Chasing the Bull

This weekend, my father-in-law and I went mining for Gems in North Carolina. I must admit I had been looking forward to it for a long time. My father-in-law has been interested in geology for the past 30 years, and his enthusiasm has totally captivated me. Needless to say I was excited about the trip.

I did not want to do the whole tourist thing. My original plan was to find a mountain and go exploring. I did not realize that there was more to it than that; a whole lot more. In my ignorance, I believed I would automatically be able to distinguish a gem from a rock. It was a good thing Mel was with me. I would have been extremely frustrated in about 30 minutes.

Mel suggested that we first visit a commercial mine. After looking through our maps (which were from the 1960s no less), we settled on The Cherokee Ruby Mine. What naturally drew me to this mine over any of the others, was the fact that it was not “salted”. This means that you may or may not find any gems. The dirt is not searched and then sprinkled with chips or other such nonsense. Being the adventurer that I am, this appeased my sense of the unknown challenge.

Within 10 minutes, I was thankful for Mel’s expertise. All rocks look like rocks. Heck, all gems look like rocks, unless you know what you are looking for. This is where Cherokee truly shines. The owner is a gentleman named Tony. What an incredibly nice guy! I have never felt so welcomed in my life. Tony takes the time to re-look through all of your stones once you are done to ensure you do not throw away any gems. He found 3 small gems that to me looked like pebbles that I had discarded.

After spending 4 hours, and only $25 total, I left Cherokee really satisfied with my experience. If you are ever in the Franklin, North Carolina area, I highly recommend Tony’s little mine. You will have a great time and will learn a ton about the native gems of North Carolina.

Next Adventure: The place I call Garnet Falls!

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Like most people, I sell my old stuff on eBay. All of my items are small and I do not make much money from them. What I really hate is that after eBay takes their fees, paypal takes even more for the same transaction. After all is said and done, I end up making about $2 per transaction, which almost not worth my time.

I have been searching for an alternative to paypal to increase the amount of money that I actually receive after ALL fees. Today I found a possible answer. Revolution Money is similar to paypal except for one thing - NO FEES!

From their website, Revolution Money is:
FREE to register for an account
FREE to add money to your bank account
FREE to send money
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FREE to request money
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When you sign up, you immediately get a $25 bonus. Most sites make you wait until you get $50 or so before you can withdraw any money. With Revolution Money you can request your sign-up bonus immediately. That’s what I did. After the $2.50 check charge, I ended up making $22.50 for 5 minutes of my time. Additionally, I know have a cheaper alternative when selling items on eBay. I may even stop accepting paypal altogether if I like this site better.

Please note that these are affiliate links and that I a small bonus for each person that signs up. I do not feel this is a bad thing, since you can immediately earn $22.50 just by signing up. If you do sign-up and take advantage of this free cash, please use one of these links. It truly won’t hurt you to help me out a bit.

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“Then [Jesus] said to them, ‘Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.” - Luke 12:15

I would have loved to retire a millionaire. I would probably sleep better at night if I knew that our future was secure. The more I think about it, however, the more I have come to realize that my personal net worth does not define who I am as a person, as a dad, or as a husband.

This does not mean that I have suddenly stopped caring about our finances. Unfortunately, I tend to spend a tremendous amount of time worrying about them. What this does mean, is that I have finally forgiven myself for the financial mistakes I made in the past. I cannot go back ten years and correct these mistakes. I can change my future, if I start now.

We are not in terrible fiscal condition. Our net worth is relatively modest at $93,462. We do not really have a ton of assets, we have simply minimized our liabilities. We basically have our mortgage, my student loan, and another personal loan (which I took at 6% to pay off every one of our high-interest credit cards).

The main problem with our fiscal plan is that our expenses equal our income, almost to the penny. At the end of the month there is nothing left. We stick to our budget within 5 to 10% and have cut out just about everything that we can (and still maintain the lifestyle that we have agreed upon). We have 2 old cell phones with the minimum amount of minutes for emergencies, have basic cable that is bundled with high speed internet, and cable phone (Yeah for free long distance calls), and only eat out once a month. My wife and I go to movies about twice a year, and rent movies even less than that. It is just so hard to find anything else to cut out.

Just this week, I have began Snowflaking and will send this money off to our Roth IRAs. Additionally, with any money left over from my My Diet Coke Challenge will also be sent to our retirement accounts. I guess this is as good a start as possible.

Will we retire as millionaires? I have no idea, but I would love it if you joined me on this adventure. Please consider subscribing to my feed.

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