• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Start Here
  • Our YouTube Channel
  • Mile High FI Podcast
  • About Me
  • I ♥ Longmont
    • Cowork In Longmont
    • Live In Longmont
  • Stuff We Like
    • Tesla In Ten Years
  • Best Credit Card Offers
  • Contact
    • Media
    • Guest Post

1500 Days to Freedom

Think different and escape the rat race.

1500 Days to Freedom
  • My Investments! (REAL TIME!)
  • Bucket List
    • Anti Bucket List
  • All Posts
  • Best Posts
  • Guest Post Policy
  • 10 Questions
  • Tesla In Ten Years

Grecian Delights, Dildos And Dinosaurs

October 22, 2018 by Mr. 1500 Days 15 Comments

After a seemingly infinite amount of time in planes and airports, we’re back home from Chautauqua in Greece. I’ll have more to say about the trip later in the week, but for now, you’ll have to settle for some random observations and pretty pictures while I catch up on sleep.

Castle! I had never seen a castle before and didn’t expect to see one for the first time in Greece. But then, boom! There was a castle and it was pretty awesome:

Editor note: The Mad Fientist reminded me in the comments that I had indeed seen a castle before, just last year in Edinburgh. Oopsie.

Photo credit: Big Ox Little Bird

Toilet madness! Yes, I went there. I always go there. Sigh… I had never seen a squatty potty in real life and it was intimidating. I’m not sure I’d have the aim to be able to use one of these effectively. Luckily, I had already done my morning business, so it was a moot issue:

what the???

Another bathroom observation is that showers and toilets both have emergency systems. At first, I didn’t know what this string was. Thinking it was a drying line in the shower, I yanked on it. Twenty seconds later, the front desk was ringing my room.

Ooopsie!

If you have a toilet emergency (no toilet paper? forgot your reading material??), just pull the string from the throne.

Oopsie poopsie!

The ancient Greeks also had their shit figured out:

Cars! No 8-seat, mega-land yachts like in America! Everyone has reasonably sized vehicles:

At a Greek gas station:

Speed limits: In Greece, speed limits are merely suggestions that are ignored by the entire population. I rented a car one day and found myself being tailgated by an angry Grecian. My first thought was that maybe I was going too slow. A quick check of the speedometer showed that I was only going twice the limit. Sorry Greek dude behind me.

Greek beer: The microbrewery trend has yet to come to Greece and the beer choices were suboptimal. By suboptimal, I mean bad:

Krappos

Bucolic towns: We explored small towns in Greece that looked like nothing I’ve ever seen before:

 

Honey, look what I brought you from Greece!

We couldn’t help but notice interesting souvenirs at the airport:

I enjoyed causing mischief with the help of the dinosaurs:

Craig gets dinosaured

Fantastic people: Of course, the best part of these events is the people and Chautauqua didn’t disappoint:

On the right, Alan Donegan of PopUp fame

Kristy from Millennial Revolution and friends

This was an incredible trip. We met lifelong friends who can’t wait to see again. I’ll have more to say later this week. Now, it’s time to sleep.

Join the 10s who have signed up already!

Subscribing will improve your life in incredible ways*.

*Only if your life is pretty bad to begin with.

Thank you!! Please check your email to confirm your subscription.

There was an error submitting your subscription. Please try again.

Powered by ConvertKit

Filed Under: Chautauqua Tagged With: chautauqua, Greece

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. JRobi says

    October 22, 2018 at 5:51 am

    Hahahaha! I had the same driving experience in Ireland a few years ago….welcome back. Get some rest…
    JRobi recently posted…Weekly Retrospective….My Profile

    Reply
  2. freddy smidlap says

    October 22, 2018 at 8:00 am

    dildo is a great word. i call people that all the time. they’re allowed to say it on canadian radio too as they’re more advanced in the great white north. there’s even a town by that name in newfoundland. i even had a boss once who turned it into an adjective. i.e. “so and so was acting very dildonic.” stupid dildonic dildos. that’s all i got. that was some suboptimal commentary on my part.
    freddy smidlap recently posted…Why You Should Review Your Paycheck StubMy Profile

    Reply
    • Mr. 1500 Days says

      October 22, 2018 at 5:37 pm

      Suboptimal, no way! I didn’t realize that I had a reader well versed in the way of the dildo!

      Reply
  3. Mr. Tako says

    October 22, 2018 at 10:34 am

    Ah! Toilet and penis humor… exactly why I keep coming back to this blog! 🙂

    Haha! Looks like you had a good time Carl. Although it’s kinda surprised the beer was so bad.

    Reply
    • Team CF says

      October 23, 2018 at 12:34 am

      Haha, I was thinking the same. Not many bloggers can put the word dildo in a blog title and get away with it.
      Nice one again Carl, seems like you had a blast!

      Reply
  4. Max says

    October 25, 2018 at 7:44 am

    Can you caption the photos with people’s online personas so we can check out their blogs too?

    Reply
    • Mr. 1500 Days says

      October 25, 2018 at 9:59 am

      Done!

      Reply
  5. Arrgo says

    October 25, 2018 at 9:12 am

    I think that castle could use some of your fix-up skills. What no Gyro flavored beer?

    Reply
    • Mr. 1500 Days says

      October 25, 2018 at 10:00 am

      I offered to put some vinyl siding on it, but they turned me down.

      Gyro beer? That couldn’t have been worse than what we had…

      Reply
  6. Mad Fientist says

    October 26, 2018 at 10:41 am

    Dude, remember this guy?!? ——> https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edinburgh_Castle

    Reply
    • Mrs Chaos says

      October 30, 2018 at 1:38 am

      Errrmmm – Mr 1500, did you visit Scotland and FORGET you saw a castle? The poxy Greeks have nothing on the Scots. Just saying.

      Laughed out loud at your ‘comfort zones’ btw.
      Mrs Chaos recently posted…The Reluctant Chautauquan : 10 Weird Things I Learnt About a ChautauquaMy Profile

      Reply
  7. Mike Preper says

    November 2, 2018 at 9:40 am

    Did someone same dildos? Interesting pictures, adventure and read. I am impressed by this grecian delight!

    Reply
  8. The Other Carl says

    November 6, 2018 at 7:40 am

    Hellenic Beer? Sounds more like Hell Beer. Hope you all make it to Gainesville for Camp Fi in January. Much good beer to be found here!

    Reply
    • Mr. 1500 Days says

      November 6, 2018 at 9:05 am

      I will be in Florida for week 1. You?

      Reply
      • The Other Carl (FIRE Ready Aim) says

        November 7, 2018 at 12:30 pm

        Unless something is going on crazy at home with the then one month old, I’ll be there with bells on.

        Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

CommentLuv badgeShow more posts

Primary Sidebar

Follow Us!

Follow Us on FacebookFollow Us on TwitterFollow Us on RSSFollow Us on Instagram

Freedom!

My goal was to build a portfolio of $1,000,000 by February of 2017; 1500 days from the birth of this blog (January 1, 2013). And hey look, I’ve since retired!

Investments only (primary home excluded)
1/1/13 (The Start): $586,043
1/1/14 (1 Yr Later): $869,635
1/1/15 (2 Yrs Later): $987,351
1/1/16 (3 Yrs Later): $1,057,961
1/1/17 (4 Yrs Later): $1,257,128
1/1/18 (5 Yrs Later): $1,527,701
1/1/19 (6 Yrs Later): $1,549,440
1/1/20 (7 Yrs Later): $2,035,040*
1/1/21 (8 Yrs Later): $3,379,746**
1/1/22 (9 Yrs Later): $4,762,642
1/1/23 (10 Yrs Later): $3,112,821

2023: Investments only
1/1: $3,112,821
2/1: $3,582,368
3/1: $3,716,852
4/1: $3,861,599
5/1: $3,694,445
6/1: $4,089,141
7/1: $4,384,858
8/1: $4,539,865
9/1: $4,468,622

Gains: $1,355,801

Overall
Gains since 1/1/2013: $3,882,579
Net worth***: $4,698,622

* The big jump between 2019 and 2020 was partly because we bought another home, but kept the previous (much more expensive) one as a rental. We have since sold it.

** Tesla.

*** Includes our primary home equity in addition to our investment portfolio.

Finally, we still have about $290,000 in mortgage debt (which I love!). No regrets about the debts!

Featured in

Smiley face

Disclaimer

Investing is risky business. The information contained on this site is for informational purposes only. As with all matters financial, proceed with caution. Do your research and seek professional advice.

Get my annoying emails!

Join 1500 Days! (now 27% less annoying)

Subscribe to get great good pretty ok content by email.

Thanks so much! Check your email to confirm your subscription.

There was an error submitting your subscription. Please try again.

Powered by ConvertKit

All Posts

Read all the posts ever published to 1500 Days of Freedom.

© 2023 1500 Days to Freedom · Privacy Policy · Contact