alevin's account talk

[alevin]

I've had enough fun for the time being. Back to G-100%.

 

[alevin]

I need to get braver. didn't wait for the top-out signal this time, seemed like it took forever to get back to even after last time I got in, got spooked once I got a little ahead. Anyway, I need to get braver, take a little more risk. tonight I finished 3d in the poker game, big improvement. need to let that start reflecting more in my tsp moves. probabilities. topping signal hit on Friday last week. If I was in, I'd be getting out tomorrow. sorry about the doublepost, I didn't get it sized right the first time, don't know how to undo it.

 

[alevin]

So today we got snow at our elevation, first of the year, been snow on the mountains for about a week now, truckers don't much like it, chainup and intermittent highway closure weather up on the mountain, especially when one of those bigwheels goes topsy turvy across lanes. lucky for me, this newfangled thing called video teleconferencing works pretty slick these days, comes in handy on these kinds of days.

expecting up to 4 inches by Saturday down here, nothin like the burro's got, but enough to get people slipping and sliding a bit already. Manager got nervous mid-afternoon, began suggesting people head home early, but was trying not to say the admin leave phrase. not quite kosher but she's not used to having to make those kinds of decisions.

I'm good enough friends with her that I will probably discuss that hesitancy with her when things are a little less concerning weatherwise, tell her she needs to man up and be decisive or let people make up their own minds if they want to cut their work day short on their own recognizance. otherwise union might get a complaint if she pulls that again-not necessarily from me but from any number of others. which would get her in dutch with her own boss, which she doesn't need at this point.

Meanwhile my own newer set of new Ford pickup wheels got a chance to do snow driving test on the way home this afternoon. despite good mud and snows, 4 sandbags in the back and 4wd, it still slipped a little on the backend pulling out onto and across the 4lane to head home into town when I left work. good little test of performance, and what to expect. this vehicle is a little bigger than the one it replaced, bigger tires. The 4 sandbags that worked for the older vehicle, not quite enough for this one, I need to get 1-2 more sandbags tomorrow, and chains. It has been feeling all fall like we're in for a genuine snowy winter this year, unlike the last 2-3.

 

[burrocrat]

alevin, the secret to driving a pickup on snow and ice is underalls. yep, underalls, tink tink.

a rear wheel drive vehicle with a light back end will always swing around a bit, even in 4x4 mode, just don't brake while turning the wheel and wait to accelerate out of a curve until the headlights are mostly pointing down the road. it is pretty predictable and the truck will track itself back on line unless you stomp the brakes or romp the gas.

once you know how it works you can play with it, make it swing wide to one side almost perpendicular then let off let it come back around and swing it out the other side, throwing snow the whole way.

you might consider getting yourself a sixpack and finding an empty road. back ends were made for swinging. if you want a ride to track like on rails then buy a train. and sandbags are a waste of money, just get yourself a couple of fat friends and make them ride in the back. plus they can help push if you get stuck. i'm a practical man.

 

[alevin]

:laugh: burro, you always come up with such good advice. Having driven the last smaller pickup for 16 years, I think I know how to handle backend on a pickup, in deeper snow and slicker streets than we have right now. I'm just simply getting used to a slightly bigger heavier pickup with different feel to it, 6cyl instead of 4. getting to know it intimately, kinda like you and Missy.

The sandbags are a standard with me, traction going straight, uphill as well as the flats, not just around corners. not worried too much about the swinging back end, I know how to corner at low speed. It wasn't a fishtail this afternoon, just a little slippage, getting feel of the road before heading down the road straight. no worries. try to stay out of the ditch, you'll get home quicker that way. :smile:

 

[burrocrat]

this newfangled thing called video teleconferencing works pretty slick these days...

she needs to man up and be decisive...

alevin, a word of advice, you can't say man up anymore because it elevates 'man' to desirable position and in so doing denigrates all non-men or potential but not yet transitioned men. it is actually a micro aggression trigger word and hurts feelers. i'm sure you had to watch that hour long lgbqtia aglearn training so you should know this. i don't even know what an "i" or an "a" is yet.

Nebraska university tells students not to say 'crazy,' 'ghetto' and other bad words - Watchdog.org

In fact, students may notice one of 300 student volunteers wearing brightly colored T-shirts with the banned words emblazoned on the back. A pink shirt informs students that saying “man up” only “reinforces masculine stereotypes that are unhealthy for everyone.”

also, be very careful with that voip video teleconferencing thingy, i put tape over mine just to be sure until i'm ready.

 

[alevin]

You are sooooo right, burro on subject of VOIP! Which is why I'm generally the one who calls in, rather than other way around. :wink:

As for management, manup seems to be part of the expectation, either that or they need to modify the noun to make it even more genderized....? maybe that's what needs to happen, hmmm. management, shmanagement? shmanup? a shmanager still needs to be decisive and be accountable when comes to making a decision about declaring weather-related admin leave, or any other decision only shmanagement can make, no? :nuts:

 

[alevin]

Market chart has finally made a meaningful move worth posting. Traders and buy and holders beware, ignore at your own risk. Given topping patterns over the past year+, this market could still keep going until it hits 2d standard deviation level on these charts, but this is definitely a warning to consider in conjunction with any other indicators you may use. Hit the 1SD level day before yesterday, ready to rollover if it decides its time. Based on chart behavior sinceJuly 15, I've realized that while this is a definite warning buy/sell signal, it is not an absolute either way. which is why I've begun giving it one more day of observation after the initial move, before I post a chart.



Also, I decided, based on the chart, that I'm ready to bail for now til a better reason to get in and stay awhile shows up. Back to G.

 

[alevin]

Poor chart. so boring. still waiting for something visible to happen up or down either one. In the meantime, for some reason, search engine has vanished on me this afternoon. I type in search window and it just stares back at me, no reaction. simple term like poker gets no reaction.

But the real deal is I wanted to do some reading on withdrawing roth tsp alongside regular tsp. wondering if I can take back the roth tsp contribs I made this year by accident. Just noticed it a little earlier this afternoon, reviewing a paysheet, running some math on gross vs takehome vs various deductions. I've been maxing out the tsp catchup for a short handful of years now. No interest in Roth tsp. way too late in career for that to make any sense. somehow, when I signed up for tsp catchups this year, I accidentally signed up for roth tsp catchups instead. 6 payperiods worth. dang it! no idea how that happened.

At least I went in as soon as I realized and stopped the roth tsp catchups as of this pp, and started the regular tsp catchups I thought I was already doing. arg. Be careful out there, everyone. there are booby traps, yes even in payroll and tsp contributions/deductions system, especially when there are many workload demands ongoing same time. :suspicious:

Meanwhile, back to missing search engines. anyone have an idea how I can get mine working again? since I can't google and get an answer, just a blank stare from the search engine window? :blink:

 

[PessOptimist]

Poor chart. so boring. still waiting for something visible to happen up or down either one. In the meantime, for some reason, search engine has vanished on me this afternoon. I type in search window and it just stares back at me, no reaction. simple term like poker gets no reaction.

But the real deal is I wanted to do some reading on withdrawing roth tsp alongside regular tsp. wondering if I can take back the roth tsp contribs I made this year by accident. Just noticed it a little earlier this afternoon, reviewing a paysheet, running some math on gross vs takehome vs various deductions. I've been maxing out the tsp catchup for a short handful of years now. No interest in Roth tsp. way too late in career for that to make any sense. somehow, when I signed up for tsp catchups this year, I accidentally signed up for roth tsp catchups instead. 6 payperiods worth. dang it! no idea how that happened.

At least I went in as soon as I realized and stopped the roth tsp catchups as of this pp, and started the regular tsp catchups I thought I was already doing. arg. Be careful out there, everyone. there are booby traps, yes even in payroll and tsp contributions/deductions system, especially when there are many workload demands ongoing same time.

Meanwhile, back to missing search engines. anyone have an idea how I can get mine working again? since I can't google and get an answer, just a blank stare from the search engine window?

Don’t know about the search engines. What OS? What browser?

About the Roth v regular TSP withdrawals. You will get the same percentage in withdrawals as you have in TSP Roth or regular. I would be willing to bet you cannot take back the Roth contributions or convert them to regular contributions. Yeah, I agree too late in the career/life for Roth to make any sense.

Workload demands? Why it sounds as if you are in my situation. Only way to change the TSP contribution is from .gov domain. So at work. NEVER charge any time to admin stuff. If you stay late to do it some manager pops in the door to remind you there is no OT and you must leave for security reasons.

30-50 e-mails a day, a lot about new federal programs to show “they” care, many about long stalled projects you are waiting on the old “what do I tell my people to charge it to?” and the work order needs to come from the manager wanting the update. Some about brush fires needing attention. You are expected to work through lunch so don’t try that. Lunch time is when the managers show up at the door after they went to a trendy place for lunch early.

Never have understood how some TSPTalk contributors post so much during what I think may be their normal work day. I must be doing something wrong.

Alevin, just take the time to double check anything you do on your employee website. No matter who is standing there or how many “urgent” e-mails you have. Hard to do I know. Get rid of that “can do, get it done” attitude and take a lesson from the managers demanding status after six months of not replying to requests from them. It apparently doesn’t matter and is probably time for their review which is why they are asking. 15s will continue to get the bonuses, 14s will continue to politic to be 15s, 14s will tell 12s to make it so and tell the trench people to shut up and do it. 13s are somewhat invisible in my structure. They are there but make no decisions. Trench people are usually not brave enough to tell the 12s we can’t do it if we don’t know what to charge it to. 12s usually tell the workers to “find something to charge it to” All perfectly legal of course. I suppose. Who gets investigated for improper charging? Guess?

OK off soap box. Glad it is almost over.

I think the Roth contributions are a done deal. Congrats on being able to contribute the max catch up.

Thanks for all your posts over the years. No one really gives a rodent’s rump about what happened to you or someone you knew. Keep on posting it. No one really gives a rr about anything I post. I continue to believe the TSPTalk family aspect does care but only if it applies to them. The TSPTalk family aspect is important to me. Yeah, I know this is a site to make investors millionaires.

PO

 

[alevin]

Hey PO, I got the search engines running again. I think that a recent firefox update messed things up, so I closed out firefox, restarted, went up to tools and hit the search tab there. that got things running again. going to the search dropdown from the window, where you can pick which search engines you want to work with, stayed inoperable until I went through the other hoops first.

Now that I've been forced to do some learning about roth tsp, which I hoped never to have to do...here's a sampling of what I learned:

1) They make you withdraw proportionally when you do a withdrawal after retirement, so the measley teeny (way less than <1% of my tsp that is now ROTH tsp) will get withdrawn over 30 years or more, assuming I go with lifetime payments and live that long. what a stupid thing to have to deal with.

2) The roth tsp must be in effect for 5 years before withdrawing, or they tax you on the earnings (commingled earnings on the teeny <1%Roth earnings with >99.9999 % proportionate tax-deferred withdrawal), every year you live til the whole tsp is gone or you did . Good Lord. Doesn't matter if you are over 59.5, doesn't matter if you are planning to retire in 2.5 years (me) and need your tsp monies then. What a god-awful paperchasing tax prep setup to have to deal with, due to accidental 6 payperiods of accidental roth tsp catchup late career, instead of tax-deferred tsp catchup. Did they do it on purpose? maybe.

3) I found an official TSP-U-2-R form online for tsp payroll people-uniformed services only. Uniformed services can get their roth tsp contributions recharacterized back to tax-deferred, apparently. The form is dated 2012. I didn't find it on the tsp site facing us normal people tho. And that form references another recharacterization form also, similar but little bit different scenario (TSP-U-2-D). That one I did not find anywhere online. at all.

4) No such payroll fix-it forms evidently exist to recharacterize civilian roth tsp contributions back to regular tsp contributions. nada, zip, zero. so much for similarities with roth iras in the outside world.

5) I can of course roll over (maybe) my ENTIRE tsp account to the outside world, to never return, which would allow me to direct the puny roth tsp $ to an existing roth account that has been in place for considerably longer than 5 years, and direct the regular tsp contributions to regular trad ira account that has been in place even longer. Just to get rid of the tax-prep nightmare and still be able to start taking tsp distributions without paying excess taxes on the roth tsp teensy $, 2.5 years from now (and for the following 5 years after that).

6) full withdrawal has consequences in terms of lack of protection from lawsuits, etc. One good reason to leave funds in tsp until needed. gad. 6 freaking payperiods and my retirement planning and "simple" management of retirement accounts and tax paperwork has just gone to h in a handbasket. recalibration required. I could use a drank right about now.

Thanks for the kind words of encouragement, even online-family matters, even if only providing a response allowing time for me to take deep breath, let the blood pressure drop, offer weak smile, wipe my runny nose, sniffle and try to move on-after I go find that drank.

 

[Tsunami]

Alevin,

Wow, that's awful! This is no help to you, but for others I thought I'd share my own TSP booboo I just discovered yesterday. I've never done this before but apparently I clicked the wrong link when I intended to make an IFT to the C fund a week ago. It turns out that the Contributions Allocation and Interfund Transfers buttons are right next to each other, and silly me, I apparently clicked on the wrong one. Since the following screens are identical, I didn't notice through the entire process that instead of moving from 100% G to 100% C in my TSP account balance, I was instead moving from 100% G to 100% C for my future allocations (which is fine, and actually something I should have done long ago).

I didn't discover my error (or I wonder if it's possible that it was the TSP that messed up and did this to me, similar to Fogsailing's recent fiasco... but there's no way to know since they don't send you an email showing what you did, only that you did something....hmm, maybe there's a conspiracy going on against TSPTalk members :blink:) until yesterday when I went in to make my 2nd/last IFT of the month. Naturally the mistake resulted in me losing a few thousand dollars instead of gaining, so no luck there. Argh. A few thousand dollars just for not paying attention to which button I clicked. So I thought I'd share this for others to not make the same mistake! On the bright side, I also manage my wife's TSP and at least I clicked the right button for her account.

P.S. for PO, I always appreciate your posts and do give a RR about what you have to say. :smile:

P.P.S Alevin, sounds like we could end up with the same retirement date. One of my dates that are scattered between Dec. 2018 (the point when the Windfall Elimination Provision no longer affects me since I will finally have 30 years of paying "substantial earnings" into Social Security) and the end of 2019 is 8/31/19. That date would work especially well for me since I turn 59-1/2 in Dec 2019, and if I do decide to roll over my TSP to an IRA then I could use my annual leave check to get me to the end of 2019 when I could start making IRA withdrawals. I'm pretty much taking it a month at a time at this point though. I started a new position last November that's working me to death (and for the first time ever no time to look at TSPTalk during work hours LOL), but the big salary bump is keeping me going.

 

[alevin]

Tsunami, sorry to hear about your own erroneous button-pushing. fortunately we've discovered these mishaps sooner than later could have been. Yuk yuk as Boghie would say. btw, where is Boghie these days? been awfully quiet for some time.

I hit the 59.5 mark before you, and target retirement date right now would be end of FY19 for me, per my most recent assessments of financial matters. that is unless agency undergoes rif before then. considering latest Presidential budget underappreciates my Department right now by a sizeable margin-which has substantial implications for my agency. what will be will be, on that one. More power to you if you can pencil it out to leave before 60 hits.

And yes, I love reading PO's practical musings and family contretemps and do give a rr, wish I had the way with words that he does. PO, you need to write a humor column in a local paper or online. post-retirement extra income. You could do it, easily. Male Erma Bombeck. seriously! And in case you're out there still wondering, PO, I teleworked from home latter end of the workweek, and did my changes today not on gov time but from .gov equip I haven't hauled back to the official desk yet. Posting here today done from personal puter after logging off the other macheen which is nearby at this point. Lugging the other macheen back to official desk on Monday is soon enough for that. big workload entails quiet uninterrupted mental concentration right now, cube farm and normal office noise levels not conducive to meeting impending deadlines. The location-juggling and the reasons behind it currently are known by those who matter. We all do what we have to, to keep higher ups happy, all while trying to keep body and soul together in decent state of repair enough to both afford and enjoy retirement when we get to that point.

 

[evilanne]

Posts today make me so happy to have taken early out!

I would check with your Personnel/HR office and TSP about the Roth contributions--it never hurts to ask.. As long as they were all in this calendar year, they should be able to fix it since it is at beginning of the year and long before W-2 will be issued for 2017. Whether they will or not may be a different story. There is no difference in the dollar amounts between Regular and Roth TSP, so that fix should be even easier to change. When I moved from WY to TX, they didn't input my TSP contributions but they were able to go back over 1-2 months to correct it, along with the government matching.

 

[alevin]

Posts today make me so happy to have taken early out!

I would check with your Personnel/HR office and TSP about the Roth contributions--it never hurts to ask.. As long as they were all in this calendar year, they should be able to fix it since it is at beginning of the year and long before W-2 will be issued for 2017. Whether they will or not may be a different story. There is no difference in the dollar amounts between Regular and Roth TSP, so that fix should be even easier to change. When I moved from WY to TX, they didn't input my TSP contributions but they were able to go back over 1-2 months to correct it, along with the government matching.

I figured I'll ask-nobody local to ask tho. will have to talk to a remote voice on a faraway phone at best. worth a shot, not hopeful. at least the matching only goes to regular tsp, no worries there. something else I learned along the way today while studying up on Roth tsp. as far as the contributions problem related to your move-wow, just wow. glad that got straightened out for you!

 

[PessOptimist]

Alevin, thanks for letting me vent and hijack your thread somewhat.

What evilanne said. It never hurts to ask and I tend to do more complaining about stuff at first than trying to fix it so check it out and let us know.

We too went through a reorganization of our HR people and for a while it was all e-mails and phone calls. You should establish a connection with one of them at wherever your HR function is. It worked for me.

Since I never can keep stories out of anything…I noticed today when I decided to go for a walk to get out of the office that there is actually a HR person in an office here. Never heard a thing about it. Kind of miss the days of being a mere tech and doing phone moves/adds. Then I knew when people left or came in. Maybe I should start micromanaging those tickets and…

Along that line Tsunami-

I started a new position last November that's working me to death (and for the first time ever no time to look at TSPTalk during work hours LOL), but the big salary bump is keeping me going.

I took a new position in May and all the rest applies except the time to look at TSPTalk. I didn’t want it, the departing incumbent said I was the best choice but he hated it, the team I was a member of convinced me that I had the most to gain (high three) and the least to lose (close to retirement). I don’t really regret it but would have loved to retire as a tech and not a boss.

Alevin, I really do not care who has time or is allowed to post on TSPTalk at work. I do like to mention that to some. I confess I do the same as you, I am set up to telework but no time is ever authorized. I do work and personnel stuff from home occasionally. Thanks for the reminder, I need to take .gov equip back to the office since there is some update that cannot be done over secure virtual network?? I will place it where I will remember to take it at oh-dark-30.

Thanks again for allowing me to vent in your home. I have a good job. I make a good hourly wage. I am not a general schedule employee. I just wish I was still a tech and qualified for the FERS 62+20 rule.

PO

 

[alevin]

PO, you are welcome in this thread anytime, as long as you tell a story when you are here. Dang, how quickly I refocused on getting the timesheet in this am after a bout of phys therapy in the early early am, meeting with the regional chief mid-day (would have to go back to DC to meet with anyone higher), and then getting into phone conference with long-distance work colleague mid-afternoon onward, on the project that is taking me into tele-time lately for quiet uninterrupted focused worktime. So focused I forgot all about trying to track down an HR person today, or a B&F person, whoever. :frown:

They've removed those payroll HR functions so far away geographically, that there is no way to develop personal relationship anymore. Submit an online ticket, wait anywhere from 1 hour to a couple days to get a response, by email or phone if lucky. No last names, they don't give out their direct line numbers. submit an online "ticket" for each infrequent contact need, never get the same person twice. Local HR payroll people scattered across the country all retired several years ago rather than move to another state for a brand new centralized location. We lost a huge amount of agency HR expertise right then and there, overnight, nationwide.

The agency has regained some of that vanished expertise over the years since then, but a little concerned for when I put in my papers-HR experience and knowledge of the nuances of the transition era from CSRS to FERS-is somewhat limited anymore. I came in during the FERS transition era, bought back some early early temporary time from the pre-FERS era along the way to boost my years of service for annuity and retirement date. spooks me a little worrying they will mess up the on-off-on-off (FICA time)-ontransition-off-ontransition-off-interim on- CSRS-final on-FERS destination work history stop/start dates time-in-service calculations.

Meantime, I still have to chase that darn Roth tsp catchup undo question this week, at least the stop order went through for last pp, and the start for the regular catchup got started. thanks for reminding me. I don't look at my own thread on a daily basis.:31:

 

[burrocrat]

View attachment 41288

one bite at a time.

 

[alevin]

thanks for dropping by, b. things are a bit dark, dreary and drippy around here with this spring weather, can use a little sunshine.

 

[FogSailing]

Hoping for some sunshine!

FS