Sorry @Hoggirl, it was the “plenty of cash” part I meant as a reference to you.
I think this pandemic has made life at least a little “scary” for all of us.
Thinking about putting in a Craigslist ad: Will trade 401K for a thermometer.?
No pension here, only our savings. Lived frugally to be able to retire this year. (Was about 50/50 invested before Feb.). We definitely took the childhood story ,“The Ant and the Grasshopper”, to heart, and hoped to reap the benefits of savings. On one hand, we do have enough in cash for about 3 years (with no excessive inflation), so that certainly helps us sleep. But I still wonder at what cost, when years of savings are wiped out. Anyone else wonder if the Grasshoppers truly have the better idea?
I know how you feel, @kjofkw . We are in similar circumstances. I keep reminding myself that we are still better off than so many others. It’s how I stay sane.
@kjofkw, we’ve got to be happy that we know how to live within our means and make do with what we have. I know it’s really frustrating right now, and I have thought about pulling money out of the market over time, but in my opinion living below your means and planning for the future is still the right thing to do.
In a couple of years, when all this blows over and the market has recovered, you’ll have a big pile of money and the grasshoppers will still have none.
I am a person of truly minimal means compared to virtually all posters on this thread. But I must say that I find it difficult to believe that you just DON’T LOOK. This is not forever. What goes down will definitely go up, eventually.
@oldmom4896 - honestly, I haven’t looked in a couple of months. But I can do simple math 
I don’t look at our own accounts. But hard to “ignore” the situation when the first thing I see when I log on to the web, is the downward slide of the market.
I also know we are VERY fortunate to have any savings at all. It has been an emotional roller coaster. I vary from feeling times of panic, to optimism, to shame (since we even have savings when others are losing their jobs) to anger, to regret to ???. You name it! Anyone else?
I finally logged on to take a look. With the bounce back up last week, we are down about 15% overall. Not great, but it could be worse. Not sure how to value my real estate. The RE market is very weird right now.
Will we have a second drop down? Hmm.
A second drop from when? I thought we had about a dozen drops.
We could drop back down to 18,000 again. Or lower, as the reality of the global recession really starts sinking in.
Futures are lower.
I would not bet my house on futures any time soon. The markets get spooked so easily - Trump sneezes, look out below. 
That pretty much sums if up for me, too. H checks our retirement account too often; I don’t look at all any more. I persuaded him that we should move more of our retirement funds out of equities last year. Sure, we missed some upside but we’re sleeping well at night and I feel no need to obsess.
I stay on top of the routine bills, make sure the credit card is paid in full each month, and look to see what we’re no longer spending money on so I can divert those funds to more important needs such as unemployed nieces and nephews, the local food bank, etc.
These days I feel very glad that H was “retired” early and has a pension. We also have some deferred compensation payments that will fortuitously last two more years. I won’t deny that a lot of hard work, a certain level of expertise in our fields, and a good deal of frugality brought us to where we are now - but I also recognize Lady Luck who doesn’t bestow favors on everyone.
As Charles sang in Pippen, “It’s smarter to be lucky than it’s lucky to be smart.”
A little levity. Weeks ago my DIL suggested they buy shares of Zoom. Son only bought one share. A month ago, I never heard of Zoom. I asked DIL to pass on any other hunches she has.
We changed to Zoom at work last fall. I really don’t get the allure of video calls. In the office, you are typically doing other things, eating lunch, etc. Why would anyone want to see that or be seen?
Now that people are working from home, there is a sub-group of people who always pick the video option. To me it seems very middle school like. I am always dialing in with my phone with audio only. Last night I went to bed at 2am. Got up today at 6:30 and ran straight through the day with calls, emails, docs to draft/comment on, etc. Had a call at 3 with CEO of major client. He was bummed a couple of us were not on video. I hadn’t taken a shower and was wearing a baseball hat, glasses and a 25 year old ratty sweatshirt. No way I was going on video. And everyone should thank me for that actually. And I like to walk around while I talk on the phone (even in the office). Kept running the rest of the day. Had a quick dinner at 7:30 (watched Jeopardy), exercised for 45 minutes and took a shower at about 9pm. Worked again until 1am. Wash. Rinse. Repeat.
I personally also prefer audio only, except perhaps the presenter or facilitator. I don’t see why I need yo be seen if I am only playing a peripheral role.
I used to think that way. But a huge percentage of communication is non verbal, and I find meetings more interesting and effective when I can see my coworkers.
Especially now that we are all trapped in our houses, it provides a social element as well that is important, that audio only can’t duplicate IMO.
In my field though, no one cares if you are wearing a baseball cap and an old sweatshirt. And no one can tell if you’ve showered or not.
If you are working 18 hour days on a regular basis, that’s a different problem.
I know a lot of people who are unemployed or who have very little work to do (and sometimes none both of which lead to unemployment at some point). If I tell clients “hey, I’ve hit 8 hours already, I am clocking out and will get to your stuff tomorrow” I likely will be joining those people.
BTW, there is a good chance the CEO was wearing a suit and tie in his house. He had to walk away from his computer and tell 3 teens in his house to get off the WiFi when his audio was getting garbled. I have heard about several people where I work who have been wearing shirts and ties every day at home. Different people have different coping mechanisms.