does your mom send you her paintings when she misses you?

sounds like it was a great way to spend your 20th year. You thought of shrugging at that age? Or was it just an adventure?
For us, it has been a decision long in coming. and we did not want to do it-I guess in that way which would mean not keeping a home base in the country of our citizenship. In our line of work, it just so happens we saw the economic writing on the wall in advance of most of the US. and it became too depressing to watch scores of our start up clients lose their shirts because of idiot laws and regulations. and few legislators listen, even ones who seem smart and savvy. So we knew that 2008 was going to hit hard and we planned. and it wasn't becasue we watched the housing bubble. That bubble could have only happened if opportunities had vanished in other sectors. It was the only place left play around with. We each other that we would try the best we could to insulate ourselves the best we could from the next collapse and that we would lower our productivity substantially, change careers to enhance our lives but to starve the beast and use the beasts' own rules to our advantage (except govt programs-I am philosophically against that). There is no Gulch in the physical sense, in my opinion. I believe places like this site give us a gulch-like comradery as well as other avenues. One of my purposes now that I have more time to devote, is to ask relevant questions of like minded individuals about what and when and how some kind of galting becomes relevant. But I will do everything in my power to not unwittingly or wittingly help the US government destroy our Constitution and the nation I grew up in.