I opened my Gift Envelope this morning, the one I gave to Patti and me on January 2, 1982 – 36 years ago. I emptied its contents on the kitchen island counter: $102,800!*

I followed the same investment plan as for the envelope

In our Recalculation the first week of December, Patti and I found that we had far more than enough to support our current spending. A small mountain of cash: +$147,000 per $1 Million starting Investment Portfolio (December 2014). And a calculation of a new Safe

Yep. It’s a hockey stick with that inflection point locked in right where I want it to be – 2035. That’s zero probability of depleting our portfolio for 18 years. The Safe Spending Rate (SSR%) of 4.75% and other original design decisions determined the shape

I reviewed our extensive Retirement Financial Plan (Written out, it fits on a 3 by 5 card.) and made the following changes:

1. On my 3 by 5 card, I erased the $46,100 that I had written in pencil last year for our Safe

This is my imagined task every December 15. I even mark this day as Bottling Day on my calendar. Why do I do this? To imagine my portfolio differently.

We all need to form our view of risk tolerance. The real shape of my

If you follow the CORE in Nest Egg Care, you Recalculate this general time of year. You may have Recalculated using your 12-month results ending October 31 (like Alice) or November 30 (like me now). Perhaps you will use December 31.

No

This is the time of year that we all think about giving to others we care about. If you’re like Patti and me, you have some left over from your 2017 Safe Spending Amount. Or, if you’ve recalculated for next year (following the CORE),

Most of us worry about bad variability in stock returns. Our focus, our worry point, is usually no further than 12 months away.  The image in our head is a seesaw or roller coaster. When we’re retired – with the right plan – our real

The game of Save and Invest that we retirees have played for decades has turned out to be a somewhat easy game. The timing has worked out great for us. We retirees have ridden an above sequence of annual returns for stocks. That’s added up

I peaked. The R in the CORE is coming up for me: Recalculation. Oh, boy. Wow. Unless the world falls apart over the next three weeks Patti and I have dodged the bullet of “bad variability” of returns for three years now. It’s waaay