, I feel as though I was entitled. You don’t give a pig an entire pen of the deepest mud you can find and not expect at least some wallowing.

___________________________________________

Tangent: Did I mention I was raised in the country? We never owned pigs though. We owned a buttload of cattle (around 3,000), and had a goat at one point, but no pigs at any point. I know enough about pigs to know they wallow and they enjoy mud, but please don’t expect lots of pig facts in future posts. It ain’t happening.

___________________________________________

We had no earthly idea how to dig out of this mess, and there were lots of options thrown about including filing for Chapter 13. Which in the book “How to Mess Up Your Life” is a chapter that falls right between the much more exciting chapters of Chapter 12: Booze and Chapter 14: Buying Your Spouse a Vacuum for Their Birthday.Read More »