100 Ways to Slightly Improve Your Travel Experience #11 - Take A Day Off From Your Vacation

 

Sometimes we need a day off from our travel adventures.  This can be a low impact day, like taking the open top bus tour mentioned last week, or a day when you hardly leave the hotel room. Our vacations and travel tend to become perpetual motion exercises.  There is so much to see and do, and sometimes what we most need to do, is less. 

Taking a day off is more important for some than others.  Some people retreat from activity every few days in a routine life.  This may be the weekend day when they don't leave the house and take a break from their daily routine. Or it can be the rare day when the person just does nothing.  I can remember in my hard driving 30's setting a goal one year to spend one day a month when I didn't leave the house each month (I succeeded about four times that year.)  

It is helpful to have a low-impact day from time to time.  A day when you drive slowly, and see the sights through the windshield, only getting out and walking when you truly feel like it, and not at all if you don't feel like it.  

Thursday Ramble: Closing a Tax Loophole

One man's important provision in the tax regulations, is another man's tax loophole. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) the United States national income tax agency, has announced intention to change a provision in the tax regulations.  An important distinction, Congress writes the tax code or law, it authorizes the agency (IRS) to promulgate regulations.  As long as the regulations are not contrary to the law, the agency has fairly wide discretion in how they implement the law by writing regulations. Simply put, the IRS created the rule they are changing, and they most likely can change the regulation.  

If you are still awake, and still with me, let me explain what they are going to change. 

Currently the value of assets contributed to a partnership (this includes LLCs, PLCs, general and limited partnerships) is whatever value the partners agree on.   The change would require there to be a reasonable or rational basis on the value of the assets contributed.  Currently only agreement on the value by the partners is required. This change is estimated to increase tax revenues by $50,000,000,000 in the first ten years ($50-billion dollars.) 

Let me offer an example.  You have a blog and I have a blog, we agree to go into a partnership to create a blogging partnership to increase readership and advertising revenue on our new super blogs.  We agree between the two of us to contribute our blogs, all of the intellectual property, good will, and established business from our blogs. And we agree that each blog is worth $1,000,000 ($1-million dollars.) This is an in kind, contribution of capital under the current IRS accounting regulations.  The regulations will allow us to write this off as a business expense over a number of years, say ten years.  This means that each of us will be entitled to $100,000 a year expense against income, income from TravelPenguin is currently about $120 a year.  I can write the rest of the expense off against other income.  That would reduce my tax liability to zero. 

This is how rich people pay less in taxes, than you and I do. 

With a rational basis rule, even if we value travel penguin at 50 times earnings, my write off would only be $6,000, spread over ten years.  Twenty Five years ago, when I first read this rule,  I thought, this is ridiculous and needs to be changed. It is about time. 
 

My World of Wonders, aka the Wednesday Ws June 19, 2024

What have I been thinking? What a great life we have lived, reasonably good health, love, comfort, adventures and exploration.  And we should have a few good years left. 

Who have I seen?  I had lunch with the person who replaced me as director the other day, we had dinner last week with the friend whose wedding we are going to on the September road trip. 

Who have I heard from?  I trade daily morning texts with a couple of people, I had a couple of emails from Doc Spo. I traded emails with an old friend in Kentucky, he keeps saying he is going to cash out and retire someday. I hope he does while he can still enjoy life.  I traded emails with my sister-in-law and spoke briefly with Ed. 

What have I read? I finished the book on visiting Islands, and the Wisdom of Sheep.  I am reading a book on closing the generation gap written by a management think tank.  

What did I hear this week? The rattle of the subway trains, trains are seldom quiet, but the DC system seems to have more clunks and rattles than others around the world.  

What have I overheard? Waiting to meet a friend for lunch, the man sitting next to me, talking a younger family member about being in town for the funeral of a family member, uncomfortable questions about if there will be an inheritance.  Two ladies in the pool floating near me, one of them talking about this wonderful weight loss program, the other one asked what happened when she stopped the program, the answer was gained it all back plus 10 pounds. 

What have I smelled this week? Can you smell the green of summer?  It is intense right now, with blooming trees adding sweetness to the sidewalk experience.  

What have a felt this week? The comfort of floating in the pool in dappled sunlight.

What did I taste this week? I am using zucchini (courgettes) as an added ingredient in cooking, and a great cantaloupe melon.    

Who deserves a slap this week? Amazon delivery for showing something as delivered, 24 hours before it was delivered.  3 out of 5 slaps.   

What did I want to say this week (and didn't)?  I was riding up in the elevator, someone asked the young woman next to me how she was doing and she replied, really kind of terrible.  Her husband had moved out and told her he wants a divorce.  I wanted to say, "he wants you to be happy, everyone deserves happiness, and he didn't think he could provide the happiness you deserve, or find happiness for himself."  Unhappy people fear making those they love, unhappy.  

 

Travel Tuesday: The Ship

Explorer of the Seas is about 1,000 feet long, a floating resort hotel. It is an older ship, about 25 years old.  When she was launched she was the largest in the world. One of the first to have a large indoor central atrium. 

People ask if we were bored, there were 8 days at sea.  We enjoyed every one of those days. There are hundreds of things to do. Time to relax and watch the sea roll by seemed to fly by.  My advice, don't fear the ship or time at sea, savor being away from the world. There were a couple of thousand passengers onboard, and there were always places to find quiet and solitude. 

I realize I didn't take photos of the cabin, there are lot of photos online.  We really enjoyed the balcony, having a private outdoor space. On our previous cruise we  had an inside or "ocean view" cabins, the balcony costs quite a bit more, but we really enjoyed it.    

The view up and back from our balcony at night. No we didn't ride the slide. 

In port in Tenerife. The small ship in front of us is Ritz Carlton at sea, it is doing a transAtlantic crossing next spring, $7,500 per person with everything included.  I know it looks tiny, it is 590 feet long. 

The view down from our balcony. 

He had a colorful collection of swimwear. 

The flowrider looked fun, but the cautions crossed the line into Dr. W's advice to not do anything stupid. 

Nap time. 

Miami fading into the distance. 

'Take Her to Sea Mr. Murdoch" my favorite line from the movie "Titanic." 

Moody Monday: Feeling better

I had a little post vacation crash, but "I am feeling much better now." 

I went to the outdoor pool for the first time this year, the water is warm enough to not take your breath away, and I can go in the middle of the day, in the middle of the week, when it is peaceful. Being in the water is therapeutic. 

I am mixing outdoor walks with treadmill hours.  The weather is very summer like, the world is very verdant. The gym is cool and has great WiFi; YouTube works well on my Ipad.    

I have picked up the brushes and started painting again. A study in shades of grey, and starting one in shades of green.  

I will likely finish a second book, before this posts, the Wisdom of Sheep, beautifully written by an organic farmer in England. 

The September road trip is planned - except for the last night.  The beginning of next April's adventure is booked, and there is plenty of time to work on the other couple of weeks of it.  

I finished three articles I had promised to do. 

I am settling back into being busy with what I am doing, and that is a good thing. 

Why is the photo above in black and white? Because I bumped the wrong dial on the camera and didn't realize it for about 20 exposures.  

The Sunday Five: Mail Call

1: Do you look at your incoming mail (post) everyday? 

2: Do you have stamps to send mail readily at hand? 

3: Can you remember the last time you received a handwritten letter from a friend of family member? 

4: When was the last time you mailed a letter or card to a family member or friend? 

5: Will postal delivery as we know it, exist in 25 years? 

My answers: 

1: Do you look at your incoming mail (post) everyday?  No, the post arrives in a locked box in the lobby, we pick it up a couple of times a week. 

2: Do you have stamps to send mail readily at hand? Yes, in a ceramic box on my desk. 

3: Can you remember the last time you received a handwritten letter from a friend of family member? A thank you notes from a friend a couple of years ago. 

4: When was the last time you mailed a letter or card to a family member or friend? I always send my sister a birthday card - March. 

5: Will postal delivery as we know it, exist in 25 years?  Package delivery, yes, cards and letters - maybe not.  I am starting to think not. 

Please share your answers in the comments. 

The Saturday Morning Post: Doors and Knockers

Doors keep us in, keep us out, are the portals to what lays beyond. They vary from the mundane and functional, to elaborate works of art.  Knockers and other hardware are functional sculptures. 

Historic preservation in old town Alexandria Virginia was triggered by a door.  The colonial era door and surround from Gadsby's tavern is a masterpiece of colonial architecture.  So nice, that in a remodel of the building, the door and surround were sold to a museum in New England. The loss triggered a move to preserve the historic fabric of the area, after all Gadsby's was a gather place for the founding fathers.  The door was repurchased - restored and much of what remains is there because of the protections in place. (Historic preservation in Savannah Georgia was triggered by a parking garage.) 

Treasury Door, Palace of the Popes Avignon, 

Door Number 1 in Nimes, France