About this Site

Welcome to my blog!  I retired in 2014, after working 30-plus years for natural resource agencies as a policy analyst and planner, including work on strategic planning, capital program budgeting, cost-benefit analysis, and watershed planning.   In this blog, I would like to share some of what I’ve learned as I’ve made the shift into life after work. 

I will write several posts on the big question facing anyone contemplating retirement,“Can I afford it?”  Having obsessed over this question myself for some time, and waded through a morass of conflicting and self-serving financial advice, I’ve come to the realization that understanding where you stand financially is surprisingly simple – if you can screen out all the noise.  

I will also write about:

• how to manage money and take withdrawals in retirement;
• when to take social security;
• are annuities as terrible as people seem to think;
• can you send a kid to college when you’re retired;
• caring for a parent or disabled child when you’re retired (and maybe beyond); and
• mitigating the financial impacts of the life’s nasty surprises and outright disasters. 

I’ll point to some resources and financial calculators that I think are particularly valuable and well written.

I hope you find my posts helpful, and that you are inspired to make sure your own financial plan is in order.  It requires only a modest effort, and you will sleep better at night.

Please come back, check out my future posts, and let me know what you think.  Thanks for stopping by!