Retirement

[Gregg1100]

Hi All,
Only 3 more days till I never have to drive an articulated truck again. No more slipping and sliding down a ice covered road. No more early or late starts, wondering what time you are going to get home. In short----YIPPEE.
Greg

[Since1982]

I'm assuming you're finishing up a lifetime of day in day out workweeks. I give you 3 years (or less) of forced inactivity(broken by assorted vacations) before you're so bored you're hunting all over the place for some job you can do that will break the daily boredom of inactivity. I've known dozens of friends (including myself) who faced the same problem before getting back on the horse.

A lifetime of work is very hard to quit cold turkey and replace with TV or daily computer poker.

[crfriend]

Greg, while I am sure you will not miss the assorted hazards an BS of the job one bit, I hope you look back on your career with fondness and pride. All in all, it sounds like it's been a good run.

I'll echo what Skip said, though: find something to keep your mind engaged and alert. Sadly, I've seen "retirement" kill a few too many people.

[Gregg1100]

Thanks for replies- appreciated.
I have plenty to do- 1 living and 2 dead Kawasakis to sort out, cambelt to do on my Xantia, concrete shed to re-roof, interior and exterior of house to do, garden. All interupted by periods of skirting. 2 computer courses starting soon.
I walk a fair bit, and if I get tired of the previously mentioned, there always the pub,
Greg

[Gregg1100]

To add,
After 40 years of driving trucks, and with the crowded roads we have here, I am glad to be getting out of a now cutthroat industry. Thankfully, I trained as a motor mechanic when I left school, so that saves me a good pile of drinking vouchers, as I do all my own cars, bikes , etc. Years ago, trucking was far better, with a 'it gets there when it gets there' attitude. Now, with far more vehicles using the same roads, firms are wanting deliveries at a certain time. Whilst this may be achieved mostly, it cannot be certain. If you hear our traffic news on BBC radio 2 via web, the M25 around London is ALWAYS in trouble, even during the night. M6 is another disaster area, closely followed by M4.
Apart from all the bits to do , I will be getting about on my motorbike, calling on people I have not seen for a while. I leave the car at home mostly now, only using it for a big shop and if SWMBO wants to go somewhere. Finding parking is a p i a.
Greg

[ethelthefrog]

I'm a year or two off retirement just yet, but many congratulations on putting in so many productive years. Life is only just beginning...

Paul

[Kirbstone]

Planning one's retirement must make one assumption: that ill health or death doesn't intervene.

I have slated from now a five-year exit plan, which will take me up to age 74, InchAllah. After that it will be more of a sideways carreer move into something else that will be equally absorbing. Inactivity rapidly invites the Grim Reaper, and I don't want to have any converstaions with him anytime soon.

Tom K.

[rick401r]

I took an early retirement, 10 years earlier than I had planned. The company I was with was failing and I stood to lose $90,000 in company stock if I stayed any longer. My plan was to invest the 90K and get another job. That's when the bottom fell out of the job market. So now the money's tied up and I haven't found steady work for 3 years.

[RichardA]

I retired after I damaged my spine in an accident when I was 38, never worked since, now pushing 60 I have never been bored I can always find things to do and project to make.

[DALederle]

I was forced to retire by bad health, far sooner then I had planned. Most of my 401 was used up in emergencies and I am relying on SS to keep my head above water.
If it gets taken away, the way some politicians want to, then I'll be in real trouble.
It isn't what I planned for but what happened!

Dennis A. Lederle
Live Long and Perspire!

[crfriend]

Retirement? Ha! I'll be working until the day I drop because there's no other choice.

I was supposed to be fully vested for pensions from two separate companies until those companies decided they either didn't want to fund the pensions or were criminally mismanaged and imploded. Social Security, as a Ponzi scheme, isn't got to be of any value to me once I reach "retirement age" which, at this point, is likely already beyond my life-expectancy and receding.

So, I'll be working either until I'm dead or until I become unemployable, and if the latter's the case I'll live off my savings until they're used up (no heirs) and then make a fast exit. It's a lovely world, isn't it.

However, what I will not do until the very last moment is wallow in sorrow and lonliness; I intend to remain fully engaged with those around me, to retain my curiosity in things (to the point of wonder -- it's a nice sensation), and to do my level best to keep my mind sharp. It's the least I can do for myself and those around me.