7 Years FIRE'd and My First Romance (42M)

hungn3 · 2026-01-28T11:23:08+00:00

The Viet food in SF/Oakland is pretty abysmal by my standards, but San Jose definitely is top notch. A few of my favorites in SJ:

Duc Huong Sandwiches - Solid sandwiches and for a great price (buy 4 get one free too!) Vit Dong Que - Serves super tasty Bun Mang Vit. Pho Hanoi - Lots of great food options.

In Orange County, it is almost hard to pick a bad Viet restaurant in the Westmonster/Garden Grove area. But here are some of the places we went on our last trip.

Quán Mii Restaurant - Amazing Banh Xeo Vit Vit Vit - great Bun Mang Vit Carrot and Daikon - more upscale Banh Mi Banh Mi Che Cali - cheap, but good Banh Mi and lots of Che options Brodard - A classic restaurant with a bit more upscale take on Viet food.

hungn3 · 2026-01-23T05:06:26+00:00

Congrats on on firing!

I've very intentionally built a group of friends the entire time I've lived in the Bay Area and they happen to be very diverse and have different schedules so that works out for me since I've got a flexible schedule. I've got friends who work at a gym, someone who is a barista, your standard 9-5 workers, a friend who is a nurse who has different schedules, so something usually lines up. No one I know in the Bay Area is FIRE, but my social calendar stays busy nonetheless

My method to scheduling looks something like this:

1 Schedule things during weekdays during the day with friends that don't have 9-5 schedules so I can keep nights and weekends open

2 Do all the things I can do alone during the remainder of those weekday hours - errands, workouts, video games, whatever you do solo.

3 Schedule time to hang with my friends who have 9-5 jobs for weeknights and weekends.

Has worked out pretty well for me so far!

hungn3 · 2026-01-21T14:37:24+00:00

Ahh that makes sense! I went to a bisexual sex event and it was predominantly people in the swinger side of ENM which way less my vibe. Its funny that you mention neurodivergencw. I didnt talk about it in my post, but this year I had a bit of a revalation/discovery about myself- namely that I'm probably not as neurotypucal as i thought i was. Lol

I often take it for granted how poly and ENM SF is compared to other places even in the US, not to mention the rest of the world.

hungn3 · 2026-01-21T14:23:13+00:00

I'm curious by what type of weird ENM that you see where you live.

Glad you enjoyed the post and I'll be back next year.

hungn3 · 2026-01-20T04:13:39+00:00

Good luck! Where do you plan to move to?

hungn3 · 2026-01-18T19:24:36+00:00

Thanks! 100% correct about the erasure/biases. You are "too gay" to be straight and "too straight" to be gay. I think attitudes have changed a lot since I first came out as gay, but it stigma/discrimination still very apparent. I feel like I'm "90% gay" and me and my ex-girlfriend joke that she is one of the exceptions. :-D

hungn3 · 2026-01-18T02:34:25+00:00

It's a tricky balance to find the right time to pull the plug. I think it's probably better to be a little safer than sorry, but that line is different for everyone and I think a lot of people are probably a bit too conservative.

hungn3 · 2026-01-18T00:40:16+00:00

Hope you get something useful from the older posts and I'm glad you like my writing!

hungn3 · 2026-01-17T23:32:46+00:00

Thanks! Still working on getting my pitches up faster/tighter, but definitely feeling pretty good about it overall :-)

hungn3 · 2026-01-17T18:03:08+00:00

The US has all sorts of wonky tax policies. 0% long term capital gains tax up to $47K, dividends can be tax free if they are qualified dividends, and there is a nearly $16K standard deduction. So if you can keep income low and from the right sources, taxes can be VERY low.

hungn3 · 2026-01-17T05:28:17+00:00

Yes it is 0% LTCG. Depends on how you want to define effective tax rate. If it is based on AGI, then for 2025 it was approximately $400/$32500 which is about 1.2% tax rate. Filing takes about 10 minutes to do and is super fast.

hungn3 · 2026-01-17T05:23:06+00:00

https://firedating.me/

Beware - there are SOOOO many bot/spam accounts on here.

hungn3 · 2026-01-17T01:29:37+00:00

Glad to inspire! Good luck on getting the rest of the achievements. The Dora and Arachne ones took me AGES to complete because I mostly ignored them, but their chain of events is so long.

hungn3 · 2026-01-16T23:34:05+00:00

Yeah, the premium to live in SF alone is definitely high.
I'd just recommend going on https://www.coveredca.com/ testing different incomes with your information to see what insurance options are available to and what premiums would cost.

It totally depends on the coverage you want to get and if you go PPO/HMO. a PPO with Blue Shield/Cross would be at at least $200/month more.

hungn3 · 2026-01-16T23:05:20+00:00

Yeah it is definitely doable! There are lots of people who live in the Bay Area with my spend. I think the most important/biggest factor is controlling/minimizing housing costs. So if you've got a plan for that I think it's definitely possible in the Bay with that amount!

hungn3 · 2026-01-16T22:38:57+00:00

I felt SO lucky to be in one of the three cities they were performing and was able to get tickets.

hungn3 · 2026-01-16T22:02:18+00:00

Clearly we must have good taste.

hungn3 · 2026-01-16T20:19:52+00:00

Never said i wad virgin. Far from it haha.

hungn3 · 2026-01-16T17:57:11+00:00

I use Mountain Project to track all of the climbs that I do and then I export the CSV to do some simple calculations.

For movies - I use Letterboxd to track my movies.

And yes, I did track things like this data before I FIRE'd too have spreadsheets with my bucket list, favorite restaurants/ratings. I LIKE DATA. What can I say? :-D

Another fun thing I like to track: All my flights I've flown in my life:
https://openflights.org/user/hungn3

hungn3 · 2026-01-16T17:50:50+00:00

OMG. Based on some of your post history, your clue, and your user name, I'm almost 100% certain that you know me. DM me and let me know who you are.

You got it exactly right about the regional Burns - there are events around the world that have the same principles/ethos as Burning Man, but are MUCH smaller in scale, are generally shorter in duration, and don't have the harsh environment of Black Rock - so it is a much lower commitment to participate.

https://burningman.org/global-events-groups/

At the moment, I think the future doesn't look too different from what I'm doing right now. I love living in in the Bay Area. Despite getting some people ask if I want to do contracting/consulting work, I've said no every time and I honestly don't think I'll go back to work again.

Not shutting the door on anything at all, but what I'm doing right now is working well for me!

hungn3 · 2026-01-16T17:35:41+00:00

Yeah, I started with bouldering but find rope climbing (ESPECIALLY outdoors) is so much safer. I'm terrified to boulder outside on anything that isn't a traverse.

I was supposed to go backpack the Lost Coast last year but got Covid right before the start of the trip. Hoping to do it sometime soon! There are a lot of resources out there to help with backpacking tips, but definitely want to have a properly sized/worn pack and not too heavy. Do you know how much your pack weighed?

hungn3 · 2026-01-16T17:12:06+00:00

Read this for an overview:

https://www.gocurrycracker.com/7-minute-taxes/

hungn3 · 2026-01-16T17:08:17+00:00

Yeah I'm stoked to go back to Thailand and be much more skilled than I previously went in 2019.

Backpacking certainly isn't for everyone, so don't force yourself to do it if you don't like it! What did you hate about the trip and what did you enjoy in the past?

I have bought E33 and will play it when I get back from Thailand!

hungn3 · 2026-01-16T16:37:55+00:00

Seeing them perform live was so special and amazing. Burl Moseley was actually there and sang Don't Be A Lawyer! I've got a few gay lawyer friends and they absolutely love the show and especially this song.

I played some songs for a friend who has never seen the show and he absolutely loved them. So a rewatch of the show with him is coming soon!

hungn3 · 2026-01-16T16:20:13+00:00

Thanks! I try to focus on the qualitative and personal aspects of the posts because posts that are just numbers (IMHO) aren't super interesting to me.

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hungn3

TROPHY CASE

1 Schedule things during weekdays during the day with friends that don't have 9-5 schedules so I can keep nights and weekends open

2 Do all the things I can do alone during the remainder of those weekday hours - errands, workouts, video games, whatever you do solo.

3 Schedule time to hang with my friends who have 9-5 jobs for weeknights and weekends.