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I stumbled upon this site about 18 months ago and have been reading ever since.
When I heard about Jonathan’s diagnosis, it really got me thinking about how I could contribute. The thing is, I’m based in the UK, and I was a bit hesitant at first because I know Humble Dollar primarily focuses on US personal finance – especially with all the ins and outs of US pension planning.
But I decided to post a few essays on some more general financial topics, just to see how they’d be received. And honestly, I’ve been really encouraged by your responses!
So, I wanted to politely ask: would you be happy for a UK-based writer like me to keep contributing? I’m obviously a bit needy and need some reassurance 😂
Are you anywhere near Edenfield?
Wrong Country but right Kingdom lol
A market town called Lisburn in Ireland
Mark, I spend much of my day in online conversation with “furriners” on social media hosting fans of the football club Everton. (I’ve been a Toffee for 40 years now.) I’ve built friendships so deep that I stay with them when I go over every few years to watch games. On the site we talk not only footy but politics, music, history, travel and just about everything else — except money, which apparently is too personal to discuss. So it seems perfectly natural to me to be reading commentary from someone who writes with a different accent than mine!
Please continue. Unless you’re a Liverpool or Manchester United fan, of course. In that case, sod off. ;-))
My son is a die-hard Man City fan. We saw our first match there back in March. It was a great experience. He and his family did some trail in Wales afterwards and saw a match in Swindon and enjoyed. And I agree about Liverpool and ManU. Except for a dear nephew who somehow picked Liverpool!
My grandson is a Liverpool fan. I look on the positive side…. because they loose so often it gets him used to disappointment and builds his character!
Not guilty lol
G’day Mark, all the way from Australia. I too felt a bit weird writing given that I’m outside the US. But if found that HD readers seem to enjoy a different perspective and have been very supportive of me as a (very) novice writer from the other side of the globe.
Good morning yourself!
I’ve enjoyed your articles and have to agree, our America cousins are very welcoming.
our America cousins
This feels so right! We are all one human family.
As I’m not in the US either I think there are lot of commonalities regardless. The technical specifics may change but the overall themes and issues are the same. Plus an outside perspective helps as do some younger voices.
The biggest surprise to me is that a lot of the HD population seem to regard international travel as a big thing. I suspect for Aussies that travelling is as natural to them as beating the Poms in home Ashes.
I spend a fair amount of time in the US and some of my best friends are there. I did consider at one stage buying a property with an eye to eventual retirement but concluded that healthcare would end up being prohibitive given I wouldn’t have benefited from low personal taxes during my earning career. So if it happened anywhere, bar a lottery win, it would be Canada rather than the US.
OK, you’ve got me intrigued, “as natural to them as beating the Poms in home Ashes?”
Please explain this saying to us Yankees.
Cricket is THE bat and ball sport played worldwide and the reason the US had to develop baseball in order to have something to be good at. 😉
There are various formats ranging from 100/120 ball to 300 ball to 5 day Test Matches. The Ashes are the most prized trophy in international sport being a tiny urn containing the remnants of some burnt stumps and they never actually leave Lord’s in London and only Australia or England can be the holders at any point in time. This coming Northern Hemisphere winter England will once again try to regain them on Aussie soil and no doubt come home disappointed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ashes
Not unlike the World Series the name has its origin in a newspaper.
Sidebar: England are currently engaged in a fascinating Day 5 run chase vs India where they not only have to pass the Indian score but also defeat Yorkshire weather.
Further sidebar: I remembered that the US actually played in the first international cricket match vs Canada
I constantly tease my Everton friends — a couple of whom regularly travel to the West Indies to watch cricket — that a sport isn’t really a sport if it includes stopping in mid-match for tea or competing for cigarette leftovers. 😉
Sorry I noticed an error in my previous post which should have read “in order for the Cubans, Puerto Ricans and Japanese to be good at” 😉
So the ashes is a series of cricket test matches between England and Australia. England have a habit of losing when they host the competition and a Pom is Aussie slang for someone from the UK….. simple really 😂
No wonder I can’t watch a British TV shows. They butcher the king’s english. 👑
From 8:00 pm each night we watch British TV on Britbox.
I occasionally find myself using a British phrase. The other day I opened the door and said come through rather than come in.
I had assumed you were US based
Nope but I do sometimes slip into the vernacular.
Yes, please! As someone whose stock portfolio is split 50/50 US and ex-US, I assert HD could use more international writers.
I have enjoyed your articles, Mark. Count me in for hearing more. Chris
I look forward to your next article!
Thumbs Up Mark!
Mark – absolutely. I agree with Ken below; I’d love to know more about you, whatever you are comfortable with. I’m intrigued by a vacation home near the Giants Causeway.
Yes, please keep posting! As someone considering living outside the US later in life, I enjoy hearing financial and lifestyle commentary from non-Americans.
I watch Britbox every day, so I might understand even if you use “jumper” or “bracers” and I eat black pudding for breakfast and I have sausage rolls in the freezer. I would have voted against Brexit if a could.
I love sausage rolls, steak and kidney pie, English sausages, tomato and sardine paste, pork pies, and more. When I worked in NYC, this was my temple:
https://myersofkeswick.com/
I love the sausage rolls, fried fish and pasties on Merseyside — though scouse is an acquired taste I have not yet acquired — and remain wistfully in love with a faraway Scottish stew called Cullen Skink. Magic in a bowl on a rainy day in Mallaig.
Please don’t tell us you like Marmite on toast.
I love Marmite on toast. But I know it offends those around me, so I try to eat it sparingly.
A friend of mine in England tricked me into trying it.
I eat that as part of breakfast every morning. Don’t like the sound of tomato and sardine paste, though.
It’s a byproduct of brewing beer so I guess that’s a good thing. 😀
I was glad to find my local Harris Teeter stocked it, but it wasn’t on the International aisle as you’d expect. Turned out it was on the Baking aisle, presumably because it’s derived from yeast.
Kathy and Dick, your repartee always makes me chuckle. Please let me know when you start your podcast. Or are you secretly the same person?😀😉 (For any newbies here, I’m just kidding – no podcast in the works as far as I know, but it would be good if they did).
BTW, there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for the marmite toast, quite aside from the fact that I actually like marmite. I eat one slice of whole wheat toast at breakfast for the fiber. I have borderline hypoglycemia, and if I put marmalade on it, which would be the normal British thing to do, never mind jam – er, jelly – it messes up my blood sugar and I’m starving before lunch.
You do know there is a difference between jam and jelly right?
What my US friends call jelly is what I would call jam. See here.
We aim to please… 😉 Definitely no podcast! I used to have a travel blog but it’s been dormant for years. I believe Dick has an active finance blog.
It’s active, but not much finance. More employee benefits, health benefits and politics and of course, rants about it all.
OMG Linda, brilliant idea!
Welcome…
Cheers
Yes, keep posting Mark. Your articles are interesting and well-written. One suggestion: create your Forum profile to provide us with some general background and biographical information.
Mark, I see you took my suggestion. Now where’s that “thumbs up” symbol when I need it?
The boss has spoken, enough said.
And now, since I’ve been running around the country the last few days enjoying myself, I’d better get some house chores done before I pick Suzie up from the airport in the morning!
Definitely yes. Your writing is quite thought provoking. At first I was a bit hesitant to read your posts being that they are UK based, but still there is some definite overlap in our hopes, experiences, and investing/retirement “fears” on both sides of the pond!
Of course, it’s always interesting to get a different viewpoint. Keep ’em coming!
Absolutely! Other viewpoints are great, and it’s nice to see a fellow Brit here, even if I have been gone a long time.
Yes, please keep posting!
I vote a resounding yes! As I just wrote in a response to one of your other articles, I’m enjoying your writing very much! And articles not based on evaluating pensions is a welcome divergence. I’m relatively new to HD, having found it about a year ago, so I’m not sure of the value of my vote, but there it is!
Yes👍🏼