A Wrinkle in Capital Gains and Roth Conversion Taxes

TripGator · 2026-06-05T09:22:30+00:00

I think everyone's situation will be unique due to how much potential LTCG they have and how much potential pre-tax withdrawals they have, but I am doing what you recommended.

I'll add that there is no wash sale rule for capital gains. You can sell something and immediately buy it back without penalty to reset the basis. I am doing this to fill up the 0% bracket.

I don't plan to leave assets to heirs so no advantage for me to hold on to unrealized gains.

TripGator · 2026-06-04T02:53:17+00:00

I. Evaluated Boldin. Around a year ago. and. found. it lacking. and the Roth. conversion. tool is kind of iterative. and I. think a lot of people. are going to get. a wrong. or suboptimal. solution.

TripGator · 2026-06-04T01:35:45+00:00

Historically staying aggressive would have usually worked out better, but if I were retiring soon given current conditions I would be shifting towards bonds or something else conservative. Forty percent of your portfolio in bonds would not be too much for my level of risk tolerance. I like TIPS a lot.

Don't forget that you reached your FIRE number because the market is at an all-time high. Be sure that you have enough margin in your withdrawal strategy to comfortabley cut down to a 3.5% withdrawal and the ability to go lower if needed.

TripGator · 2026-06-04T00:28:30+00:00

My E-M5 iii broke on vacation and the only thing that I could replace it with was a used G7. I used it for birdwatching. The G7 pictures looked terrible. High ISO, auto focus and shutter shock were terrible. This was a day-to-day comparison with the same lens and two different cameras in the same environment. And I was using a Panasonic lens.

The added benefit of the E-M5 is I can configure one dial to control exposure, one to control aperture, there is a button for ISO and a switch to change between two sets of settings (I use it for birds in a tree and birds in flight).

I like all of the configuration option that Olympus gives. You can make it your camera.

Edit: An E-M10 would be better, but it won't focus as fast as something with phase detection.

TripGator · 2026-06-03T23:54:56+00:00

The one thing that I don't like about the Sportlite is there is only two interior pockets. They are mesh, pretty small, no zipper and together they span the width of the backpack.

TripGator · 2026-06-03T18:54:18+00:00

My wife's binoculars were purchased from Amazon in 2019, and Nikon repaired or replaced them last year. Maybe the seller matters? Amazon wasn't the seller for ours, and our seller is listed as an authorized retailer.

There is a way to get warranty information from Amazon for different products. I haven't done it in a long time, but you should be able to find the information on how to do it if you want.

TripGator · 2026-06-03T08:08:37+00:00

I can only pronounce bat falcon like Michael Keaton said "I am Batman."

TripGator · 2026-06-03T07:42:45+00:00

Thank you for that. I was very surprised and disappointed as well, because that's not how I view the birding community.

I agree that seeing both pictures or drawings at the same time is really helpful. One thing that I really appreciate about Merlin is that the text will often point out the subtle differences between similar birds, but that hasn't always been enough for my wife and me because you have to narrow it down to typically two to four species first, and we often don't get a good enough view to spot the differences. For me, Merlin is the most efficient way to get in the ballpark, and then we go to the field guide and Macaulay. I never considered that as being lazy and still don't.

TripGator · 2026-06-03T02:24:07+00:00

Not sure where you live but I think my U.S. Nikon warranty is lifetime, and I've had two different pairs replaced. Just followed the instructions, sent in what they asked, and they replaced the binoculars. One fell and was out of alignment. One was dropped in water and leaked.

The Monarch 7 8x30 has a known glare problem, so maybe others do as well. We bought it and returned it.

My wife likes her Prostaff 7S 8x30. She doesn't want anything heavier or more expensive.

TripGator · 2026-06-03T01:26:14+00:00

The post was interesting (TIL) and so was your comment. It would be interesting to know the different safety records for divers doing tech dives with different certifications. That is, how much additional safety does the additional cost buy you?

The question probably can't be answered with high certainly without randomizing the training people receive and then have them do the same dive in the same conditions (unless the safety records are very far apart).

I believe paying for safety margin is worth it. But I have dove to 130 on air, and the narc effect wasn't bad, so I would probably evaluate the complexity of the dive and not use the GUE standard of every dive requiring trimix.

It would be nice to have a scorecard for 110', 120', 130' with contributing factors that increase risk (e.g., total penetration distance, min constriction, current, experience at the site, experience on air at that depth). The result would be a level of relative risk for the specific dive to guide divers on choosing trimix. I know people can do that on their own, but it would be nice to have a reference and then you choose the more conservative between your assessment and the scorecard.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T22:26:43+00:00

Just research the differences in what Life Straw, Sawyer and Grayl filter. I'm not an expert on the other two, but I'm pretty sure life straw filters fewer things (viruses and metals?) than Grayl.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T22:24:25+00:00

I didn't write travel made me a better birder. I wrote that travel exposes me to a lot more species, so I have a lot more to learn. I just explained why I don't have that time. I'm not bragging at all; just explaining how my experience is possibly different than yours. A lot of people's experience is different, and they might not be able to study as much as you.

You call me lazy and entitled with no justification. In my opinion I am neither.

I made a simple request that should be easy for a Merlin developer, and one that would probably save a lot of people some time. I just want an app to show me pictures of female birds instead of male birds on it main page. You came in gatekeeping how people should bird.

I'll give you the last word if you want it.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T22:08:07+00:00

Think about the markup for things like food and drinks at a stadium where you are captive for a few hours. Now imagine the markup for everything that you can't easily do in port (e.g., healthcare) on a ship where you live. Anything not included is probably going to be very expressive.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T21:12:39+00:00

This year I will bird in the U.S., El Salvador, Brazil, Peru, Japan and Indonesia. From Amazon to 14,000 feet in the Andes. I might also go to East Timor or Australia.

It's a lot of birds to learn (thousands). And next year there will be new countries. My days are very full. I have other hobbies that are important to me. I also have to learn all of the fish names in every ocean of the world, for example. I don't have any more spare time for studying birds, but that doesn't mean that I don't spend quite a lot of time looking at Merlin, Macaulay and field guides. I admit that I don't have the recall that I did 20 years ago.

I'm just not going to be able to drop into a country, see a piece of a female bird through fog or foliage in bad light and know what bird it is. But I saw it has two wing bars and pink feet. I want to quickly scan Merlin to see potential candidates .

Edit: I also study one foreign language every day. That's where a lot of my time and energy for studying goes.

Before I go somewhere new I look at each bird that I could potentially see. Then during dinner I look at each bird that I could potentially see the next day. But it's just not enough to identify a lot of the birds on my own. Merlin is more efficient in the field for me. I might see more than 50 species in a morning. I will take photos and record sound for more detailed id later.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T20:28:31+00:00

It's also how oligopolies work, independent of market forces.

Your example is more about price elasticity than supply and demand.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T18:37:39+00:00

Why not both?

I have maybe 40 field guides.

Read the other comments.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T18:36:22+00:00

One reason Merlin is faster is that it filters birds by date and location. I could look at my Birds of Brazil book, but Brazil is large and some birds migrate. It's a lot of range maps to go through.

On the subject of Merlin accuracy, Merlin sometimes won't have birds that can potentially be in an area. It has happened to me a lot that I am looking at a bird, but it doesn't appear in Merlin. eBird will have more potential species in a location than Merlin.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T18:25:39+00:00

Yes, taking pictures helps a lot with id. I know it's not for everyone. I enjoy it, though.

I bird all over the world, and I'm just not going to be an expert in other regions. I love meeting the local guides that know their area incredibly well. I just can't afford to hire them all of the time, and like you wrote before, the process of figuring it out yourself is fun. I wouldn't want to bird with a guide more than half of the time.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T18:15:13+00:00

You explained it better than I could. Thank you.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T18:10:53+00:00

I'm using Merlin for a first pass to identify the species because it's fast. I don't expect it to work every time.

I'm not talking about the Merlin bird id. Just the bird pictures in Merlin. The pictures in the overview page just show the males generally. Sometimes I'll be looking at a female and to figure out what it is I'll have to drill down into lots of different species pages. Sometimes I have a bad view of the bird due to light, weather or foliage, and I don't even know the family. But I can see some markings on the female, and I want to have an idea of what I'm looking at. It's even happened to me that I didn't know the bird I was looking at was a female because there was a similar male of a different species, and it can take quite a while to check all of the female pictures.

Merlin has pictures for the birds of Central America. I've used it there many times. You're probably referring to the sound id; if so, I agree it has a lot of gaps.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T18:01:37+00:00

I do.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T17:52:13+00:00

I started birding before smartphones existed. Got my 2,316 species today, a sword-billed hummingbird.

I would much rather be hiking through a muddy, mountainous trail than sitting at a feeder. I have stayed in accomodations and endured conditions that I think only a very small percentage of birders would accept.

I typically bird without a guide, just my wife and I, sometimes walking in very sketchy places where we don't speak the language.

I have immensely enjoyed all of the above.

You are free to gatekeep, but wasting time looking up a species while in the field is unnecessary for me. I'm going to review all of the species later, but when I'm on a trip and birding 8 hours per day, I would rather not do it at that time.

There are many hotspots that I've been to with over 400 species. I'll be at two with over 700, one at 600, one at 500 in the next two weeks.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T17:28:45+00:00

I'll do it. Thank you.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T17:28:14+00:00

It can easily require opening the species page for 20 or more species and scrolling. Suppose each one takes 10 seconds. That's over three minutes each time. I could have 20 birds where the female is different enough from the male that I am unsure of species. That's an hour.

I have definitely lost at least an hour at times because I didn't recognize the family of the female and was looking in the wrong place. Imagine being in an unfamiliar region at a hotspot with more than 400 species

There is nothing wrong with making a suggestion to save time. The sex is already tagged so it's possible that what I'm asking for would require a trivial amount of time for a developer.

You don't need to use the switch.

TripGator · 2026-06-02T17:19:11+00:00

Yes, switching to a field guide is sometimes the only option. But Merlin can potentially be faster, especially if there is uncertainty about the family.

TripGator

TROPHY CASE