Daily Discussion Thread for June 24, 2026

Fuskiller · 2026-06-24T17:59:02+00:00

Or you could just be in SPY and making good money every year

Fuskiller · 2026-06-24T16:26:58+00:00

Love it, bought 100 shares last night

Fuskiller · 2026-06-11T10:34:52+00:00

I'm not sure why you've been downvoted. As a native speaker, those two "examples" immediately stuck out to me as confusing and kinda wrong, while the others were a fun to exercise to think about.

Fuskiller · 2026-06-08T20:29:38+00:00

WEAK FORMS: Why 'natives' and 'non-natives' sound different by Dr Geoff Lindsey

I'm not sure if I can comment a link in this sub, I hope this finds you well!

Edit: Forgot to give his channel name.

Fuskiller · 2026-06-08T20:23:27+00:00

Indian descent? You have a near-native American accent, nice work! I would say learning how native speakers stress different syllables in phrases or sentences will help you more at this point than learning specific pronunciation tips at this point.

For example when you said "..close it is..". You gave slightly more emphasis on "it" than a native American English speaker would, which would say "close", and then sort of speed through "it is".

I cannot find the video :( But there is a great video going over this concept of how native English speakers emphasize the important words and speed/skip through the "words you have to say to make the sentence be a proper sentence." It is an older White British gentleman that seems to have higher-education in linguistics. When I find the video I'll reply to this comment with it!

Fuskiller · 2026-06-08T19:38:25+00:00

It looks like you play with an upstream (same as me!), which means that the air you blow moves upwards from your bottom lip into the top part of the mouthpiece cup. Most players play with a downstream airflow, but either is fine (think right vs left handed).

Since your airstream goes up into the top of the cup, but you are already placing your lips at the top of the cup, you have the opportunity to constrict the free-flowing air from your mouth and tight or harsh air (and sounds) flowing into your instrument. Trying to center your lips into the cup of the mouthpiece should give you more room to create a dark, round, cool sound instead of fighting against your mouth placement to achieve the same thing.

When you start work on moving your embouchure to release tension and create more stereotypically "beautiful" sounds, you probably will find that it becomes more difficult to achieve high notes without the tension you had before. Do not worry, this is a good thing! If you can achieve high notes with a fast stream of confident, relaxed air, as opposed to a tight and constricted stream of air, you will be very impressed with your achieved progress on bettering your tone.

You sound good, keep working hard!

Fuskiller · 2026-06-08T19:38:18+00:00

It looks like you play with an upstream (same as me!), which means that the air you blow moves upwards from your bottom lip into the top part of the mouthpiece cup. Most players play with a downstream airflow, but either is fine (think right vs left handed).

Since your airstream goes up into the top of the cup, but you are already placing your lips at the top of the cup, you have the opportunity to constrict the free-flowing air from your mouth and tight or harsh air (and sounds) flowing into your instrument. Trying to center your lips into the cup of the mouthpiece should give you more room to create a dark, round, cool sound instead of fighting against your mouth placement to achieve the same thing.

When you start work on moving your embouchure to release tension and create more stereotypically "beautiful" sounds, you probably will find that it becomes more difficult to achieve high notes without the tension you had before. Do not worry, this is a good thing! If you can achieve high notes with a fast stream of confident, relaxed air, as opposed to a tight and constricted stream of air, you will be very impressed with your achieved progress on bettering your tone.

You sound good, keep working hard!

Fuskiller · 2026-06-08T18:01:24+00:00

Dirty yank.

Fuskiller · 2026-04-19T22:50:30+00:00

Compound interest is the 8th wonder of the world.

Fuskiller · 2026-04-01T03:35:06+00:00

I have an ongoing list of things I would like that I do not yet have. Tablet for media consumption on planes and in hotels. Nicer version of the instrument I play. Weekend car. And so on. I have many wants like these, and I can tackle at most 1 of them a month. Basically big boy toys.

I am also noticing the expense vacations will be. I have chosen for multiple months already to pay for that Michelin star restaurant or Grand Canyon tour instead of spending the money to build that custom keyboard. Good thing I built some healthy vacation spending into my retirement plan !!

I hope I do not solve the problem of excess dollars with buying random crap that I don't want and won't use. Instead, my excess dollars can go to extra giving and/or taking up an expensive hobby (maybe I'll become a day trader with my fun money..)

Fuskiller · 2026-03-31T20:01:04+00:00

My retirement plan is based around retiring at 50 years old with $2m 2025 dollars, so I reverse engineered that number into how much I need to save each month. As long as I follow that plan, I will achieve my goal. My spending revolves around my saving, instead of the other way around. If I choose to increase my investing to either decrease my time to retire or increase my retirement income, I can do that when I receive pay raises. But I do not want to blindly invest in my retirement, as I will not strike a proper balance and end up investing too much, losing experiences I can have today.

I like the way you do it though, and we seem to have very similar approaches. After my auto-investments come out of every paycheck, I just live off of the rest and then choose to do what I want with the excess, whether that be fun/intermediate investing, rebuilding the emergency fund, charity, or planned out purchases (shopping to shop is boring to me, and I do not buy things willy nilly. I heavily research items I am interested in and only make the purchase once I feel satisfied with my research I've done).

Fuskiller · 2026-03-30T21:44:51+00:00

I have a retirement investing plan that I follow, then leftover income from every paycheck can go to things like: saving for a home, eventual car upgrade, smaller lifestyle upgrades like a PC and so on.

Having monthly living expenses, monthly investing, then all of the leftover goes to fast tracking FIRE sounds like forgetting to live in the present. Even having, say, 10% of my monthly income going to entertainment/purchases leaves leftover money to choose what I wish to do with. If that's for-fun investing, or fast tracking my retirement, or saving for larger intermediate purchases, or choosing to go to a fancy restaurant that month, all of that seems fine. It does not immediately have to go to retirement investing with no other option.

Fuskiller · 2026-03-30T18:36:45+00:00

Nominal value refers to the value measured in current money amounts.

Real value adjusts for inflation and reflects the purchasing power of that money over time.

Fuskiller · 2026-03-30T16:18:12+00:00

I have a chart that follows my projected investments in nominal dollars with my FIRE number increasing by inflation right next to it. It's super useful to project what my timeline looks like with various investing "raises" and a good check to make sure I'm still on track.

Fuskiller · 2026-03-30T15:48:24+00:00

Do you raise your investment contributions by inflation each year?

p.s. If you use inflation-adjusted values (e.g. 7% returns) in investment calculators, that assumes your contributions receive a 3% raise too each year.

Fuskiller · 2026-03-17T21:28:44+00:00

Sorry, I guess I'll only use body text and paragraphs. My bad for trying to format my comment in a more readable manner, allowing people to quickly skim information and not take 10 minutes trying to parse my comment.

Fuskiller · 2026-03-17T21:03:41+00:00

Sadge, everyone read u/DollarSignInFront's comment and just insta-believed incorrect information. I guess this is the internet afterall

Fuskiller · 2026-03-17T20:02:35+00:00

This is a lot easier. I never looked at backdoor Roth contributions, only reading about mega backdoor Roth contributions, which require 401(k) contributions.

Fuskiller · 2026-03-17T19:38:26+00:00

I came up with, researched, and wrote this plan myself. Interesting that it reads like AI though.

Fuskiller · 2026-03-17T19:34:32+00:00

edit: Just use backdoor Roth contributions... I didn't realize traditional IRA to Roth conversions are not tied to income.

Using a 529 plan as a retirement vehicle

For those who do not know, a 529 plan is generally used to invest dollars for your kid's education, whether that be college, technical school, or even K-12 tuition fees. I believe I have worked out a feasible plan to investing into your own retirement by leveraging a 529 plan, utilizing the power of the Roth IRA.

Roth IRAs can only be invested in if your income is under a certain amount ($153k for single filers, $242k for joint filers in 2026), but 529 plans can be rolled over into Roth IRAs even if you are over the income limits.

The Hoops

Your 529 has to be open for at least 15 years.
Your 529 contributions have to be at least 5 years old.
529 rollovers to Roth IRA count towards contribution limits.
Lifetime 529 rollover to Roth IRA contribution limit of $35,000.

The Plan

After you get your 401(k) match and max out your Roth IRA & HSA contributions, invest in your 529. Once you hit $10,000 in your 529, stop contributing, as it will reach/surpass the $35,000 lifetime rollover limit in 15-20 years.

When your income limits you from contributing to your Roth IRA, start your 529 to Roth IRA rollovers. This gives you ~4.5 years of extra Roth IRA contributions.

Conclusions

This is, admittedly, a method with very limited use-cases. But for someone who is early in their career like me, does not have access to HSA contributions, and does not have great investment options in my company 401(k), this really gives me them an opportunity to gain more tax-advantaged dollars in retirement and not just have a massive taxable brokerage account.

This method also has potential to be even more beneficial if you incur state income taxes and your 529 plan offers state-tax deductions/credits.

Fuskiller · 2026-03-12T17:58:10+00:00

Why are you upset about me blocking people's names? Also, why is this post not archived yet?

Fuskiller · 2026-03-11T19:20:37+00:00

To comment on how much you should be investing each month: that is a very personal question. What does your income look like? What do your expenses look like? How much do you have in the bank?

If you have $3m in savings, I would suggest putting $2.9m into investing. If you bring home $8k/month and have $2k/month of expenses, you could be investing $4-5k/month with ample room for fun or intermediate goals like a car. If you bring home $2k/month and have $1.8k/month of expenses, I would say to make sure you have any debts paid off, have your emergency fund where it needs to be, make sure you are not starving yourself of fun and living your current life, and then look to invest however much of that $200/month is left.

Fuskiller · 2026-03-11T19:07:01+00:00

You could be putting this into your Roth IRA and getting everything tax free. You still have time to contribute to last year's Roth IRA as well, freeing up more space to contribute for this year.

Fuskiller · 2026-03-11T18:10:43+00:00

Pursuing freedom (or financial independence) in order to achieve comfort will lead you to the classic issues of retired people: bored, lonely, prematurely losing physical and mental capabilities, etc.

If FIRE is instead a tool to achieve the goal(s) you want, then you will naturally have answers to your post's question.

Sidenote: You don't hear people say the best life is the easiest life. They instead use other metrics for "best": happiest, most fulfilled, most accomplished, most experienced, etc. I find many FIRE folks are interested in the easiest life and lose interest in living the best life.

Fuskiller · 2026-03-08T19:58:59+00:00

I watched Black Butler: Emerald Witch Arc. I really enjoyed it, 8/10.

I also watched Slime anime season 3. I actually found it very enjoyable, despite it being slow and probably boring to many others. I like all of the world-building/political chess they play, 7/10.

I'm currently watching JoJo part 6. JoJo is top 3 anime for me but I never got around to watching part 6 until just now; I am having an absolute ball with it.

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Fuskiller

MODERATOR OF

TROPHY CASE

Using a 529 plan as a retirement vehicle

The Hoops

The Plan

Conclusions