Financial Strength

I'm reading Get Financially Naked: How to Talk Money With Your Honey by Manisha Thakor and Sharon Kedar.  In the first part of the book, they ask the reader to respond to one question --"When I live my life from a position of financial strength, I will...."  I'm curious how people respond to this question.  Here's my response, what's yours?

When I live my life from a position of financial strengh, I will...

• feel confident about my career choice;
• not worry about future expenses (mortgage, college tuition, medical bills, etc.);
• live in an environmentally sustainable way; and
• be able to help others in need.

I may add on to this later, but I think that's a solid statement for now.

Valentine's Day

My husband and I had a wonderful weekend.  First of all, we finally got some snow!!  It has been torturing us to hear how the DC Metro area has almost 6 feet of snow when we had nothing.  Unfortunately, it all melted within 24 hours, but it was nice while it lasted.  I'm still holding out for some more, though!

On Saturday night, we went to a local non-profit theatre to see their production of Macbeth.  I know, really romantic.  But, we both loved it.  I hadn't read that play since middle school and my husband had never read it.  I still have a hard time understand Shakespearian language sometimes, but seeing it acted out obviously helps tremendously.  We're looking forward to seeing other productions there in the future.  Yay for local theatre!

On Sunday after we returned home from church, we snuggled on the couch to watch the Olympics before getting all dressed up for dinner.  We went to the Melting Pot and had a fabulous time!  There was a set 5-course menu (read - way too much food) that was amazing.  They also took our picture and gave us a magnet frame for it along with those refridgerator words.  I also got to take home the yellow rose that was on our table.

We returned home to watch more of the Olympics before I passed out at 9 or 10pm.

How was your Valentine's Day?

The future

Last week my 6 year old laptop decided to finally bite the dust.  Although it was inconvenient timing, I was able to transfer all of "My Documents" to an external hard drive.  I've ordered a new laptop that I am really excited about, an Acer Aspire Timeline.  It is considered a lightweight laptop and has an 8 hour battery life!  It's supposed to be arriving today, so I'm on pins and needles waiting for the UPS truck to show up!

In other news, we're not even a month into the new school semester and I am very behind, maining on reading.  Is it really possible to keep up with all the readings professors assign?  I'm starting to think not.

I'm taking a course titled "Preparing for the Professoriate", which has caused me to really think about what direction I want to take my life (and my husband's) when I graduate with my Ph.D.  We've been doing some tough thinking, but the answer is never clear as day.  One thing we are really concerned about is when will we start a family?  If I decide on a tenure-track faculty position, I essentially wouldn't be able to take maternity leave for 6 years.  Six years!!!  So do we try and have a child while I'm still in school.  I know many people, including nearly all my family members, would advise against this, but my huband and I don't want to be nearly 40 before we start to have children.  It's all up in the air right now.  We have no concrete answers.

There was something else I was going to write about, but now I forget.  Oh, yes.  My husband and I have instituted a date night once a week as part of our New Year's resolutions.  Tonight, we are going to our favorite local pizza place and then bowling.  Another great thing to look forward to!

Okay, enough procrastinating, more reading...