It’s official: a study published in the Mayo Clinic Proceedings showed that as of 2014, Emergency Medicine (EM) took the top slot for physician burnout (59%). Suck it, critical care (50%). In your face, OB/GYN (56%). We’re #1, we’re # …huh? How did my beloved field of EM win the race to nowhere? When I was in medical school, the …
Why Japanese Workers (and Medical Residents) Should Pursue FIRE
In the years following WWII, the U.S. helped Japan rebuild infrastructure and institutions. From that time onward, the relationship has been mostly a bromance. Our nations have arguably become the Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson of the G-8, putting one another in playful headlocks when negotiating Pacific trade agreements or playing wingman when a cute vulnerable bachelorette country finds itself …
Keynes: The First Mustachian Prophet?
John Maynard Keynes, famed British economist, was a piece of work. He developed and promoted modern macroeconomic theory. Government monetary policy during the Great Recession of 2008 was based directly on his ideas, which many credit with having prevented a full-blown depression. He was openly bisexual in the Victorian era (!), and kept diaries in which he tabulated his conquests …
Of Cannibals And Financial Independence
The FI movement consists of a fringe group of people scattered across the globe who shun conventional consumer culture. Could the experience of such a tiny group of individuals with deviant financial behavior and limited means someday have an outsize impact on the world? Stranger things have happened. Read on for a far-fetched tale of improbable impact by a misfit …
Recipe for Financial Independence
Every now and again I succumb to sappier impulses. It must have been from watching too many reruns of When Harry Met Sally back in the day. Forgive the indulgence!Makes 1 heaping serving of financial independence. Cooking time: Approximately a decade and a half after residency, depending on student debt, specialty income, and spending. 1 jar of resident lifestyle preserves …
Project Fi Update
It’s been four months since I returned my iphone to Sprint and my wife and I switched over to Project Fi, the no-contract cellular service operated by Google. Calls are routed preferentially via wi-fi when available, and on the Sprint or T-mobile networks when you’re away from wi-fi. We put Fi to the test by traveling out of country (Mexico …
The Five Stages Of Lawsuit Grief – Part Two
Acceptance Eventually, the ability to enjoy myself seeped back into my life, one area at a time. My kids sucked me back into their world that didn’t care about my troubles so long as I could splash them in the bath or read them a bedtime story. My wife was simply extraordinary. I didn’t feel deserving of my family’s love, …
The Five Stages Of Lawsuit Grief – Part One
I was tired – it had been a busy winter shift and my head was spinning, but I was slowly winding down after a nice family dinner and some reading time with my daughter. My wife and I had put our toddler to bed and were catching up when the doorbell rang. Taking a perverse pleasure in the humiliation he …
Notes from a Financial Toxic Wasteland
I’d heard California called many things before. The Golden State. A nature lover’s paradise. A youth and beauty parade. But the White Coat Investor (WCI) was the first to call it out as a Financial Toxic Wasteland. I describe myself as an unrepentant Californian, owning up to my idiosyncrasies and accepting the faults (and more reluctantly, the fault lines) …
Too Much
My wife runs a side hustle that has been in full swing all summer, and which despite being mostly a word of mouth endeavor has evolved over a decade into a full-time job. On top of this, she works one clinical day shift per week in the ED to maintain her skills. My 10 hour shift yesterday turned into a …