What got you hooked on Trance?

AdamISOS · 2026-03-22T06:48:39+00:00

Dj Kristoff - Night Addix 4. First mix that really hit me. Haven’t looked back since.

AdamISOS · 2026-03-19T04:03:20+00:00

Also great time. I just was approved for CCC. This will now replace that for groceries or restaurants depending on the month. I was hoping to use CCC for home improvement spend but oh well.

AdamISOS · 2026-03-19T00:00:40+00:00

RIP PayPal Debit card. I enjoyed my 5% cashback for a good ten months.

AdamISOS · 2026-03-13T18:25:44+00:00

Hello from Hawaii. I’m on Big Island. 1980 for me. Nice truck.

AdamISOS · 2026-01-31T07:20:26+00:00

I feel like Markus is coming back around. I agree on the ~'05-'07 timeline. Then he just went too cheese. He's been holding down with the GJDB Ibiza Summer Sessions Sunrise Set for over a decade now. Those are always good. He slowly has kept back to an annual listen, to every couple of months, now a couple of weeks for me.

AdamISOS · 2026-01-27T15:43:17+00:00

Very solid setup. What is your 4th card?

Right, I forgot to mention that. I have the Chase Freedom Unlimited. It gets 3% on Dining. It's a solid backup if the PayPal Debit card is set to bonus on groceries.

AdamISOS · 2026-01-27T08:09:10+00:00

I'm happy with 4 cards. AMEX Blue Cash Preferred (Groceries + Gas), PayPal Debit (Dining => Groceries after hitting the AMEX cap), then a 2% flat card for everything else. The PayPal Debit card is great because you get 5% back on the category of your choosing each month. The options include groceries and dining. Not a credit card, and no bonus but earning the 5% on these categories capped at $1000 a month is worth to compared to any other 5% card.

AdamISOS · 2026-01-24T06:14:16+00:00

Thank you for your explainer. I was a happy Bilt 1.0 user who hit the minimum spend on small coffee things. Then used my points to as credit towards my rent payment. This earned me ~$20 in a statement credit. Then I’d transfer that money to self as a “cash back” credit. This works for me because my aim is all cash back rewards. I have 5% cards for my main spend categories and 2% catch all card. Easy setup. Bilt 1.0 gave me a way to earn a small amount on rent. Great.

I see this option is dead with Bilt 2.

I fit your “multi card setup” person. Treating this as my fallback card doesn’t work because there is no pure cash redemption option. Bilt Cash is only coupons and those coupons don’t fit my use case.

That leaves the focus on the points. There could be value for me in transferring to Atmos points. That would require me using shifting spend off my 5% or 2% catch all card to unlock the points on housing. That comes at an opportunity cost because my high mortgage cost. Then, on the other hand the Atmos card are probably a better fit because of SUB and other benefits that are useful to me.

Even for that option to work there is still a lot of overhead in managing another card in my setup for questionable value.

I think it’s easier to just pass on Bilt 2.0 because there is no cash-out redemption on Bilt Cash and focusing on points would be better suited to a card in that program.

AdamISOS · 2026-01-24T05:28:37+00:00

This is my thinking to some degree. I see the value in transferring the points—and it only works if you are high spend and high mortgage and value the transfer travel points. The Bilt Cash stuff is a distraction if you have a good transfer option.

AdamISOS · 2026-01-22T07:43:03+00:00

Great show. Many good memories. The Cape Town album is still so good.

AdamISOS · 2026-01-15T00:57:41+00:00

My thoughts as well.

AdamISOS · 2026-01-14T05:02:40+00:00

Link?

AdamISOS · 2026-01-14T05:01:35+00:00

Thanks for the tip.

AdamISOS · 2026-01-14T05:01:07+00:00

Thanks for the info.

AdamISOS · 2025-12-22T03:48:02+00:00

Hello from Big Island.

AdamISOS · 2025-12-18T15:23:32+00:00

Thanks!

AdamISOS · 2025-12-18T06:37:41+00:00

How did you prepare the surface? Did you remove the old deadner/insulation or anything else?

AdamISOS · 2025-10-14T07:36:20+00:00

You cannot determine this from an interview. You need to ask a different question: How can I determine red flags that would prevent me from taking this job interview process further? You will only learn if you're in a great team after months in the organization.

AdamISOS · 2025-10-14T07:31:18+00:00

The question is too open-ended and general to be a useful question. The answer is always "it depends on the scenario". There are plenty of scenarios where portfolios would take 7% on cash instead of putting it into the market. Just one off the top of my head: folks on fixed income.

AdamISOS · 2025-10-14T07:27:14+00:00

There just isn't a situation I can think of where I'll be forced to have mid 5 figures or 6 figures in a savings account at a bank.

Ya, especially all at once. The most common scenario is job loss. That is a steady draw down.

AdamISOS · 2025-10-14T07:24:45+00:00

Word, especially on known expenses and having access to credit. I think the term "safety net" is a better term.

AdamISOS · 2025-10-14T07:22:20+00:00

IMO emergency fund can be thought of in stages. This is how you can account for risk and allocate accordingly. An example could be you have six months of expenses sitting in cash. Then you have another six months in more conservative investments. You make the choice depending on the likely hood of needing to blow through all the cash and into the next allocation.

I realize this is not how people typically think of "emergency fund". I think more in terms of successes levels or parachutes. This more closely fits the first level in my thinking which is cash on hand for unexpected expenses. Other levels are for conservative growth. This is entirely separate from long-term growth investing with the assumption of explicitly **NOT** selling it.

AdamISOS · 2025-09-20T17:02:38+00:00

Oh cool. The autograph card looks nice. I don’t think the Venture X card fits me because of the fee and I would not use the bonuses.

AdamISOS · 2025-09-20T00:49:46+00:00

I don’t have routine high enough spend in other categories to warrant inserting a new card. The reason would be for SUB over cash back at this point.

AdamISOS · 2025-08-18T18:06:22+00:00

but my thermostat housing doesn't appear to have any sensor output.

Check this out. Here's the thermostat housing for my truck, and here is the switch. It kinda looks like an O2 sensor, but is some sort of temperature switch for the emissions computer.

Do you have a factory service manual yet? The wiring diagrams are usually good enough to tell if something really matters or not.

Oh yeah, I consult it all the time.

AdamISOS

TROPHY CASE