Retirement Planning - Part 3: Oh, shit! Things just got real.

 

This Was Not a Part of My Plan!

Just when you think you have everything figured out, the Universe pulls your pants down and you fall down.

At the end of March my company announced a change in structure and a large percentage of us in Canada were going to be laid off. My last day of work was Friday. Most of my coworkers who were also laid off were done on April 10th. 

For the first few weeks after receiving the notice I was in a near-constant state of low-level anxiety. It would've been much, much worse but Kim now makes a decent salary and we paid off our mortgage last March. Still... anxious.

I cancelled Netflix. I cancelled our TV cable. Those were costing me about $80 a month. Nobody really watches TV in the house and we have other streaming options. Saving that $80 reduced some of my stress.

Less Anxiety For Me, Some For Her.

Between the day I was informed I'd lose my job and today, my love of spreadsheets has reduced the anxiety a bit more as I looked at my financial situation. The question I had was, how soon would I need to get a job? I will be receiving a severance package, but the sooner I get employed, the more of that money could be put into savings or investments.

Every time I'd come up with a plan, Kim would reiterate that I should find a job. But the more I looked at the numbers, the more it looked like I could actually retire. That set off some warning bells with my Beloved. I kept looking at ways to make it work.

In this day and age, in the industry I've worked in for the past almost-thirty years, there's not much call for somebody with my set of skills. (I've tried to learn JAVA, so I could create test automation, but my brain just doesn't code.) If I had more technical abilities, I wouldn't be nearly as concerned. As it is, there aren't a lot of jobs out there for me.

Kim really wants me to find a job. Each plan I came up with was "we could get by for a few years," but that doesn't allow for emergencies. We can't just "get by". What if our strata had a special assessment and we had to come up with $20,000? What if one of us got really sick? What if our Kia rolled over and died? The Universe... She's a fickle being.

Each of my plans had me being retired, but only just paying the bills and not saving. At least not for several years.

Cracking the Code!

Today I figured it all out! Despite not having much in the way of an RRSP -- relative to how much I was planning on having at retirement -- and my TFSA not being quite where I need to to be, I figured out how I'll never have to work again!

It all comes down to my RRSP. More specifically, where it is. My RRSP is being managed by a company that apparently charges a relatively high management fee (2%) and they also charge for withdrawals ($50). 

As an aside, my parents are retired and they withdraw the minimum amount from their RRIF as mandated by law. I asked my mother when/how they do this, and she informed me that they do a lump-sum once a year.

This is interesting because when I found out my RRSP company would charge $50 per withdrawal, I immediately thought the fewer the transactions the better. Gotta be frugal here, right? But then I thought, if I do one big transaction at the beginning of the year, then I'm also removing a large chunk of investment opportunity.

Two things came to mind. First, find out how much Questrade charges. Second, figure out how much of a difference the withdrawal frequency impacts the growth of the account.

Questrade has two options for RRSP accounts. They offer a self-directed account, which is like my TFSA; the investments are handled by me. They also offer to manage an account for a 0.20% - 0.25% fee. When the difference between a good year and a bad year in RRSP growth can be 2%, then keeping that money is huge. I'd go self-directed, of course.

Then I started in with the spreadsheets. And that's when it all clicked.

Oh, For the Love of Spreadsheets!

I'll be turning 55 in June. I have to be able to get to 70 without drawing on my CPP and OAS. My RRSP cannot get me through 15 years. If I stick to my RRSP Meltdown Strategy, how far can I get until my TFSA can be utilized as tax free income? Apparently, I need five years. I just need to get to my 60th birthday. 

From this birthday until that birthday, my RRSP has to not only be of a certain size, but it also has to grow as I withdraw from it over time. (My parents' RRSPs have grown at the same rate as they have withdrawn from it; it's the same amount today as when they retired.) I won't be withdrawing the minimum, though. 

How can I do this if my RRSP isn't currently big enough? Through trial and error and some light bulb moments, the data I was seeing in my spreadsheet made things clear.

I need to use the same DRIP strategy in a self-directed RRSP account as what I have been doing in my TFSA. 

Okay, I just said I only need five years from my RRSP account to get me to 60, but that's not true. From my 55th to 56th birthday, I need to use the DRIP strategy to grow my RRSP to a particular size. I figured that even in a Bear market, I can get it to where I need it to be. (Bull market? It'll be even better.)

From that "final" number I want, I then started plugging data into my spreadsheet to see what impact the withdrawal frequency would have on things. The news just kept getting better. As Questrade doesn't have withdrawal fees, I could easily compare withdrawal strategies. From one, big annual withdrawal all the way through to making withdrawals twice a month (which is the pay cycle I'm used to). 

What I found was, if I took out less money more often, the money still in the account had a better chance of growing more. So much better, in fact, that I was able to up my "annual salary" because otherwise I was blowing past the target of my 60th birthday with funds still in the RRSP due to growth. (The goal is to drain it to zero.)

Where is the Anxiety Now?

What absolutely shocked me was I was able to show that an annual withdrawal that would be less than 80% of what my work salary was, equated to the same amount of money in my bank account every "pay day". There are lots of deductions from a work paycheque as well as the income taxes from being in a particular tax bracket. Without all of those deductions, and being in a lower tax bracket, I can take less from my RRSP, but still get the same number, almost exactly, as my recent paycheques were.

Since the number are almost identical, I can save for vacations just like I was. I can save for a car, like I was. I can pay the bills. Better still, since my TFSA is maxed, I wouldn't be contributing to it like I was, which means, I actually have more disposable income. (Yes, they up the contributions limit each year, but that increase is about half what I was depositing into it.) I can actually put more towards savings than before. For emergencies.

How does Kim feel about this? She'd still be more comfortable if I had a job. But now it's because of the other issue with me not working; sitting around and doing nothing all day. I told her that I'd have to have a schedule. Do the dishes. Laundry. Clean. Shop. Cook. Walk dog. House husband. I'll make it work.

But we'll still keep Netflix and our TV cable cancelled.

Retirement Planning - Part 2: When a Meltdown is a Good Thing!

This Time, With Pictures!

In my previous post, I shared a link to the Retirement Income Calculator. (Just did it, again.) It's definitely worth the time to play around with it. But, if you don't want to, right now, I'll walk you through how my plan works, without using my actual data. I'm also going to go through sections out of order, to help see how things look.

Also, I'm not, in any way, an expert in any of this, nor am I telling you that this is the best/only way to go for retirement. It's just the strategy that I'm planning on using. 

Go talk to a professional. Make your own choices.

General Information

The first section of the Retirement Calculator sets up your life expectancy and your retirement income goal. For this demonstration, we'll pretend we're a 50 year old male whose income is $75,000 a year. For this, I chose to have an income goal of $60,000 (in today's dollars). 

The year you're born and gender at birth determines your life expectancy. A male born in the 70s is expected to live to 85; a female is 88. (My kids' generation adds a year.)

Using those numbers, we get a chart that looks like this:

Old Age Security (OAS)

We're now skipping to this section of the Calculator because it's the easiest. It asks about where you live. Let's assume the person has lived in Canada their whole life. It also asks when you want to start taking your OAS. In my previous post, I wrote that taking it later is beneficial. Since that is what I'm going to do, let's show what that looks like for our friend, here, taking it at Age 70.

Just under $12k, in today's dollars until he's 75, then there's a 10% bump to just over $13k. Nice.

Income taxes aren't withheld for OAS, but you can request it. There is something called a "clawback" for high income earners, but that won't be necessary for this demo because we won't hit that number, here.

A note to my Canadian friends who might be living, or have lived, abroad. You can still qualify for OAS, but at a reduced rate. Look into it.

Canada Pension Plan (CPP)

Whereas OAS is based solely on where you've lived during your lifetime, CPP is based on how much you've contributed to the plan. To find out what your pension estimate will be, you'll have to log into your My Service Canada Account. The more years you've maxed out your CPP, the higher your number will be. (If you don't know, and don't want to bother to find out, the Calculator will give you an average value to use.)

I'm going to use $1000 and, once again, push off receiving it until 70.

This is where things get interesting, as far as the planning goes. As you can see, this person, at 70 years old, will be receiving about $30k a year in benefits. Essentially half of what their retirement goal is. (And, once again, these are today's dollar values. The actual pension is indexed to inflation, so it will be higher when the time comes.)

Another thing to keep in mind about the $30k is that it's well within the lowest tax brackets, both provincially and federally. For a British Columbian, right now, a total of about 20% would be paid in taxes from those numbers. Currently, like OAS, CPP does not withhold taxes, but you can request it.

Miscellaneous Income

For the purposes of this demonstration, and because I don't have to plan on this myself, I'm skipping the Employer Pension and Other Income sections of the Retirement Calculator.

Retirement Savings

Think of your CPP and OAS as the bones of your retirement plan. For our fictional person, we now have to pack $30k worth of meat onto those bones to hit his $60k retirement goal. At least, it has to happen after age 70.

The only way this will work with our Registered Retirement Savings Plan (RRSP) is if we have investments in our Tax Free Savings Account (TFSA). So, we're going to look at the RRSP Meltdown Strategy to go from the age this guy retires to his 70th birthday.

But let's start at age 70 and go backwards from there.

How do we make up the $30,000 annual income deficit after age 70? One word: DRIP!

Dividend Reinvestment Plan (DRIP)

Okay, that's an acronym and three words. Sue me. 

Since I use Questrade (referral code: 646431618477353 for $50 deposit into your new account) for my self-directed -- I don't have anybody but myself to blame for my investments -- TFSA, they charge a small fee for every stock-related transaction. To help avoid this, enrolling in a DRIP eliminates that fee. Do you miss out on buying low and taking advantage of that purchasing power? Yes. Is it less stressful? That's the plan! I like set-it-and-forget-it, myself.

What the Retirement Calculator doesn't really do is take dividends into account as a source of income. All it does is take what you currently have, how much you plan to contribute to it, then factor in a growth percentage until you start to use it. In other words, it assumes you're going to start selling your shares once you hit 70. And that's not what we're going to do. The plan is to use those dividends as income, starting at age 70... maybe even later.

Let's pretend there's a company out there that pays a dividend of $0.10 per share each month, and the shares currently trade at $10.00CDN. If our guy purchased 5000 of those shares (for $50k), he'd have a $500 income from that after the first month. If this guy reinvested that $500 into more shares (via the DRIP), then he'd get about 50 more shares. Keep doing that, month after month, year after year, and by the time he's 70, he could have about 40,000 shares generating about $50,000 a year, tax free. 

But the market is volatile. Dividends aren't set. 

More on Shares that Pay Dividends

You can diversify your portfolio, buying shares from multiple companies, to help offset losses if one stock tanks. It's up to you what you want to do. I'm focused on an Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) which includes many different companies in a particular sector; diversification is built in and the ETF is managed by the company running it.

Another other issue with the Retirement Calculator is it takes what you've accumulated in your TFSA and divides it up for the number of years left in your life expectancy. In other words, if you plan to live to 85, but actually live to 95, then you'll only have your OAS and CPP to live on. Using the DRIP to age 70 gives you a passive income that will be around for as long as the shares are paying dividends.

Retirement Age

Remember our last chart, above? It starts at Age 70. We need to determine when our retirement age will be and how much we'll need in our RRSPs at that time.

Let's say our guy has $100k in his RRSP at 50, he contributes the maximum allowable 18% every payday, and retires at 65. Since he's using the RRSP Meltdown Strategy, he wants to burn through as much of his RRSPs before hitting age 70 as he can.

The Calculator makes that look like this:

Whoa! He's way above this income goal! Great!

Or maybe not. That's a fairly high tax bracket to be in.

What are his options? (Again, this assumes that he's covered from Age 70 onwards with his TFSA investments.)

1. Retire before age 65.
2. Draw down less of his RRSP in those first five years of retirement and draw upon it beyond his 70th birthday. As I mentioned, he's currently in a tax bracket where he's going to be losing money that he doesn't need to.
3. Take the surplus (taxes be damned!) and, if he has contribution room in his TFSA, increase his investments further in there. Doing so would have an impact on...
4. His retirement income goal might actually be too low. Maybe it could be higher?
5. When one retires, one's RRSP should be converted to a Registered Retirement Income Fund (RRIF). With a RRIF, your investments keep investing, you just can't add more funds to it. However, maybe this guy is married. A RRIF allows for income splitting. Perhaps his spouse doesn't have an income; he can split his RRIF money between them, lessening the tax burden he would otherwise face via putting himself in a much lower tax bracket.
6. Buy a boat, that Porsche he's always wanted, and a timeshare in a tropical location.

Maybe the answer is the first one. What would that look like?

Instead of retiring at 65, what if he retired at 63?

That works. 

Regarding the second point on the list above, unfortunately the Retirement Calculator doesn't allow for staggered RRSP withdrawals; it divides the estimated value from when you chose to retire and spreads it across the years you've chosen to draw from it. 

If our guy was over his goal by $45k each of those first five years of retirement, he could, for example, take that surplus and spread it over the next seven years, delaying drawing off his TSFA until he's 77. Doing so would likely result in an even better passive income from his dividends, because of the DRIP. He'd have to pay more in taxes, mind you, as RRSPs are taxable income.

Summary...

The RRSP Meltdown Strategy essentially shifts the tax burden to one's early retirement, allowing the TFSA/DRIP investments to grow.

If you're still saving for retirement, look at where your RRSP could take you, but definitely look at a TFSA and enrolling in a DRIP.

I highly recommend watching Adam Bornn's videos on YouTube. Very informative and he makes it all easy to understand.

Just about everything I mention in this post has nuance to it. Finances are complicated. I'm trying to keep it simple so the concept is clearer. 

Retirement Planning - Screwed? Not Screwed?

My story so far...

When I was in my early 20s, I opened an RRSP account. I made small contributions over a period of time and then stopped. Unfortunately, there was so little in there that even if it showed any signs of growth, it wasn't amounting to much.

I recently closed that account. It only had a few thousand dollars in it. (I took the slight tax hit closing the account, but used that money to start an investment account.)

When I worked at Electronic Arts, they had an RRSP benefit program, so I signed up for that, and had put money into it for a few years before leaving the company. 

And then I sort of forgot about it. 

Life had changed. It sounds weak, but I couldn't afford to contribute money from my paycheque. Between having two kids and us deciding that Kim would only work part-time, we were living paycheque-to-paycheque.

When I left the video game industry, and joined the company I'm with now, my salary jumped considerably, but we were still living cheque-to-cheque. The significant difference was we were at least able to pay down our non-mortgage debts and save for vacations. 

My current company has always had a contribution-matching program for RRSPs, but I just didn't think about doing it. I only joined it a few years ago, mostly just to take advantage of the "free money" the company would give me, but I wasn't maxing out my annual contributions. 

Before I enrolled in that program, I had opened a Tax Free Savings Account (TFSA), but that was mostly so I could invest in Tesla (ticker: TSLA) stock. I also bought a few Apple (APPL) shares, but only enough to say I owned some. (I bought a Macintosh computer in the early 80s; I've always liked Apple products.) I was also buying shares in companies that were adjacent to the Electric Vehicle industry. 

Where am I now?

Today, I have some money in my RRSP and some money in my TSFA, we're less than 18 months from being mortgage free, and will be replacing our aging Kia Sorento when that's done. But I didn't really have an eye on retirement.

I've known for many years that a smart thing to do is to invest in companies who pay out dividends to their shareholders. The idea is you take those dividends and buy more of the same shares. Keep doing that until you're able to draw a small salary (for lack of a better word) from just the dividends. 

My problem is that my exposure to dividends were from the handful of APPL shares that I own. Every year, my few shares generate a grand total of about five Canadian dollars. I'd have to spend millions just to get dividends that would come anywhere close to be an annual salary.

Only recently have I been looking for something better and, I'm hear to tell you, there are quite a few companies that payout a much better dividend. It's completely changed my outlook on investments.

I've invested some money in Bell Media (BCE) because they payout a substantial dividend. At today's market value, if I sold my AAPL shares and purchased BCE shares, my year-end dividends would be about $135 CDN. That'd almost be enough to buy 3 more BCE shares. 

That's great, right? Definitely better than $5 a year. 

Unfortunately, I'm currently not convinced Bell, a company that's been around since 1960, is going to be around much longer. They're heavily in debt, had to sell their share of Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment, and their dividend payments to their shareholders seem to be outpacing their revenue. Things don't look good. 

I've come across some other companies that have low stock prices, but pay enough of a dividend to make them interesting to me.

As an aside, I refuse to invest in the oil industry; some of those stocks pay a nice dividend, too.

Where am I going? 

I'm in my early 50s, have been wondering how much longer I'll have to be working in order to retire, and afraid that answer will be "forever".

After doing more research, the answer is a heckuva lot less grim than I originally feared.

What have I learned?

Canadian Pension Plan (CPP)

The CPP, that working Canadians all contribute to, is first available when one turns 60 years old, but one must start taking it when one turns 70. Regarding CPP, in simple terms, you're penalized for taking it before you're 65, and rewarded for taking it after you turn 65. The goal is to put it off until you're 70. 

It's also indexed to inflation; as inflation goes up, so do the payments.

If I take it when I'm 70, I'm projected to get a little over $22,000 per year. (It'd be under $16k at 65, or just $10k at 60.) Again, that's in today's dollars. That much money currently covers all of our monthly and annual bills. 

Old Age Security (OAS)

I have to be honest, here; I'd never even heard of OAS until very recently. To get the full amount, all you need to do is live in Canada for 40 years between your 18th and 65th birthdays. I've done that.

Like CPP, OAS is indexed to inflation, is available to draw from starting at 60 through 70, and pays more if delayed until your 70th birthday. 

For me, waiting until 70, means another (roughly) $12k per year. (It goes up slightly after your 75th birthday, regardless of when you start it.)

So, without saving any money, I'm going to be taking in about $34,000 in today's dollars. And that's just me. Kim's CPP won't be as good because she hasn't maxed out her contributions like I have during my lifetime, but her OAS should be about the same.

With just CPP and OAS, the two of us would get enough to live on. Assuming I can get from retirement to the age of 70. Which brings us to...

Tax Free Savings Account (TFSA)

As of this year, the lifetime contributions to a TFSA is $95,000. I have my TFSA with Questrade (referral code: 646431618477353 for $50 deposit into your new account). Every January, that lifetime contribution is increased. Currently, the increase is indexed to inflation. I'm going to assume the increase for 2025 will be $7000. 

My current goal is to invest in a Canadian company (or companies) that pay a dividend that can be drawn as a salary when I turn 70. This money will supplement the CPP+OAS that I'll be getting. (As a Canadian, there aren't any taxes withheld on dividends from Canadian companies. Non-Canadian companies will hold back taxes.)

I currently have my eye on an ETF that pays $0.17 per share, per month, and each share is currently trading under $15. Again, the goal is to reinvest the dividends, not care so much about the growth of the stock. If I had 1000 of those shares now, I could be getting between $10000-$20000 per year by the time I'm 70. That's without buying more shares. Only reinvesting. 

I will be setting up a Dividend Reinvestment Plan (DRIP) with Questrade so they automatically buy more of the same shares as the dividends get distributed. Using a DRIP, I don't have to pay the ~$5 commission fee, as well.

But hold on, what about a...

Registered Retirement Savings Plan (RRSP)

All Canadians know what these are. There's a problem with them, however, compared to a TFSA. When you draw upon your RRSP, it's a taxable income. 

Yes, there's a tax credit when you turn 65, and, yes, when you convert your RRSP to a Registered Retirement Income Fund (RRIF) you can do income splitting with your spouse as you draw from it, but it's all still taxable income. Drawing funds from your TFSA is Tax Free. It's right there in the name! If I can keep the DRIP going until I'm 70, then between the TFSA, my CPP, and my OAS, I should be comfortable.

My RRSP is then used to bridge the years between when I retire and my 70th birthday. It's called an RRSP meltdown strategy. Burn through the taxable income, first. 

In Summary...

As I mentioned at the top, I didn't think I had enough saved for retirement. After crunching the numbers, and finding out there are strategies involved, it now looks like I'll be in decent shape.

From the time I turn 70 until I die, I should have a decent yearly income. 

The question now becomes, when can I retire? 

Right now, the answer is when I'm 64. ("Will you still need me? Will you still feed me?") What's better is that number is based on me making the same annual salary from now until my retirement and contributing the same amount of money to my RRSP. Highly unlikely considering I'll get a raise each year.

I've had a lot of fun playing with this tool:

Canadian Retirement Income Calculator

How's your retirement planning going? 

Are you retired? What have you learned? 

NEXT POST: Forget what you just read. Markets can be volatile! Get better at winning lotteries!

What is Tesla's Secret Sauce

Tesla is a disruptive force. 

They are not a car company. 

They are not an energy company. They are not a manufacturing company. They're neither a tech company, nor a software company, nor a mining company. They're not going to be an insurance company, a ride-hailing company, or an HVAC company, either.

They are, or will be, all of those.

And it spells the end for so many companies that will not, or can not, keep up. 

What makes them so special? What is, to use the popular phrase, their "secret sauce"?

Obviously, it starts at the top with Elon Musk. I'm not going to talk about him here, but if you really want the scoop, either read Ashlee Vance's biography of him, or Tim Urban's series of posts on WaitButWhy.com.

I also don't want to get too much into how they got here; I'm going to focus on where they currently are. I'm going to try to do this in an orderly fashion, and I'm actually going to focus just on the one thing that most people think they are, but as I said, aren't: a car company.

First, the primary goal of Tesla is to eliminate our reliance on fossil fuels in order to "save the planet" from us, and for us. It's not to make money. It's not to make the shareholders happy. It's not even, really, to be the #1 auto manufacturer in the world. Save the planet. Period. (Okay, one can argue that the planet will be fine with, or without, us. Let's move on.)

Second, Elon loves to work from first principles. Forget how things have always been made. If you want to make a thing, and started from zero, what would you have to do to make the desired product? Start with the most basic assumption about a thing, then build from there. Tesla does not do something a certain way because that's how it's always been done. They start from zero.

The Cyber truck is probably their finest 

example of working from first principles.

Third, for a while now, the top two companies in the world that engineering graduates want to work at are either Tesla or SpaceX (one of Elon's other companies). This means Tesla pretty much has the pick of the litter. 

Fourth, they've got the biggest brains in the world working for them, but Elon's created a company structure that allows for anybody to make improvements. Now, I'm sure there's a filter of some sort; there has to be an approval process somewhere, right? Every employee at Tesla knows that if they can make things better, then they go to whomever it is that can make that happen. If they don't think it's their manager, then they go to their manager's manager. If an employee feels like the best way to go about doing this is to go straight to Elon, then they're supposed to go straight to Elon. 

For example, Beth works on assembling the doors in the Model Y. It's occurred to her that by making a small change in the assembly, she can remove two meters of wiring from the Model Y. That's two meters of wiring they don't have to pay for, two meters of less weight, and two fewer meters of wire that could become a problem in the future. Once this has been reviewed an approved, then in a very short period of time, every Model Y that rolls out of that factory will have two fewer meters of wiring in it. 

Most companies change products slowly, pretty much annually. Watch enough YouTube videos of Sandy Munro, and you soon learn that making changes to any car at a legacy Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) is not worth the fight. It's why cars barely change every year. The cars rolling out of Tesla's factories today are better than the ones that rolled out six months ago, and will not be quite as good as the ones three months from now. The hardware built into the cars are being improved all of the time.

Fifth, they are completely vertically integrated. When Elon got SpaceX going, he asked himself how much does a rocket cost to manufacture? It's just a pile of different metals and alloys, right? How much does each pile cost? Instead of buying the parts, and assembling them, they bought the materials and made the parts themselves. Just like they're doing at Tesla. They're even getting into the mining business so they can get their batteries' lithium cheaper than elsewhere (and more ecologically friendly, if they can help it).

Sixth (or Fifth-A?), they make the machines that make the machines. For a while now, many people on Wall Street have said that Tesla doesn't have a secret sauce; they don't have anything that the other companies don't have. This is far from true. You can't reverse engineer a Tesla and make one yourself, because Tesla manufactures just about everything in their cars themselves. The legacy auto manufacturers don't do this. They assemble parts that they purchase from other companies. Tesla formulates their own alloys to use in their vehicles. They design and manufacture their own computer chips and boards (and it's next-level, beyond military grade, stuff). I think the only things they don't make themselves are the tires. Oh, and the computer programs that they use to run the company? They coded that themselves, too.

Seventh, as much technology that is going into most cars these days, regardless of who makes them, or what makes them move, very few cars have over-the-air (OTA) software updates. Sure, the hardware doesn't change once the car is done in the factory, but the day they deliver the car to you, that's the worst a Tesla will ever be. New features get added, and improvements are made at least several times a year, just by being connected to the internet. Your Tesla's range and performance only gets better over time with OTA updates. Again, most automobile manufacturers don't have this OTA capability. (Very recently, VW had software issues with their new EV, the ID.3. They're having to update each car at the factory one by one. Dumb.)

Eight, they have a gigapress... and they make octovalves... and... and you'll just have to look those ones up yourself. In a nutshell, and this ties in so much from above, they have such a streamlined process that they are making money off of every car they sell; they're profitable. Guess what? Many automobile manufactures don't actually make much, if any, money on the cars they sell. Tesla does. Fewer parts than everybody else -- including other EVs -- means lower costs, higher build quality.

Most cars have three heaters/coolers, 

the Model Y has the octovalve.

General Motors (GM) is 9 billion dollars in debt. They sell each car at a loss. The Toyota Prius was always sold at a loss. Fiat's 500e was sold at a loss, and their CEO didn't even want to make it. Making cars is one thing. Making money from cars is a whole other story. (I've believed since I was a kid that American cars were made to fall apart because it was selling the parts that made those companies money. Guess what? EVs don't really have parts to replace, so if you can't make money off of selling them, how are you going to make money if your cars aren't profitable?)

Ninth, they built their Supercharger infrastructure so you can travel all over the place and not have to deal with range anxiety. Oh, sure, you'd be leaving your house with a nearly full charge, and you'll be able to go further than any other EV out there (and soon further than just about any ICE vehicle), but if you were to keep going, there are Tesla Superchargers out there, just waiting to charge your battery. Unlike other chargers, the money you spend goes to Tesla, which helps them do all of the things I've been writing about here.

Last, they will have the best batteries on the planet, shortly. I mean, they kind of already do, but the latest design, the tabless battery, is a significant breakthrough in cost, power density, etc. Their new 4680 cells are better in every conceivable metric than anything else out there. 

The new 4680 cells are so good, in fact, that they're starting to build them right into the frames of the cars. That's right; they won't be replaceable soon. Why'd they do that? Let's do some math. How far do you drive in a year? The average Canadian drives a little over 15,000km. The average American drives just under 22,000km a year. (Europeans drive less than Canadians.). Let's say you drive 25,000km a year. No, even better, let's double that. Let's say you're putting on a whopping 50,000km a year. With Tesla's new 4680 cell, you can expect to drive that car for over 30 years before you begin to notice a degradation of battery performance. That's not 1.6 million kilometers before the battery isn't functioning anymore. That's 270 times across Canada and back (both ways!) before you'd be noticing that a full charge isn't getting you quite as far is it did the last time you were crossing Manitoba.

The 4680 cell is the sizzle and the steak.

If I had to choose one thing from above and say it's their secret sauce, it'd be their newest cells. They, alone, separate Tesla from all of the other OEMs.

In summary, Tesla's "secret sauce" is like any sauce you'd prepare in the kitchen; it's a combination of things. It's who wants to work there, their culture, their process, their innovation, their hardware, software, and motive. And it's all come together in the most disruptive flavour ever.

Now, if you want to talk about the value of their stock, then that's a whole other discussion that relates to all of the companies that Tesla could be labeled as.

How by 2030 most other OEMs will be gone? A whole other discussion, again. <winking face>

Van Halen - Ranking Roth

Not that long ago, I came across an article published in a well-known website, that ranked every single Van Halen song. Even the ones from Van Halen III. Ugh. It became apparent, however, as I read through the list, and each comment the author made, that he wasn't actually much of a fan. He actually seemed to dislike almost every song on the list, despite saying he was a fan.

For me to replicate that list, I'd have to spend time listening to Van Halen III, which I can't bring myself to do. Instead, I decided since I love the David Lee Roth era albums the most, I'd only include songs those songs. Dave's been involved in 75 songs.

Here they are, starting at the bottom, with minimal comments.

75. Tora! Tora! - This is the intro to Loss of Control.

74. Intruder - The intro to (Oh) Pretty Woman.

73. 1984 - Instrumental.

72. I'll Wait - Ironically, this was the song that got me to go out and buy my first Van Halen album, 1984. (Purchasing the rest of the catalogue followed soon after.) I really don't like this song much, anymore.

If those four songs didn't exist, I'd be happy.

71. Bullethead

70. China Town - Rips at the start... but then goes over a cliff.

69. Can't Get This Stuff No More - Despite having a fantastic lyric ("Steak and potatoes, a feather in a bucket" What?!), this song does nothing for me.

68. Jump

67. You're No Good
66. One Foot Out the Door
65. Hang 'em High

64. Secrets

63. Honeybabysweetiedoll

62. Blood and Fire

61. Sunday Afternoon in the Park - Instrumental. Maybe the least Van Halen song ever? Leads right into One Foot Out the Door.

60. Push Comes to Shove

59. Loss of Control - This used to be the only VH song that I really never liked, but then I realized I mostly hated the intro. (See above.)

58. Girl Gone Bad

57. Little Dreamer

56. (Oh) Pretty Woman

55. On Fire

54. House of Pain - Oddly, the demo version of this song, with all of its warts, would be in my top five.

The preceding eighteen songs are the ones I could live without. I don't dislike them, but I'd never add them to a playlist of favourites. Each could move up or down a spot or two within the group, depending on my mood.

53. You and Your Blues

52. The Trouble With Never

51. Where Have All The Good Times Gone?

50. As Is

49. Outta Love Again

48. Somebody Get Me a Doctor

47. D.O.A.

46. Hear About it Later

45. Big River

44. So This is Love?

43. Women In Love

42. Happy Trails

41. Little Guitars

40. Little Guitars (Intro) - Yes, I like the intro more than the song. (And, yes, it's technically a separate track.

39. Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love

38. Runnin' With the Devil - The first track of their debut album.

37. Fools

36. Tattoo

35. Jamie's Cryin'

34. Bottoms Up!

33. Romeo Delight

32. Beats Workin'

31. Atomic Punk

30. Top Jimmy

29. I'm The One

28. Take Your Whiskey Home

27. Unchained

26. Panama

Somewhat like the previous grouping, this section could have the most movement if I were to revisit the list in a few years. All are quite listen-to-able.

25. Spanish Fly - Instrumental

24. Dancing in the Street - Eddie's least favourite song?

23. Cathedral - Instrumental

22. Dance the Night Away

21. Outta Space

20. She's the Woman - Kim sings it as "She's the wombat." She thinks that it's hilarious.

19. Dirty Movies

18. Mean Street

17. Beautiful Girls - Schmitts Gay. Classic.

16. Light Up the Sky

15. And the Cradle Will Rock...

14. Everybody Wants Some
13. Sinner's Swing!

12. Could This Be Magic?

11. Feel Your Love Tonight

10. You Really Got Me - In 1978, this was most of the world's introduction to Van Halen.

9. Ice Cream Man

8. Big Bad Bill (Is Sweet William Now) - Edward & Alex's father, Jan, plays the clarinet on this one.

7. The Full Bug

6. Stay Frosty - Kim's least favourite Van Halen song. I prefer this over Ice Cream Man because of the lyrics.

5. In a Simple Rhyme

4. Eruption - You Really Got Me may have been the band's introduction to the world, but it was Eruption that had a generational impact on music.

3. Drop Dead Legs

2. Hot For Teacher - Has there ever been a better song+video combination? At worse, it's in the top 3.

1. Me Wise Magic - This track was recorded for their Best Of album. 

The Top 3 might bounce around, day to day, but they're never moving out of the those three spots.

THE LAST JEDI - THOUGHTS AFTER MY FIRST VIEWING

Before you read on, the assumptions are:

1. You've already watched the movie; there will be SPOILERS, here.
2. You're a fan of the franchise. If you're not a fan, none of this will really matter to you.
3. You've already read FilmCritHulk's blog post. No? Read it first. Seriously, read it. It's one of those he's-forgotten-more-about-storytelling-than-you-will-ever-know situations.

All good?

Okay.

I enjoyed The Last Jedi, but I didn't love it. Some people are gushing over the movie. Others are hating it. I'd like to share my thoughts, having seen the movie once.

RATING/HATING

I want to first discuss how we "rate" movies. In doing so, I'll get to the "hating it" part.

This will take a bit of time.

I've seen people rating this movie with 1 out of 10. Really? A one?! So, this movie is among the worst movies that the person has ever seen? Really? I believe, after a lifetime of watching movies, there's a bell curve; the vast majority of movies that you'll see fall into the 4-7/10 area. If you really enjoy a movie, and you could watch it again and again, then that movie should score an 8, or higher. That's fair, right?

Rottentomatoes.com determines that anything rated 6+ is given the "Fresh" tag. This is the score they're famous for. They also display the movies' average scores out of 10. (This is what I tend to look at more than their Fresh/Rotten score.) Although I've never seen it happen, it's mathematically possible to have a movie with an average score of 6.0, but also have a 100% Fresh rating. If you were rating a movie, and it did just enough for you to say, "Yes, I enjoyed that movie," then you'd give it a 6. If it falls just under that. You thought it was "just okay", then that sounds like a 5. If everybody gave it a 5, because it was just okay, then that movie would score a 0% on Rottentomatoes. Again, this is not something I've ever seen. Most movies that are above 90% fresh, typically score in the 8s, and movies below 10%, tend to score below 3/10. (As of right now, TLJ is 93%, 8.2, with 294 critical reviews in.)

There's an expectation, I believe, that many fans have that any time a new Star Wars movie is released, it could be a new Favourite Movie of All Time! for them. When it's not, then instead of saying, "It wasn't as good as I'd hoped, but it was still okay," they decide that it's crap. I'll be repeating myself throughout this post with this, but it's about expectations. People expect a 10, but that's just not realistic, is it? No, it's not. It's also highly unlikely that any movie in wide release, regardless of how much you don't like it, is actually a 1. (A real 1 would likely find itself in the DVD discount bin at Walmart, with no theatrical release.)

Recently, a friend told me (essentially) that I automatically love all Star Wars movies, because I'm a Star Wars fan. I told him that this is just not true. Of the 8 Star Wars movies released before The Last Jedi, I have loved two of them. Only two. I grew to hate three of them. The other three fall somewhere in between. Even the three I hated, I wouldn't score a 1 out of 10, because there were still elements in each of them that I enjoyed. (For example, in The Phantom Menace, I love the 1-on-1 duel between Obi-Wan Kenobi and Darth Maul, and John Williams's Duel of the Fates is a great piece of music.) Guess what, if I scored each of these movies, and thrown them on a graph, you'd probably see a bell-like shape. Granted, it would be shifted a little to the right, but still, there'd be a curvy line that went from near one side to the other.

Maybe it's because I'm practical, and a little logical, but my expectations when I go into a new Star Wars movie, is that the movie will likely be a 7 out of 10. I hope for more, of course, but I expect that I'll think it's pretty good.

I think most fans, or at least the vocal internet ones, expect a 10 each time, and if they don't get it, they get angry. They give it a one. And I mean they literally go online, and give it a 1 somewhere/everywhere.

That's a very childish reaction. No?

So, my initial reaction to The Last Jedi was pretty much in-line with what I should've expected. I really enjoyed it, like I did with all but three of the eight movies, but I didn't love it, like the first two episodes.

Initial viewing puts it as not as good as Empire, Star Wars, or The Force Awakens, but better than Rogue One, and Return of the Jedi. (Let's just not discuss the prequels from now on.)

Now, here's something that is so very, very true:

So many star wars fans would have been MAD ONLINE after Empire. Its like we completely forgot the immediate reaction to that movie.

— FILM CRIT HULK (@FilmCritHULK) December 16, 2017

I was 6 years old when I saw Star Wars for the first time. Despite not seeing a lot of movies in my young life, Star Wars was the best I'd ever seen. It was my favourite. I was just about to turn 9 years old, when The Empire Strikes Back was released in theatres, and I remember being so disappointed with it. My young brain couldn't process what had happened, but I knew I didn't like it. When I was almost 12, Return of the Jedi came out. I loved it so much! I remember telling somebody that I may have enjoyed it more than Star Wars. (I have problems calling Episode IV "A New Hope", so just know, when I say, "Star Wars", I usually don't mean the franchise, I mean the 1977 Life-Changer.)

It took me years to come around on Empire. I was probably 15 years old before I started appreciating it more. I was probably almost through high school before I realized it was my favourite movie of all time. It still is. If you were to ask me, "Cam, what's your favourite mo..." "Empire." But that took a long time. Ask any fan, old enough to have seen the original trilogy in the theatres, and they will likely say that Empire is the best of the series. Keeping in mind, what Film Crit Hulk just tweeted, most people didn't feel that way, at first.

I'm not saying The Last Jedi is the new Empire. I'm saying don't be dismissive of it just because you didn't really love it after watching it once.

EXPECTATIONS

For years, I've realized that anything that can make me laugh and cry (or even be near tears), automatically falls into my This is Really Good category of entertainment. Obviously, things can have either and still be good, but if it can do both, then it must be good. Buffy The Vampires Slayer wasn't a great show because it was funny -- it was, of course -- but it was great because... well, have you seen The Body (S05 E16)? That's one of the best episodes of TV I've ever seen, and I'm a blubbering mess each time I see it. (I always seem to forget just how much it affects me, until I'm watching it.)

The Last Jedi hit emotional notes, and it made me laugh. Because I had some problems with it (in a minute!), I can't say I didn't like it. But why didn't I love it, when I think I actually should have? I had to think about that (which I've done) and I'll need to see it again. But it did get an emotional reaction out of me, so that means it's automatically an Enjoyable Movie.

Maybe it's better than that. Maybe?

After The Force Awakens came out, I think most of us had expectations of what was likely to be in this episode:

1. Rian Johnson would continue the story that J.J. Abrams delivered to us with The Force Awakens.
2. We'd get more information on who Rey's parents were. If it wasn't revealed in this movie, we'd at least be one step closer to who they were, and find out in Episode IX.
3. We'd possibly find out who Snoke was, and where he came from. He looks old enough to have been around during the original trilogy, so there could be a connection to previous movies (even... even the prequels). Like Rey's parents, if we didn't find out in Ep. VIII, we would in IX.
4. Carrie Fischer died after production was complete, but Rian Johnson said he didn't change anything to take that into account. I had an assumption, going into TLJ, that Leia would die.
5. Poe Dameron would be a hero, doing heroic things.
6. Rian Johnson is a very competent filmmaker. Whatever it is he's crafted, would be great.
7. Luke would be somewhat stoic, because he was, for the most part, in RoTJ.
8. C3PO would be annoying. (He wasn't in the original trilogy, but was in everything else.)
9. Domhnall Gleeson (General Hux) would overact.

Was there more? Maybe for you, but that pretty much covers it for me.

BUT THEN...

Whether I was completely conscious of these items above, going in, and how they played out, or not, I can say that when my expectations weren't met, they were disappointing on some level.

Point #1

You know when the way this whole thing would play out should've been obvious? As soon as Luke took the lightsaber from Rey and tossed it over his shoulder. Replace Luke with Rian Johnson, Rey with J.J. Abrams, and the lightsaber with the script of The Force Awakens. That's what happened there, in that scene. Did you pick up on that at the time? No. Does it make sense now? The only way it could be more obvious is if Luke gave the fourth wall the finger. (Keep in mind, Rian Johnson had to start working on the script while The Force Awakens was still in production; he likely had a draft of that screenplay, but could do just about anything from there.)

So he decided, unbeknownst to us, but obvious now, that he'd not follow the path that JJ Abrams appeared to lay out.

So, with that in mind...

Point #2

Rey's parents went from being in JJ's infamous Mystery Box, to almost being a red herring. There was nothing special about Rey's family. She's not a Skywalker. This whole franchise was about the Skywalkers, and she was the hero from The Force Awakens. It stands to reason there's some great connection between her, her parents, and the Skywalker family, right?

Nope.

Yes, of course she's special, but no, there's not some awesome link to the previous movies. (Maybe JJ goes back to this in Episode IX.) We expect a reveal, and get... junkie parents looking to score a quick buck. Well, I wasn't expecting that.

Point #3

Snoke dies, and we find out nothing about him. I know some people say his death made no sense. That it was cheap. I think those people had expectations of him. He was also in JJ's Mystery Box. Rian Johnson squashed him in that box.

Personally, I really liked the death. (Yes, the physical action of it, but also...) In Star Wars, Darth Vader was the baddest motherfucker in the galaxy. Sure, Tarkin seemed to outrank him, but Tarkin wasn't a badass. In Empire, we find out that Vader has a master. For Vader to have a master, that guy must be next level badass. (Oh... I bet that was against expectations in 1980!) In Return of the Jedi, we get to meet the Emperor, and, sure enough, he's really, really powerful. This diminishes Vader in our eyes. By killing Snoke, and by showing Hux to be less-than-powerful in his role, Rian Johnson leaves Kylo Ren as the one true antagonist for the next film. (Or, at least, at the beginning of it. We don't know what happened to the rest of the Knights of Ren.)

Point #4

During the entire film, I expected Leia to die. Then she did... n't. And didn't again. And again.

As mentioned above, since Rian Johnson said he didn't change anything after her death, that set an expectation (with me) that she dies in this film. Sitting there for 2.5 hours expecting her to die is a little bit distracting. Now that I know she doesn't die, this won't be tugging at my brain during my next viewing.

So, for Episode IX, we'll either get a CGI Leia (I hope not!) or an Irish Good-Bye.

Point #5

Poe Dameron was a hero doing heroic things... and failing. Actions have consequences, and we're not really used to seeing the good guys constantly failing. Hopefully he learned his lesson. I expect him to, at least.

Point #6

Rian Johnson knows what he's doing. So much so that Disney has given him the go ahead to develop his own Star Wars Trilogy. They loved his movie, and the experience of collaborating with him. So, how could TLJ be anything but really good?

I've read comments from people that say the story didn't make sense, or that there was too much going on, or that he didn't know what he was doing, etc. Truth is, if you have read that Film Crit Hulk article -- seriously, if you haven't, go do that -- he did write a very good story. It wasn't a black-and-white, point A to point B, original trilogy story, but that doesn't mean he failed.

Okay, the porgs were cute, and got some laughs, but did they serve any purpose? As Kim said to me, "Even the Ewoks served a purpose." So maybe Rian had a small mis-step there.

It was really only the editing that bothered me. Just when a story arc was humming along nicely - cut to one of the other story arcs... and then cut to another... or back. The story wasn't the issue, for me, it was the editing. But, again, this will likely not bother me as much during subsequent viewings, since I'll expect it. 

Point #7

Was Luke ever funny? No. So why now? (Tyler says, "People change, you know." That's true.) Did it bother me while watching the film? No. But in digesting what I watched, it was something that I realized didn't feel right.

Point #8

Okay, Threepio was perfectly fine. Next issue...

Point #9

Gleeson's portayal of General Hux, in The Force Awakens, is one of my least favourite aspects of that film. Rian Johnson may have felt that way, too, as he ended up making Hux a doofus. Do I prefer TLJ Hux to TFA Hux? Definitely. But did it feel right? No. It felt out of place. I expected one thing, and got something decidedly different, for no apparent reason.

CONCLUSION

At this time, I'd give the movie a 7/10. There were some great moments, some good laughs, and even a couple of emotional moments. For me, it just needs time, and a chance to simmer in my brain for a while. At least my expectations will no longer play a role in how my brain processes the film.

Maybe, like Empire and Jedi, we need to see Episode IX to find out that The Last Jedi was exactly the middle movie that it needed to be.

It has the potential to be an 8, maybe even a 9.

G.A.R.T. 2015 - The Californian Coast.

Back at Yellowstone, as previously written, Kim had let slip, within earshot of the kids, that we were going to Disneyland. She managed to convince the kids that we weren't going because of the cost. More on that, later.

The drive to Anaheim... So, after driving thousands of kilometres, we discover that all of the asshole drivers in the American West, are in California. Seriously. No issues at all until we crossed the state line, then boom... idiots and assholes, everywhere. Also, if you want to know what a highway looks like when nobody adopts it, drive the I-40 in California, from Arizona.

Speaking of American highways, I'm a little confused as to what service the California Highway Patrol provides. If I'm next to the slow lane, going just a bit faster than the people to my right, but everybody else is going considerably faster than I am, to my left, and I'm doing 20mph over the posted speed-limit, then what has to happen for the CHP to pull a car over? Because they do pull cars over, I've seen it, but just not people doing 100 in a 55 zone.

ANAHEIM

When we got to Anaheim, and were close to the hotel, we were concerned that we'd see Disneyland and the kids would get all excited about it. Thankfully, we didn't, so they didn't.

Kim had told the kids that we were planning on seeing a museum in Anaheim, and also a Richard Nixon memorial; I don't know where Kim got the idea for that from. The museum was for toys. According to Kim, it had toys in it that went back to the 30s. Hey, just like Disney and their films. Waddya know...

We arrived at the hotel in the evening, so we wouldn't be visiting the park until the next day. Wondering where the park was, in relation to us, and how close it actually was, was answered when the night's fireworks began. Closer than we thought, and there was no way to distract the kids from that.

The next morning, we decided we'd let the kids know, as we woke them, that we had a long day ahead of us... at Disneyland. Connor was somewhat excited by the news, but Tyler was beside herself with excitement. "I KNEW IT!" she exclaimed, her head still on the pillow.

The last time we were at Disneyland, Kim was pregnant with Connor, and we didn't know the value of using Fast Passes. (For the record, Kim and the kids have been to Disneyland without me, but that was years ago.) I don't want to go into detail regarding everything we did in the park, but I think it's important to tell you about the first few hours, as they sort of set the tone for the rest of the visit.

We immediately got Fast Passes for the Indiana Jones ride. Meanwhile, we went on the Jungle Adventure. This was probably Connor's favourite ride.

He did not enjoy the Indiana Jones ride. Nope, not one bit. In fact, he didn't want to go on any rides after that one.

Tyler and I went on Splash Mountain, but Connor didn't want to go. Kim finally convinced him to go, but, at some point, he wasn't sitting properly, so during one of the big drops, he fell off the seat and landed hard on his tailbone.

Now he really didn't want to go on any rides. And that's what we had to deal with the entire time we were there. We had to convince him that the rides weren't scary (and not lie about it either), so that he'd at least go on something. I think he went on that Jungle ride 3 or 4 times, however.

So, there we were, in the "happiest place on Earth" with a kid that didn't want to do anything. That includes getting his picture taken with the various Disney characters.

Here's a what's-wrong-with-kids-these-days moment: There's a beautiful young lady ahead of us on The Haunted Mansion ride. She's by herself, and the whole time she's on the ride, she's on her phone. She only put the phone away near the end, during the mirrored hallway. She used the mirrors to check her hair.

The first day we spent in Disneyland. The second day we spent in California Adventure Park. The latter was a lot less busy than the former. I'd never been in CAP, before. It was a lot of fun, with some good rides.

I don't think there was a single ride that Tyler did not go on. She did all the roller coasters; a real trooper.

We ended our visit with breakfast at Goofy's Kitchen. You know... as far as pricing goes, it's a colossal rip-off. The food's good, and it's a good time, but the prices... stupid. I think this was where we got our only picture of Connor with a character. Also, the lady who we spoke to at the front desk said Vancouver had her favourite restaurant in the world: The Sutton Place Hotel's Chocolate Buffet. Too bad about that, since it's now closed.

Monterey

Next up was Monterey. We'd be staying in Seaside, however. Although we were in this part of the world to go to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, we stayed in Seaside because it was about $75 less for the hotel.

I think this was the first place we stayed, on the entire trip, that didn't have air conditioning. It was also the only place that didn't need it.

The night we arrived, Kim took Tyler down the road and did some laundry. Later that night, Kim took Tyler to see Minions, whereas Connor and I went and saw Ant-Man. (We enjoyed Ant-man... I don't think Minions was well received.)

The next day, we went into Monterey and visited their world-famous aquarium. It really puts Vancouver's aquarium to shame.

At one point, we were in the bird area, and one of the employees was telling me that all the birds in there were rescued at some point in their lives. They're never returned to the wild, but she said if you can get in, you've got it made; they had one bird that had been in there since the 80s. In the wild, that bird could've expected to live about 8 years. Unfortunately, because the rescued birds live so long, they're full and can't take in any more rescues.

Next up...

San Francisco bound.