Race from 250 to 500k!

[CdnChris]

First post in this thread!
March 1st: $271,698.51

Have had a great savings rate for the last year. At the beginning of 2016 we were aiming for 50K in savings for the year, thought an extreme goal was 100K and exceeded that target. Do not think we will be able to repeat this ; lots of work hours last year and family and I need a break. Planning for over $300K net worth by the end of the year (again, what we thought was a stretch target last year).

Happy to be here, and wondering (hoping?) if this is the last thread we are in prior to FIRE.

Wow! Great job!

Are you planning on FIRE with less than 500k?

Sent from my SM-G935T using Tapatalk

No, 500k is the target we set last year. We may not be able to live off the investments alone at that point but it seems to us we would be comfortable with just a minimal amount of work for pay at that point plus the investment income.

Since 2009 we have worked part time (with the exception of this last year) while we home schooled our kids and built our home. We are used to working part time and once our kids are through university plan to have fairly minimal expenses.

[FIreDrill]

First post in this thread!
March 1st: $271,698.51

Have had a great savings rate for the last year. At the beginning of 2016 we were aiming for 50K in savings for the year, thought an extreme goal was 100K and exceeded that target. Do not think we will be able to repeat this ; lots of work hours last year and family and I need a break. Planning for over $300K net worth by the end of the year (again, what we thought was a stretch target last year).

Happy to be here, and wondering (hoping?) if this is the last thread we are in prior to FIRE.

Wow! Great job!

Are you planning on FIRE with less than 500k?

Sent from my SM-G935T using Tapatalk

No, 500k is the target we set last year. We may not be able to live off the investments alone at that point but it seems to us we would be comfortable with just a minimal amount of work for pay at that point plus the investment income.

Since 2009 we have worked part time (with the exception of this last year) while we home schooled our kids and built our home. We are used to working part time and once our kids are through university plan to have fairly minimal expenses.

Working part time would be my ideal situation.  Certain types of work bring me happiness but only to a certain extent.  I.E. 20 hours of meaningful work a week brings more happiness than a 40 hour full time gig making more money.

I see myself eventually FIREing into part time work that is fulfilling and maybe even bringing in enough income to live off of so I can then just watch my investments grow.  Who knows.

Sent from my SM-G935F using Tapatalk

[Shelley]

I'm joining in. Thought we were in the race to 250k group till my husband double checked his retirement fund and realized it was over $90,000 more than we remembered. Feels like we made a hundred grand overnight! I am including home equity. We will be going up for the next 14 months then will drop back when we pay our horrid end of car lease balloon. Then hopefully we will just go up and up.

March 2017: $331,934.34

[dandypandys]

I'm joining in. Thought we were in the race to 250k group till my husband double checked his retirement dfund arnd realized it was over $90,000 more than we remembered. Feels like we made a hundred grand overnight! I am including home equity. We will be going up for the next 14 months then will drop back when we pay our horrid end of car lease balloon. Then hopefully we will just go up and up.

March 2017: $331,934.34

high five! :)

[RWD]

12/1/2015 - 248k
6/1/2016 - 301k
10/1/2016 - 352k
11/1/2016 - 353k
12/1/2016 - 368k
1/1/2017 - 380k
2/1/2017 - 391k
3/1/2017 - 412k

At the rate we're going it's looking like we'll hit $500k at the end of the year or early next year.

[2Birds1Stone]

1/1/2017 - $256,000
2/1/2017 - $265,000
3/1/2017 - $278,000

Looks like this month will be flat -_-

[OurTown]

Yup, my March may be flat-ish but mostly because we are having some work done on the house.

[babystache89]

I'm furnishing an entire (small) house from scratch (and adding a fence and a deck outside, painting, etc.), so it'll probably be a slightly negative month for me. :/  But yay first house with adult-y furniture! I finally understand the appeal of Pinterest.

[tightwaddy]

March update:

Invested (& Investable)
April 9, 2016:  $319,737
May 6, 2016: $325,093
June 8, 2016: $332,224
July 11, 2016:$337,287
August 8, 2016: $341,304
February 9, 2017: $361,822
March 11, 2017: $368,914


Net Worth (Including Home Equity per Zillow)
April 9, 2016:  $619,505
May 6, 2016: $629,924
June 8, 2016: $645,682
July 11, 2016: $687,219
August 8, 2016: $695,238
February 9, 2017: $735,811
March 11, 2017: $745,350

[CdnChris]

Hmmm ... got a little confused on the post I made earlier. Those numbers were for January, not February ... I have been slow getting the numbers done at the end of the month and was over a month behind. Regardless, the graph was right, just not the date in the post.

• February 1st: $271,698.51
• March 1st: $298,326.11

Work hours have finally slowed down, which has been nice.
A significant milestone this month, we are fully invested as far as RRSP's and TFSA's! This means looking at taxable investment accounts very soon, not something I've thought too much about.

Love the post about having more invested than you remembered, like a paid-for lottery win!

[TheFirstMan]

I feel like I've found my people!

I'm in the Investable Assets crowd, at 249K as we start 2016.

I will play the tortoise here (or perhaps Eeyore) with a goal of about 4 years from now, in 2020.

Over on the long-term net worth goals thread, I just posted about some of my variables, include pessimistic estimates about spending and income, inflation, and a possible home addition. That's why I'm giving a longer time horizon. If the market is reasonable, and our spending and income are more in my optimistic zone, and we don't do a home addition, the time frame shortens to about 2 years, in 2018.

And that, friends, is motivational. Thanks!

One final thing--some helpful info could be added in here, as we go on this journey together--context like I've shared here, as well as incomes, as those of us who are making 40K shouldn't compare with those making 120K!

I'm married and our combined income in 2015 was 80K. In 2016, it should be close to 120K gross.

Edit 2/18/16: 395K when you add in home equity.

UPDATE MID-2016

Alright, making progress!

Pulled 65K of home equity and still planning on the addition. Currently...

- Cash: 152K (This is high because of the possibility of an addition.)
- Investments: 217K
    - "Investible Assets" (Cash+Investments) 369K (This is up 120K, but 65K was from home equity, so actual increase here in 6 mos is 55K.)

- Home equity 52K
- Total net worth, including equity: 421K (This is up 26K in 5 months.)

- Mortgage: 203K

-Total net worth minus mortgage: 218K

This feels like really great progress, considering VTSAX (as a proxy for the economy) is only up 3.65% YTD.

Needing to update a bit here...we are halfway through an addition, and our income situation changed.

Today:

Cash and liquid accounts: 80K. Of this, home addition and other capital projects are 37K+8K+10K = 55K, leaving 25K actually.

Investments: 293K

Cash + Investments = 318K "investible"

With new savings goal of 5K/month (conservative) and a real rate of return of 3% (also conservative), I estimate...

Future:

01/01/18...365K
01/01/19...436K
01/01/20...509K...so Christmas 2019 is when I plan to graduate from here to the race to a million topic, barring huge market drops (which I expect)
01/01/21...584K
01/01/22...662K
01/01/23...741K
01/01/24...824K

[Rife]

Post annual bonus:

Jan 2017: $305,000
Mar 2017: $340,000

[YoungGranny]

Starting 10/2016 - $310,000 (rough estimate since we still have a few accounts left to be merged)
11/2016 - $328k
12/2016- $347k
1/2017 $358.7k

3/2017 - $367.2

Pretty disappointed with that increase over two months since our returns on investments have been good which means our savings rate has fallen off a bit. We've recently re-committed to increasing our savings rate and I'm ready to watch our net worth grow!

[TheAnonOne]

Starting 10/2016 - $310,000 (rough estimate since we still have a few accounts left to be merged)
11/2016 - $328k
12/2016- $347k
1/2017 $358.7k

3/2017 - $367.2

Pretty disappointed with that increase over two months since our returns on investments have been good which means our savings rate has fallen off a bit. We've recently re-committed to increasing our savings rate and I'm ready to watch our net worth grow!

Last November you had 328k

Your pushing 370k now. Id say 40k+ in that time zone sounds pretty badass to me!

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[YoungGranny]

Starting 10/2016 - $310,000 (rough estimate since we still have a few accounts left to be merged)
11/2016 - $328k
12/2016- $347k
1/2017 $358.7k

3/2017 - $367.2

Pretty disappointed with that increase over two months since our returns on investments have been good which means our savings rate has fallen off a bit. We've recently re-committed to increasing our savings rate and I'm ready to watch our net worth grow!

Last November you had 328k

Your pushing 370k now. Id say 40k+ in that time zone sounds pretty badass to me!

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Sorry should have been more specific. More upset about the January to March increase of $9k since I'm reporting later in the month so that's almost 2.5 months which is far lower than our goal savings rate. We've been on a very good track over the past few years but the last 2 months we've fallen off hard. Just trying to get back on the 40k increase train so I can continue to feel like a badass lol

[Tyson]

Today is my birthday, turned 45, AND we just hit $300k in liquid net worth!!  Woot!

[Tjat]

Roughly a year later with some better than expected progress, due mainly to stock performance and income.

Invested Assets
10/1/2015: $252K
4/1/2016: $284K
3/1/2017: 381K

Net Worth (w/ Home Equity)
8/1/2014: $250K
4/1/2016: $393K
3/1/2017: 538K

[JustGettingStarted1980]

Congrats Tjat!

[SAfAmBrit]

Hoping to be at $500,000 in 08/2018.

July 2016 - $257,306
August 2016 - $264,625
September 2016 - $270,695
October 2016 - $283528
November 2016 - $291396
December 2016 - $295603
January 2017 - $303,195
March 2017 - $333,323

Hoping for $400,000 by December 2017. 401k match, tax return and bonus all helped this 2 month jump.

[OurTown]

I may go backwards this month, just dropped 10 grand on home renovations.

[caracarn]

1/1/2015 - $319,018
3/31/2015 - $358,647
6/30/2015 - $350,887
9/30/2015 - $329,044
12/31/2015 - $340,246
3/31/2016 - $390,030
6/30/2016 - $408.983
9/1/2016 - $447,834
12/31/2016 - $459,043
3/31/2017 - $509,618

Crossed over to the other side about 3/10 and so far have not looked back!  Really amazing how quickly we've moved since 2015.  We've been blessed beyond measure with things that have helped us keep moving forward even through an unexpected job change etc. 

I do keep things in perspective however in that with regards to FIRE a lot of our savings have been for college for the kids and we also have added a lot to savings for upcoming summer vacation in July so we will have a drop then, but hoping to still stay above $500K going forward.  Feels good to be here and now for the next milestone!

[RWD]

3/31/2017 - $509,618

Congrats!

[JJ-]

Jan 2017  $275k
Feb 2017  $287k $???

I guess this is where all the numbers start to go up faster? All NW is investment/cash.

Mar 2017 $276k

I discovered that the random bump was mint double counting a shared account I had marked as closed after a recharacterization.

We have a tax bill for the state coming in at $1k this year, $26 only for fed though. Check's in the mail...

[babystache89]

9/1/16: $217,000
10/1/16: $220,000
11/1/16: $232,000
12/1/16: $234,500
1/1/17: $238,500
2/1/17: $245,000
3/1/17: $254,000
4/1/17: $252,000

First negative month since I've started tracking but I paid property taxes for all of my rental properties, furnished my first house, and attended a couple of weddings abroad, so I'm not too upset about it.

However, attending bachelorette parties and weddings all over the world is destroying my budget - has anyone figured out a way to minimize these expenses (expensive bridesmaid dresses, bride's expensive preferred hotels, bottle service etc. at bachelorette parties) without hurting friends' feelings? Most of my friends have high salaries and know I do also, so I can't really say I can't afford to attend - and, of course, I love my friends and want to be there for them. I guess this is just part of being in your late 20s?

[Morning Glory]

Jan 1: 236,254
Feb 1: 250,055
Mar 1: 262,196

April 1: 269,959

Hit 270 yesterday but then something must have cleared. Market growth has slowed but I am maintaining a great savings rate. Got a bunch of dividends at the end of March which helped.

Side gig ends this month but I should keep getting checks through the end of May. Plan is to max my Roth and start on hubby's Roth before this, then savings rate will be much slower for the summer.

I have a bit less than 2k coming in a tax return that will go straight to savings in April.

[JustGettingStarted1980]

9/1/16: $217,000
10/1/16: $220,000
11/1/16: $232,000
12/1/16: $234,500
1/1/17: $238,500
2/1/17: $245,000
3/1/17: $254,000
4/1/17: $252,000

First negative month since I've started tracking but I paid property taxes for all of my rental properties, furnished my first house, and attended a couple of weddings abroad, so I'm not too upset about it.

However, attending bachelorette parties and weddings all over the world is destroying my budget - has anyone figured out a way to minimize these expenses (expensive bridesmaid dresses, bride's expensive preferred hotels, bottle service etc. at bachelorette parties) without hurting friends' feelings? Most of my friends have high salaries and know I do also, so I can't really say I can't afford to attend - and, of course, I love my friends and want to be there for them. I guess this is just part of being in your late 20s?

My wife and I went to about a dozen destination weddings in our late 20's. Costa Rica, Mexico, Dominican, Brazil, Manhattan, San Francisco...you name it, we made it there. Despite my current mustachian ways, I don't regret even one of those trips.  You only have so many great friends in your life, enjoy them!

What we did do, however, at the time, is stay at the less pricey hotel, a couple blocks from the beach, or not do every excursion we wanted, or avoid one or two of the super late nights.  These trips usually have a floor cost, but the ceiling is what you want to avoid. Bottle service? You mean take a bottle of tequila to the beach to watch the sunrise? Yup -did that!

JGS

[JustGettingStarted1980]

Anyone know anyone getting married in Havana? I need an excuse to get down there!

[JustGettingStarted1980]

April-15     $133,400.00 (+23,993)
July-15   $179,961.40 (+46,561)
Oct-15      $207,727.22 (+27,765)
Jan-16      $257,514.77 (+49,787)
April-16    $277,918.06 (+20,403)
July-16     $306,073.47 (+28,155)
Oct -16     $357,689.04 (+53,415)
Jan -17     $405,710.23 (+48,021)
April -17   $446,004.04 (+39,424) ---> outside shot of breaking 500K by mid-year!!!

JGS

[garth]

Brutal month for net worth due to our highest spending ever (why did we buy a house again?). Investments passed $350k for the first time. If we don't get a downturn, I'm still expecting to graduate into the next thread this year. If we make it by Nov 1st, that's nearly 2 years to the day to go from $250k to $500k.

Nov 15: $255k
Dec 15: $256k
Jan 16: $241k
Feb 16: $255k
Mar 16: $277k
Apr 16: $290k
May 16: $294k
Jun 16: $305k
Jul 16: $330k
Aug 16: $336k
Sept 16: $345k
Oct 16: $351k
Nov 16: $363k
Dec 16: $376k
Jan 17: $387k
Feb 17: $404k
Mar 17: $408k

[skip207]

1/1/16 = £288,240
1/1/17 = £374,668
1/2/17 = £388,289
1/3/17 = £386,895
1/4/17 = £400,066

Good progress hope it continues!

[jorjor]

Cash & invested / including home equity:
Nov 15: $165k / $236k
Dec 15: $162k / $257k
Jan 16: $152k / $259k
Feb 16: $166k / $275k
Mar 16: $185k / $295k
Apr 16: $192k / $305k
May 16: $201k/ $315k
Jun 16: $204k / $320k
Jul 16: $221k / $339k
Aug 16: $227k / $347k
Sep 16: $230k / $352k
Oct 16: $234k / $357k
Nov 16: $242k / $367k
Dec 16: $276k / $403k
Jan 17: $289k / $419k
Feb 17: $317k / $448k
Mar 17: $328k / $460k

March increase really should have been higher. We got a bit spendy to do a few things we wanted to do since our baby is due at the end of April. Got a mid-year bonus that propped it up.

We're very excited for that! The next couple months may very well be negative though. Hospital bills, then wife is off for a few months on unpaid maternity, and we're replacing windows in the house after putting it off long enough (they are originals from a mid-50s build). We've built up some extra cash ahead of time to deal with those things so not really concerned, but being realistic about net worth growth for the next couple of months.

[babystache89]

9/1/16: $217,000
10/1/16: $220,000
11/1/16: $232,000
12/1/16: $234,500
1/1/17: $238,500
2/1/17: $245,000
3/1/17: $254,000
4/1/17: $252,000

First negative month since I've started tracking but I paid property taxes for all of my rental properties, furnished my first house, and attended a couple of weddings abroad, so I'm not too upset about it.

However, attending bachelorette parties and weddings all over the world is destroying my budget - has anyone figured out a way to minimize these expenses (expensive bridesmaid dresses, bride's expensive preferred hotels, bottle service etc. at bachelorette parties) without hurting friends' feelings? Most of my friends have high salaries and know I do also, so I can't really say I can't afford to attend - and, of course, I love my friends and want to be there for them. I guess this is just part of being in your late 20s?

My wife and I went to about a dozen destination weddings in our late 20's. Costa Rica, Mexico, Dominican, Brazil, Manhattan, San Francisco...you name it, we made it there. Despite my current mustachian ways, I don't regret even one of those trips.  You only have so many great friends in your life, enjoy them!

What we did do, however, at the time, is stay at the less pricey hotel, a couple blocks from the beach, or not do every excursion we wanted, or avoid one or two of the super late nights.  These trips usually have a floor cost, but the ceiling is what you want to avoid. Bottle service? You mean take a bottle of tequila to the beach to watch the sunrise? Yup -did that!

JGS

That's good to know! Thanks for the advice. :)

[2Birds1Stone]

1/1/2017 - $256,000
2/1/2017 - $265,000
3/1/2017 - $278,000
4/1/2017 - $282,000

SO and I combined, just cracked $349k as well.

[YellowCat]

Dec 2014: $190,811
Mar 2015: $238,653 (+$47,842)
Jun 2015: $262,010 (+$23,357)
Sep 2015: $276,420 (+$14,410)
Dec 2015: $310,350 (+$33,930)
Jan 2016: $307,436 (-$2,914)
Feb 2016: $315,430 (+$7,994)
Mar 2016: $340,739 (+$25,309)
Apr 2016: $356,946 (+$16,207)
May 2016: $370,408 (+$13,462)
Jun 2016: $377,258 (+$6,850)
Jul 2016: $397,978 (+$20,720)
Aug 2016: $403,403 (+$5,425)
Jan 2017: $444,411 (+$41,008)
Feb 2017: $466,365 (+$21,954)
Mar 2017: $473,859 (+$7,494)

The March increase isn't as high as I had hoped, but we're getting our bonuses in April so hopefully we'll see a hefty increase this month. Household NW is up ~$48k since December 31, 2016, which is nothing to be ashamed of! I suppose it's somewhat unlikely to assume that trend will hold for the rest of the year, though...

[kapnfriday]

8-2016: $369,217
9-2016: $373,735 (+$4.5k)
10-2016: $369,721 (-$4.0k)
11-2016: $385,057 (+$15.3k)
12-2016: $399,209 (+$14.1k)
1-2017: $408,813 (+$9.6k)
2-2017: $427,041 (+$18.2k)
3-2017: $425,204 (-$1.8k)

We've started paying down the mortgage on the 2nd home and I took out about $4,300 from a taxable account to contribute to that effort, so I figured we'd see a drop this month.  Not bad though considering.

[TheAnonOne]

Coming back to update...

2015 DEC	:	252k
-	-
2016 JAN	:	260k	(+8k)
2016 FEB	:	281k	(+21k)
2016 MAR	:	285k	(+4k)
2016 APR	:	298k	(+13k)
2016 MAY	:	305k	(+7k)
2016 JUN	:	307k	(+2k)
2016 JUL	:	320k	(+13k)
2016 AUG	:	326k	(+6k)
2016 SEP	:	336k	(+10k)
2016 OCT	:	337k	(+1k)
2016 NOV	:	361k	(+24k)
2016 DEC	:	368k	(+7k)
-	-
2017 JAN	:	382k	(+14k)
2017 FEB	:	403k	(+21k)
2017 MAR	:	416k	(+13k)

+$48k this year! Aiming, for just under 100k in any given year of savings. Though, I am really only tracking worth gains, not savings directly. (So it includes gains/losses in the market) Given 9 month(s) left, and (52k) more to go, I should hit this goal!

My 401k and both IRAs all maxed.

Wife's 401k needs to be maxed over a 12m period. HSA set to max as well by years end.




Sent from my SM-G935T using Tapatalk

[FIreDrill]

Q1 update below.  It was a pretty good couple months, I'm hoping we can keep the momentum going into Q2!


End Of
2014-Q1:                $55,471
2014-Q2:                $78,319            (+22,848)
2014-Q3:                $84,251            (+5,932)
2014-Q4:                $106,801          (+22,550)
2015-Q1:                $126,464          (+19,663)
2015-Q2:                $145,996          (+19,532)
2015-Q3:                $151,957          (+5,961)
2015-Q4:                $203,486          (+51,529)
2016-Q1:                $217,931          (+14,445)
2016-Q2:                $233,784          (+15,853)
2016-Q3:                $255,000          (+21,216)
2016-Q4:                $276,375          (+21,375)
2017-Q1:                $306,936          (+30,561)


Current:                  $306,936

[OurTown]

Jan. 1, 2017 = 461
Feb. 1, 2017 = 471
Mar. 1, 2017 = 482
Apr. 1, 2017 = 479

[dandypandys]

 2015- 2016

Spoiler: show

    Jan 1st: 98,437.97
    Feb 1st: $96,898.03
    Mar 1st: $103,345.54
    Apr 1st: $103,819.64
    May 1st $105,766.12
    Jun 1st $106,565.54
    Jul 1st: $105,252.33
    Aug 1st: $106,267.37
    Sept 1st: $99,122.12
    Oct 1st: $99,291.91
    Nov 1st: $105,204.00
    Dec 1st : $107,535.51

    2016
    Jan 1st:$104,592.84
    Feb 1st: $99,467.66
    March 1st:$101, 189.11
    April 1st: $107,119.81
    May 1st: $107,369.22
    June 1st: $110,836.03  my contributions went up this month to 10%
    July 1st: $112,327.7
    Aug 1st: $116,833.52  upped contributions to 10.5%
    Sept 1st: $118,564.37
    Oct 1st   $229,717.00 Paid off the condo this month :) and included as an asset going forth.
    Nov 1st  $232,973 upped contributions again this month 21.5%- next month will be 30% :)
    Dec 1st $237,953.93   

2017
Jan 1st: 252k
Feb 1st: 257k
Mar 1st: 269k    (4k back in taxes :)
April 1st: 273k
[/quote]

[RWD]

Graph of everyone's progress in one messy line chart:

[FIreDrill]

Nice graph RWD!

Sent from my SM-G935F using Tapatalk

[RWD]

Nice graph RWD!

Thanks! It took longer than I expected/hoped to go through all 12 pages of this thread.

I left out users that only posted one number. And I offset users that started above $250k (by one month per $10k).

[FIreDrill]

Nice graph RWD!

Thanks! It took longer than I expected/hoped to go through all 12 pages of this thread.

I left out users that only posted one number. And I offset users that started above $250k (by one month per $10k).

Nice work!   It's nice to see that my trajectory is on par with other mustachians. :)

[OurTown]

Awesome graph.  Everyone is on a rapid upward trajectory.

[boarder42]

pretty sure i'm there just waiting on my company share price to report which will be next wednesday and effective jan 1.  so when that happens we'll be good to go

[RWD]

Just playing around with statistics...

The average increase for users in this thread is $10,165/month with a standard deviation of $5,529. The users that started between $240k and $260k that have broken $500k have averaged 22.8 months in this race. Minimum time was 14 months.

[FIreDrill]

Just playing around with statistics...

The average increase for users in this thread is $10,165/month with a standard deviation of $5,529. The users that started between $240k and $260k that have broken $500k have averaged 22.8 months in this race. Minimum time was 14 months.

Damn, what a badass group!

[RWD]

Just playing around with statistics...

The average increase for users in this thread is $10,165/month with a standard deviation of $5,529. The users that started between $240k and $260k that have broken $500k have averaged 22.8 months in this race. Minimum time was 14 months.

Interesting! So far I'm 14 months in, averaging $6,862/month, or ~36 month rate to hit 250k. Not the leader of the pack :-P

According to my spreadsheet your rate is ranked 37th out of 55 users. Though there are a few users with only a couple data points that might be skewing the data a bit.

[CdnChris]

• February 1st: $271,698.51
• March 1st: $298,326.11
• April 1st: $307,087.83

Awesome graph showing everybody's progress, would love to hit 500k in two years.

[JustGettingStarted1980]

Graph of everyone's progress in one messy line chart:

So is that RWD that is second in the badassity graph? Thanks for the graph, it's very enjoyable to grog.

Who's first (is that Baby Stache or the Turtle?)

My "differentiation of various tones of blue ability" is a bit limited, but I think I'm 7th or 8th from the left. I think this is a good thing.

JGS