Debt is dumb; cash is king

...and the paid off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice.

So says Dave Ramsey, whose books, radio show podcast, and financial course have honestly and truly changed our life over the past few months, in spite of the fact that I am probably an unlikely candidate for his particular brand of teaching. (He's very southern, conservative, and proudly unsophisticated.)

It started in late April, when I got a free copy of his latest book at a conference the Artisan staff attended in Florida. As I read it on the plane ride home, I could feel my perspective changing. You know how that happens sometimes, right? You encounter a new idea or concept, and you know almost immediately that something in your life will never quite be the same, because there's no un-learning this lesson.

Debt is Dumb

The lesson I can't unlearn is basically that debt is bad for you. Those colossal student loans? Bad. Credit cards with 0% interest that allow me to buy stuff I can't really afford without very much risk? Bad. Car loans (which, thankfully, we do not have anymore)? Really bad. All kinds of money going into our bank account already marked with someone else's name on it? Unacceptable.

So Dave Ramsey recommends that people get seriously intense about paying off their debts in order to free up their best wealth-building tool: their incomes. And the first step to that is making and following a budget. Now, we've made budgets in the Austin household before. But never, and I mean never ever, have we followed one. I'd set up the spending categories based on our actual spending over the previous several months, trying to reduce the bloated ones so as to have more money available. But with a few dozen quick swipes of the debit card, that budget would be obliterated within the first month.

Cash is King

And here's where it gets pretty wacky. For the past four months, we have had unprecedented success following our budget as a result of making one simple change in our financial lives: we now pay cash. For almost everything that isn't automatically paid via a bank draft. Whereas we used to use our debit cards for everything from the grocery store to the post office, we now set aside a certain amount of cash for every category at the beginning of every month, and we put the bills into an envelope. When the cash is gone, the category is done. Period.

This simple change has reduced our discretionary spending by nearly a thousand dollars per month. Guess where that money goes? Well, since we've already cleared all our credit card debt, it goes straight onto the principal of Tracey's student loan, which is almost gone. Then it will be on to my gigantic student loan debt. And after that, the rental property mortgage. And then our mortgage. Our plan is to be completely debt free before Abel hits double digits.

In the meantime, absolutely no borrowing more money, for any reason. When our car was totaled, we paid cash on top of our insurance check to replace it. When we can't afford something, we save toward it. We cut up our credit cards, and we'll never see the inside of a mortgage broker's office again—and if you know my ambitions with respect to real estate, you know that last one hurts me the most. But really, it doesn't hurt. When we get around to buying our next property, we'll pay—you guessed it—cash.

Quick review of Phish at Darien Lake

"But I don't think our fans do happily lap it up [when Phish plays badly]. I think what happens is they get on the Internet, and talk about how it was a bad show."

—Trey Anastasio, in the 2000 film Bittersweet Motel

Well, here I am to talk about it on the Internet. I went to my first Phish show in five years last night, and it was unquestionably the worst of the six or eight I've seen over the years. For me, it was still a really great time, and I'm very glad I went. I was disappointed that the three first-timers I brought with me had what I know to be a subpar experience.

And just to head off what I know will be the first criticism, let me say this: I saw Phish pre-hiatus and post-hiatus, and I liked both. I saw them in late 1997, a period during which they are generally understood to have been at their peak, and I saw them at the very end of their 2004 run, when they are generally understood to have been mailing it in. I liked both eras—a lot. So I'm not one of those whiny "Things ain't what they used to be" fans. This show was a genuine dud for a couple of reasons.

The major issue was the sound. I do not know how much of this to attribute to the fact that Darien Lake Performing Arts Center is a notoriously bad-sounding venue, or how much blame Phish's new sound tech should get: let's just say you could find people complaining about both with a quick Google search. Either way, Trey's guitar was piercingly loud—often to the point of physical pain. Page's piano sounded as if it had been EQed by someone who was underwater; meanwhile, his organ was barely distinguishable. The drums alternated between impossible to hear and thumpy with no high end. Changing our spot on the lawn helped some of these issues, but it was never good enough to cease being a distraction.

And on top of the sound, the band really seemed off. The setlist included an unusually high number of Phish staples, but it felt like they could never get into a rhythm. Just when they settled into something ("Possum"), they would follow it with a complete whiff ("Farmhouse," which I would say was probably the single worst performance I've ever heard at a Phish show).

There were moments of sheer brilliance. I was completely lost in the music in parts of "Wolfman's Brother," and it was a particularly smoking "David Bowie." The "Darien Center Jam" was pretty solid, and "Antelope" was quite nice. The problem was that there was no sustained rhythm to the whole thing, and let me stress again that the sound was so poor as to be a constant distraction.

During the Yankees' heyday in the late '90s, Joe Torre once said of an injured David Cone that 75% of Coney is usually still going to be better than 100% of the other guy. This is true of Phish. The show was still a blast, and a worthwhile experience. I don't think they've "jumped the shark" or sold out or lost their touch. This was not like seeing DMB on the Everyday tour—nothing to make me want to swear them off. It was a dud, plain and simple. Better luck next time, assuming there is a next time.

[Update: I saw them again in November, and they were spectaular. Read that review here.]

iPhone apps

Since I have a few friends who have recently gotten iPhones or iPods, I figured I'd toss up a lightning-quick list of applications to consider. I've put them into four groups for easy evaluation. At some point, I may come back and add links to the iTunes store. but probably not, so don't get your hopes up.

Apps I Use Every Single Day

Tweetie
Facebook
MLB.com At Bat 2009

Games That Are Worth the Money*

Frenzic
Flight Control
Fieldrunners
Rolando

Free Apps I Really Thought I'd Use But I Don't

Evernote
Instapaper
Box.net
Air Sharing
Handshake

The Best App For Distracting A Crying Toddler, Which I Think You'll Agree Makes It Well Worth A Buck

Koi Pond




*Seriously, let's not have any complaining about five dollars for a fun application. You spend that on a hamburger, which I will remind you "disappears" within 36 hours.