EXPLORATION 5- MORGAN DEWITT

The article I read on Mr. Money Mustache gave 50 examples that can potentially produce an income of over $50,000 a year without a college degree.  I really enjoyed the article because it was interesting to see what kind of job you can get right out of high school without any student loans or strings attached. It did not convince me to drop out of college and try to become wealthy though. Most of the jobs sounded really unreliable and like things I'm of doing. For example, there is no way you'll catch me dead doing carpentry or plumbing work, it's just not my thing,. Mr. Money Mustache listed other things that did not require much physical labor but did require a lot of creativity, such as a Techno Music Composer or a Passive Income Guru. Both of those options still seem silly and almost impossible to me, but it would super cool to see someone prove me wrong. Right now, I'd just like to stay in school and receive a degree and hope it gets me somewhere.
You can see the full list of jobs here: http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2013/07/25/50-jobs-over-50000-without-a-degree-part-1/

The website I find myself using a lot is www.natgeo.com. My major is Environmental Policy so that might be part of the reason, but there is also a lot of cool stuff on there that I can everybody would like. You can find anything and everything on there, videos, photos, articles, quizzes, anything your heart desires. Anything and everything that has to do with the Natural Environment is on Nat Geo!

Nat Geo shares a picture everyday with it's viewers. This is from today's Picture of the Day.

"Dreamscape

Photograph by Tugo Cheng

In the northern slopes of the Tian Shan Mountains in China, a river carves its way through a canyon. The Earth’s rocky layers are eroded by wind and water and exposed, transforming the landscape into these colorful terraces."

Exploration 5 - Eli Kuntupis

The blog I read was "Haters Gonna Hate (but not Mate)". The article was about how he was recently critiqued by The New York Times. "Mr. Money. Mustache" offered a very interesting argument for why people hate on others. He claims that its human nature to hate on those above us so the person that is hating can raise their own social status. He uses some humor which made me feel that the paper was more relatable and laid back.

The website/article I recommend is a website called Fivethirtyeight.com. Theres a particular article that I've read recently that is relevant currently in the world of politics. The article is http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-to-evaluate-the-economic-records-of-governors-who-want-to-be-president/

This article talks about the recent politicians that have claimed to have boosted their state's economy. However this article takes a deeper look to analyze wether or not these claims are true. This website is very helpful to educate yourself more upon current global issues and i would recommend it to anybody that is looking for interesting viewpoints on current issues regardless of where they stand on the issue.

Exploration 5- Jack Ryan

   

The article that I read was How Rich are You? Find your Net Worth, Spending, and Savings Rate.  The whole point of this article is to show people a rather simple way on how to calculate how much they make, how much they should save and their overall net worth, or how much a person is worth based on income and assets.  I felt that this article was very strong in conveying the purpose that it was going for.  It very easily shows you how to do all these calculations by first explaining them then showing them in a picture like this one. 

   Joe’s Net Worth

Ownership of the Condo: $580,000 – $460,000 = $120,000
Retirement accounts (401(k) + IRA): $50,000+27,300 = $77,300
Student loans, car loan, and credit cards: $-90,000 + $-43,000 + $-8,000 = $-141,000

Total Net Worth: $120k + $77.3k – $141k = $56,300

Where most people may get turned off by this however is simply having to do it.  It can be rather annoying having to go through and find every little thing that you spend money on.  But I firmly feel that it can be well worth it for anyone who wants to get ahead on their finances.
http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2015/01/26/calculating-net-worth/

A website that I go to a lot for information is YouTube in particular there is a channel I watch called SmarterEveryDay.  The channel is run by a guy named Destin and what he does is takes things that we see everyday and explains the science  behind them for example he has a video that looks at why bugs are attracted to light.  What is really cool about his channel is that he takes what seems to be really complicated problems and explains them in a way that anyone can understand.  All of his videos are fun to watch and you will most learn something new by watching a few of them.

https://www.youtube.com/user/destinws2

Exploration Five: By Darrin Warwick

      The main point of this article is to show you there are other ways to haul your things when moving especially if it is a relatively close distance.  Mr. Money Mustache is talking about moving from his old house into a new one that is about three miles away and instead of using his gas hog mini van he decides to buy a bike trailer.  Though it cost him seven hundred ninety six dollars for the trailer he saved on gas from driving back and forth a few miles away.  He explains in detail about the things he was moving like a stove and his gas barbeque grill and how easy it was to get from his old house to the new one.  For things that are smaller he suggested using a piece of plywood to line the bottom of the trailer so it had support.
      I think this is a really well done article because he explains in detail about how to be efficient when moving your things from place to place.  There is a section where he is talking about the way the hitch hooks up to the bike and how much of a pain it is to change so he gives solutions to the problem.  He is very detailed and covers a lot of things that you might experience if you were to use this idea.  He goes as far as showing pictures of what he was doing with the hitch so it is a very good guide on how to fix it. 
      This article is very useful because he makes you think outside of the box and explore other modes of transportation.  The article gets you thinking of other ways you could move your things instead of a huge uhaul that is a gas hog and costs a lot of money.  I would of never thought of buying a bike trailer to move things its just not something you think about in your daily life I guess.  You could look up different articles that are similar to this one and possibly save a lot of money moving by doing something that isn't the everyday standard you are use to.  The pictures and in depth analysis really help make this article useful if you have a question he covers it more than likely.


     The website that I recommend checking out is   https://www.amazon.com/gp/gw/ajax/s.html this site has everything you need and more. I buy most of my school books on here its just so easy and nice to not have to spend a fortune on the schools overpriced books.  I am never on the internet so this is about the only site I ever use. 

       

Exploration Five from Natalee Christman

     The article that I read from Mr. Money Mustache was The 100% Off Black Friday Sale. I chose this article for two reasons one, was because I enjoy shopping and the second was because I love the Holiday season. The article opens up talking about how the retailers want to just take the shoppers money and how people should not be spending money especially when they are off work during the Holiday season. As the article goes on it begins to talk about traditions that the Mr. Money Mustache Family participates in. Mr. Money's Family believes "A simpler Christmas is a Grander Christmas" and the family does not buy a simple gift.  Mr. Money makes sure his readers know in this article that it is not necessary to buy gifts to have a traditional Christmas. He also goes into detail on some of his family's traditions that they do not only around the holidays but also events they do all year round to save money. The strength of this article is that it shows people that they can do fun activities with their families that do not cost anything and this is helpful because there are too many people in this country who go into severe debt by over spending. The weakness of this article is it is giving very radical ideas for Christmas. I know in my family it has become an expectation that we give gifts to each other as I know it is this way in most families. Mr. Money Mustache says to stop giving gifts all together that were bought, I know that this is something my family would struggle with because I know my mom would rather have something she wanted and not a painting I made that she has no use for. The painting might have more special meaning but the cook book I give her would be useful. Overall this article is insightful for somebody who is looking for a way to not spend a dime during the Holiday season
     A channel that I have used in the past is markcrilley and he does tutorials on how to draw all different things. I used this channel in the past because I took a drawing class in high school and I was not very good at drawing. I still use it today because I enjoy drawing now, thanks to this channel, and it could help me in the future if I ever take another drawing class.

http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2013/11/28/8740/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZ9Hpp8JygI

Exploration 5 by Catelyn Millet

The article that I decided to review was "Weekend Edition: Health = Wealth. Mr. Money Mustache discusses how he overcame a topic in a magazine about the world's top billionaires. When looking at this list, he realized they all had something in common as a group, their health. They were not in good shape. Mr. Money Mustache later discusses how it is easier for the majority of us to become healthy instead of becoming a billionaire, but people still continue to spend more time focusing on money instead of their health. He tries to inspire us by showing a picture of a 74 year old woman that is a body builder. He not only talks about us becoming healthy but he puts himself in the discussion too. He explains that he just has excuses for not being healthy. Toward the end of the article, Mr. Money Mustache gives examples of what we can do to get on track of being healthier, from eating differently to just exercising when the opportunity is thrown in your face, such as walking or riding a bike instead of driving. We can save money on gas by making the choice to walk or ride a bike.
I think this article had multiple positive things about it. He grabs our attention in the beginning by talking about how the billionaires all had something in common then goes into asking his audience what life style they'd rather choose. I like how he gave examples of what changes we could make to get on track of being healthier. He does not only care about himself, but he cares about everyone. He wants everyone to experience health and happiness. I personally didn't think there were any weaknesses to this article. He did an excellent job of getting his point across to his audience.

http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2011/06/11/weekend-edition-health-wealth/


The website that I chose is one that my dad introduced me to. It is called travelmath. Travelmath is a trip calculator. You can calculate flight or driving distances. You can also see if it is better to drive or fly to a certain place. There is also a currency converter. These are just few of the many things you can do on travelmath. It's a good website to use especially when traveling.

http://www.travelmath.com/

Exploration Five: Chas Jones

     The article I picked from Mr. Money Mustache is "How to Fix a Car". This article was posted in July of 2013. Here is the link http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2013/07/02/how-to-fix-a-car/ . The article starts by Mr. Money Mustache telling a story about how his Honda minivan needed car repair. The back left tire began to make an odd humming noise and he figured that it was just the tire wearing out and this was right before he made a 1500 mile trip to Canada. Once he got to Canada he bought new tires but the humming noise was still there. He then proceeds to talk about most people would just take the car to a repair shop and get a ridiculous bill but he tells us how to avoid that. Step one is describe the symptoms and search them on Google. Step two go to YouTube and search what you want to learn. Step three look up the part that you need. Step four is to buy the part that you need. Step five is to acquire any tools that are needed. Step six is to "go for it" and begin to fix the car. His final note to the audience is to be patient. "There are always hiccups when you do things for the first time. We did well with disassembly, but had a hell of a time putting the new hub on." I believe this is a good tip for most things in life.

   The strengths of this article are obviously the steps that he gives the audience because it is a how to article. He makes it seem simple with the wording and doesn't bombard the reader with to many steps. Another strength is how easy of a read the article is. It isn't very long and the steps are clearly labeled for the reader. A weakness that this essay has is grabbing the readers attention in the opening paragraphs. It is a little boring in the beginning when he is telling us about his story about his car needing maintenance. One way that he makes it bearable is his use of swear words that lighten the mood.

    I agree with the steps given in this article. I tested the steps with the problem my car was having a while ago. My car would make a rattling noise whenever I would back up and I took it the a car shop the problem was the muffler was worn out and needed to be replaced. Sure enough when I used Mr. Money Mustaches steps that is what came up in the search that I made.

     The website that I personally use for educational purposes is http://www.foxnews.com/ . The reason I use this website is because it has national news that I personally think that I should know. I also like the unbiased approach that the articles have. This website is also very easy to use due to the nicely organized display. Not only do they have fox news, they also have fox business which is very useful for me because I invest in stocks. Fox business gives recent news and helpful tips for the stock market.