It's the economy stupid!

[icelanticskier]

It’s not really “natural” to live well below your means, and the concept of actually putting more effort into your finances just so you can lower your standard of living is pretty much lose-lose, so why would anyone do it?

coming from someone who skied 105 days this year and actually does live well below his means meaning for me: no car payment, no car insurance payment (go nh!) much cheaper rent than one weeks take home pay, (learned that equation in high school so decided i didn't need to spend the dough to go to college), not much eating out. skis almost free all winter everywhere due to managing a ski shop, had to choose a ski friendly career, saves 1-2 week paychecks per month free and clear all year except in winter when i just save 1 but have 401k and some cd's for diversity, full bennies.
nothing wrong with living below means, i could afford a bigger place w/ twice rent and car payment and insurance and still ski the same amount but would limit the 6-8 week every two year big trips and spontaneous throwdowns which don't happen too much. well, wouldn't limit those either cuz of some pretty calculated saving strategies. no kids make things things pretty easy though and until i make twice the money, kids won't happen. i've got friends that have kids and have never skied less than 50 day seasons since the kids were born cuz they made sure to figure out ways to always bring em along or have them taken care of even on western trips and these folks make less than 100k as a couple and are hardly frugal. i don't and have never bought the commonly thought things, like, "once you have kids, no more playing or alot less of it cuz in many cases it's all what you make of it and if ya can't make of it and are caught off guard, well, then some more planning should have gone down at least to support a regular skiing lifestyle.
crap! it's 12:30 am and i gotta be surfing in 6 hours, bertha's still producing the goods!
rog

 

[Lifty@50]

I must confess that I do not top 20 days a year these days. My time is all jammed up by work, kids and a big property (horse farm) to maintain. I am definately planning to retire at an age that will allow me to spend some quality years skiing in consistantly good terrain (UT, WY, CO, etc.), hence my login name. For now, it's doing deals, paying off the mortgage and saving for the kids tuitions that is, unfortunately, eating into my time for skiing. I am not one of those chartered members of the "lucky sperm" club living in Jackson or Vail, and I'm not willing to live on "mac and cheese" while sharing a trailer home with three 20 somethings or freezing my ass off as a laboring building luxury homes in some resort town. So now I'm a 20 days a year skier. And frankly, my skiing hasn't suffered and my boots last longer.