Got another bit of good stock news today. 3M raised its dividend - effective next quarter. It went from .69/share/quarter to now .88/share/quarter.

The other good news is that I got the good news from Seeking Alpha, which I seem to like much better than The Motley Fool, or Value Line, or the WSJ or Barrons or IBD. Plus, the email alerts are just enough.

Intimate emergency fund = $28.34.

The Grim reaper has been busy this past week - several have come close (Harold Camping was on a list last year, and someone had Kim Jong-il's sister and wife of the guy who got executed last week).

And .... amazingly, 2 million visits.

I am still partially knocked out from the flu but several other neat-o things happened.

I am now at 172, by the gym scale reckoning. I do have a trainer for 30 minute sessions. She is particularly helpful for posture, balance and Pilates-type moves. Basically back, core and glutes. I can do a number of exercises at home. One set I'm to do every day and its just like a free chiropractor visit.

I opened a mail piece from my transfer agent. I also have Oshkosh Truck. Its value has been picking up in the last year, but I bought for sentimental reasons - sister and I grew up about 8 miles from Oshkosh. I rarely talk about it because you can buy but it doesn't pay a dividend. Hah! It has returned to paying a 15 cent/share dividend which has been reinvested. Yeah!

Finished my Christmas shopping last week.

I hope everybody had a tasty and reasonably low key Thanksgiving. I hosted a small group (3) and all parties were "just in case" potluck people. You have the chips and salsa people who come to a potluck with the minimum; and then you have the 180 degree style - us. There's the dish, and then what if they had no serving spoon so that goes, and then it turns into "just in case", and suddenly you are lugging half of your kitchen. So we had a lot of food for just the three of us. Leftovers for a week!

Last week my drp stock portfolio crossed a milestone. I got a 100% return. Specifically, I put about 26K worth of contributions over the past 10+ years, and now my portfolio is at 53K. Total stock portfolio worth also includes about 6K of reinvested dividends.

So far, I'm still ahead in the death pool pool. Fingers crossed, but somehow December is busy for death.

In addition to the 50K Drp stock portfolio, I also passed 200K in the 403B.

For a more intimate milestone, in the past 4 years that I've been picking up change, I'm about to hit $300 in change acquisition. And that's counting silver dimes as dimes, not melt value.

So some actual fiscal news - with the stock market highs, my dividend reinvestment stock portfolio has gone above 50K. It's good if you like hitting that milestone, but not so great if you realize that with high stock prices, reinvested dividends buy fewer shares. The perfect pricing situation would be a low, consistent price for a long period of time.

I'm not playing the snowflake challenge particularly, but a big fat one came to me this last Saturday. One of the other condo tenants approached me about renting my interior garage parking space. Since I don't have a car and for the moment am willing to go carless, well yay, the parking space now is an asset. Asking around - the going rate seems to be about 100$/month.

The only issue I see is I have talked to a contractor about renovating my 1980s condo kitchen, and we talked about the parking space as a launch pad for materials - it would be much easier, safer, better for the materials in question if they were semi-inside on my parking space where the sub contractors can pull them when needed. Of course, I'd need to approach both the condo board and my possible parking space rentor about it.

There was a hitch in the sectional - just like amino acids, they have an asymetric handedness (left hand vs right hand). And just like amino acids, the left handed version is common, while the right hand is either toxic (as in amino acids) or has to be special ordered (as in my right-handed sectional). So I've bought the chairs first, then I disperse them to their corners when the sectional comes. None of these chairs are going to get heavy duty use for long periods of time, so I've cheaped out on them.

Discovered as I checked my Drp stocks that two of my stocks migrated from one transfer agent to another. Hadn't run across that before. All to the good frankly - the fewer transfer agents, the fewer passwords I'd have to remember.

Its been 10 days since I last wrote. Not that much has happened:

Got evaluated at work, and did smashing. I did read though that our medical insurance is going up double digits so who knows if a smashing evaluation translates into a raise.

Did the Gumshoe but did not win. Paulette did the Gumshoe and she did not win. We made plans next year to do the Gumshoe together ... and not win.

Working on the mosaic business numbers. Am about 30% done. Don't know if I'll get them done before Argentina, but we will see. Went online to vistaprint and did up a $10 box of business cards.

Got the first notification of what our 403B fees are or will be, with a lunch meeting about it next week.

KO split on Monday. 246 shares. Yippee!

Been hotter than blazes lately up here in the northwest corner. In addition, I've been averaging 2-3 hot flashes/day.

But all in all, it feels like the calm before the storm. I don't think the storm will happen before the Argentina trip, but mostly after. And by a "storm" I mean a complete change in my routine. Things feel different, like the routine that I have I will not have too much longer.

I do have one change already - my current trainer left the gym and I have to decide whether the new spot is convenient enough that I can work it, namely get there by public transit within 15 minutes. If not, I think I will see if and how I can get by with just me. I say that, but the last time I said it I was 20 pounds heavier. Right now, altho I'm stalled in the mid 160's, I feel that really ... 150s is about the right weight and I'm pretty close. And without gym, I can get some real savings in for the "storm" to come.

I don't usually talk about shopping, but I will today. Today was the first day of a "City" Target located smack dab in the middle of Seattle. Last year, I opened up a Target DRIP and became a Target shareholder, so while I did a little shopping (sliced turkey breast for $5/lb), I did mucho research.

The place was packed - plenty of business being done. An excellent addition to a once nasty block where you now can get lunch fixings, a sport bra, feminine products, hardware, furniture, an iPad, a wheeley suitcase, cards and wrapping paper... not that you couldn't get them before in downtown Seattle, you would have to run a 2 hr steeplechase through at least 7 stores. And you still wouldn't be able to find a hardware store.

So I'm stoked. I'm stoked that I can shop at it, stoked that it really opens up that once incredibly nasty block (2nd & Pike), and I'm stoked that I'm a shareholder to it.

So I was the jury alternate, the spare in case something happened to the other 12. The other 12 are now in deliberations, and I was released. I'm still not to talk about the case until it is over, but the court will call me when that happens.

As far as fiscal is concerned, I had a very merry time eating lunch at restaurants, not going to the gym, etc. Gym and the trainer cost bucks, so having to cancel means despite eating at restaurants I've been saving a bit than usual.

Excited that KO stock will split 2 to 1 in August. It doubles the shares, halves the price. It halves the dividend but since twice as many shares are generating the dividend one would get the same dividend ... however if you reinvest the dividend, at half the share price you buy twice as many shares, which then get reinvested. Right now I have about 123 shares, which will soon be 246 shares. The $60/quarter in dividend (not changed) will soon buy almost 2 shares/quarter.

This week I formally asked for and got time to take the trip to Argentina. I knew I could get it - had plenty of PTO - but its a point of pride not to leave my boss hanging. I'm also taking a number of days off.

As a shareholder of KO, I got the shareholder proxy vote for the 2 for 1 stock split. Voted yes. So much less drama than voting for a person ... and yes I firmly believe that corporations are not people.

Sister's birthday gift is progressing nicely. I've glued the mosaic pieces together. I'll buy the thinset this weekend.

Contractor is tearing down the Greenwood Market building this week. I watched through the hurricane fence and saw the big gaping holes in the front of the building dug out by the dozers. Never had the lowest prices, but they were the most conscientious.

Am holding at 164.2, ready for the next drop down. My lowest weight in the modern era is 163.6.

Took a look at the 403B - its all knit together into one account. Now to figure out how I want to rebalance things.

Looked at my not-so little drip portfolio. Still hanging in there pretty well. I've shut off adding to two companies WEC and IP, but I'm adding to TGT. I am ashamed to say that I am following the JP Morgan trading issue with more than a little amusement.

555 doings: I've been off and on with the water. The beef soup helped last week, but this week I'm going to drink it. I'm taking two days off this week, so those days along with the weekend means that I'll get the 8 hours those days. Had a six-colored salad with my sliced turkey on Friday. Today, when I stowed my clean gym clothes in a storage locker I realized that I could put some of them on and work out for an hour, so FINALLY I met a new 555 requirement. (5 workouts at the gym without a trainer...got 1). During the little workout, I used the interval setting on the bike which I NEVER did before and used the stretching machine which I also NEVER used before (do or use 5 new exercises ... so far I have 3).

Well, possibly. I know, I know, when a stock splits two to one, I get twice as many shares for half the price. Net worth is the same. KO pays a dividend, and after the split that is also halved to keep the dividend from doubling.

Still it makes me giddy - not necessarily right away, but afterward because a year or two later, when the dividend rises by a penny, it for all intents and purposes rises by two pennies. I have enough that when I reinvest I buy an additional share, after the split I buy two. (the dividend amount stays the same, but if the share price drops I buy twice as much)

I remember about 8-9 years ago when I would dutifully put in $50 into KO, and when it was in the low to mid 40s, I would buy at least one. Now its at around 75$, and I look forward after the split (75/2) to perhaps buy a little bit more.

Much better for the waistline if I buy a Coke share rather than a Coke.