baselle's Financial Diary

Saving log - $3 tip box
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $15 chirashi lunch

Payday is tomorrow and I was up around $200, so in celebration I had the chirashi sushi lunch.

I was weighed today in gym. Still holding at 185, but I lost 1/2 inch on the hips and waist since Paris. Since I started, I've lost 7 inches on the hips and 7 around the waist. (We didn't have enough time to measure the rest.) My body fat dropped, so instead of simply losing 25 pounds, I've really lost 40 pounds of fat and gained 15 pounds of muscle.

The trainer asked me if I would indulge her in a demonstration. She, along with another trainer, helped me into a 40 pound vest. We took a stroll around the gym and went up the stairs. It all came back - the sluggishness, the shortness of breath, and while my joints didn't hurt they were unhappy. Actually, I was worse off then - I didn't have the extra 15 pounds of muscle to help me out. When they took the vest off I felt I could fly to the ceiling!

I'll have to remember this while I'm offered that next piece of cake.

Saving log - $3 tip box
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $9 lunch +$13 Fred Meyer

Ever since I photographed that penny stuck in the blacktop, I've been averaging finding a penny/day. The least likely place that I found a penny was in front of my neighborhood ATM machine. Too busy collecting those 2 twenties to notice the cent at your feet?

My little fiscal project for the summer was to move my 3 recurring monthly charges from my credit card to my debit card, because I found out this spring my credit card was going to increase the interest rate on deadbeats from 9% to 12%.

ISP - $19.95/month - moved to debit
Netflix - $10.88/month - moved to debit
NYT newspaper - $49/month (will increase beginning next week) - still on credit.

Not that I hadn't tried to get the third one off. Its weird, but the NYT customer service told me over the phone that my card must be a credit card, not a debit card. Doesn't matter if it has the little Mastercard logo on it, no sirree bub, picky about the plastic.

I suspect that the NYT has an old validation algorithm. All credit cards have them, because they are supposed to have valid and invalid numbers in fairly random patterns. Think about it. If you gave out credit cards in sequential order, it would mean that you wouldn't have to steal a number - pick any number and you could steal anyone's credit. Anyway, I suspect that debit cards use a different algorithm and the NYT just doesn't have them.

I'll move the NYT to my bank credit card, along with charging the trainer's time. If nothing else, it consolidates a couple of accounts. I plan to keep the old credit card account open, but not use it.

Made a little purchase at Fred Meyer - something that would have been sci-fi to me 2 years ago - I bought lifting gloves for gym. Yesterday, even though the gym was air conditioned, my palms were sweating so much that the bars were slippery and it was difficult to grip. The weights I'm using for the upper body are in the (drumroll) 60-70 lb range. Not like you can tell by looking at me!

Saving log - $3 tip box
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $5.50 lunch + $14.50 groceries

Most of the fun I have catching up with my credit card is that I can spend the cc payment on things I like - namely assets that pay dividends. I've put $500 on one of my DRPs, the one whose transfer agent is on the poky side. It looks like the transfer agent buys the stock once/quarter, but its hard to tell. If I think that the transfer agent is inefficient, then I'm not excited to put a little something in every month - I much prefer to wait until I have a chunk of money to put in. The stock price on that DRP (MI) has been see-sawing a bit, but its been down. I hope it goes down some more during the time that the transfer agent finally buys it.

As I was telling my DH, I didn't really mean to test 4 different cost averaging buying styles. Style 1 (MMM), where the transfer agent dependably buys the stock on Friday if you get it to them by the following Tuesday, I've been playing it like a tennis ball - sending money back as soon as I get the form. Style 2 (KO), where I have electronic deposit at $1/transfer, I allow the account to take out $51/month for a $50 buy. (sucks - that's like a 2% fee). Style 3 (WEC), where the transfer agent buys twice/month, I've treating a bit like style 1. Style 4 (MI), transfer agent is poky, so I buy in a lump when I can.

I can't really tell the difference in results. But it is easiest to buy on the dips if the transfer agent is dependable, so I've acquired those shares quickly.

Found a great deal on frozen corn - .99/bag. I was walking home, though, and I didn't have the energy to lug a lot of bags, not to mention its hotter than -h right now and I didn't want it to go bad. So I bought only 2 bags and called it a score.

...well, the license plate on the car he would drive. Wouldn't work as a getaway car.

Saving log - $0
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $20 chiropractor + $5 curry lunch

Sister called me at work. The final hurdle for the sale of the second piece of land was that the town council had to approve it. It went through without a hitch. Apparently they approved it in about 2 seconds, sister said.

I expect that the estate will be finalized rapidly now, within a couple of months.

Sister went with her insurance agent, and paid the insurance for the farmette. We are now joint owners of the farmette. We talked a bit about getting a joint account in both sister's and my names, just in case sister got struck by lightening or something, and then we talked about plans.

I had to catch her a bit. She's having the foundation on the house redone for $5000. The site assessment for the solar panels came in at about $400 (a copy is to be sent to me), and they are interested in selling sister two lines of solar panels, each for $30K! Apparently there is a rebate of $4K/line, but I still had to remind her that she has now mentally spent $60K!

I'm not saying bad, I said, I'm saying be aware and slow down. Two big projects - tops - per year, so you can keep an eye on the work. Part of the usefulness of the joint account is that it provides a natural budget line. Put a certain amount in yearly and don't add more upon the pain of death. And I was thinking somewhere around 25K for each of us this year!

I also told her that I thought that the slowing real estate market would work somewhat to our advantage - a contractor with no jobs will start to work lean and pay attention to us. We could get a better deal somehow. We would be small, but we could keep someone eating next year.

I feel like the bean counter/ emotional brake/ killjoy here. I want this to work out. I want my sister to be happy. I don't want to be taken for a ride. And if sister buys me out in 5 years I at least don't want to lose too much money.

Saving log - $0 tip box (but with a twist)
Spending log - $3.28 coffee, bagel

Found this article about the proliferation of tip jars in the Christian Science Monitor

So last week we had the Duvall friends over for dinner and Paris pics. They have a few acres, ducks, chickens, a little garden. They also will have a lot of blackberries, blueberries and raspberries. And they want to have a berry picking/ processing party and learn to can.

Well, I'm a pro at waterbath canning, and the possibility of whipping up a few dozen Christmas gifts (jam, sauce, syrup) is highly appealing. So I'm coming with the waterbath canner, the racks, funnel, magnetic lid grabber, recipes, and know-how.

Tonight we had another set of friends that we hadn't seen in a couple of years. Lo and behold, while the late July - early August didn't work for them, they have several dozen canning jars to contribute. A couple will come back filled as a thank you.

Now for the lids and the sugar. Grocery store time. You just don't want to teach people bad habits, and reusing lids is a bad habit. The seal doesn't form right.

The Duvall friends also want to learn to pressure can. We need another friend for later!

Saving log - $3 tip box
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $10 lunch + $20 energy bars

Found the 10 for $10 deal on energy bars at my local Fred Meyer. Its a semi-weird place for me to find food items. I know that the general rule is not to buy items out of place (eg. batteries are usually a bad buy at the grocery store), but being frugal means keeping an open mind and an up-to-date price book.

Also noted that the HT (asian grocery store) has fruit and vegetable prices about a dime cheaper than anywhere else. Including potatoes. At Uwajimaya - another asian grocery store - I saw a package that made me wince. Vermont curry, with a touch of apple and maple (?). Yipes.

Savings log - $0
Spending log - $3.28 coffee, bagel + $16 gym shorts

It was 80 today. I wore shorts in public for the first time in 10 years. Actually they were gym shorts, so my trainer was excited too.

The second insurance estimate for the farmette was even a better price than the first one, which is a little weird to me.

Hope you all had a great fourth! The Lake Union fireworks show was lovely, but the 1 hr traffic jam at the end was a nightmare.

Savings log - $0
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk +20$ chiropractor +$7 lunch + $9 in the ear earbuds

Found 3 pennies on the sidewalk and in the street. Lately I've been finding them all dinged and beaten up as if they have been coming up from the blacktop.

Everybody's been in and out at work. A stylistic thing for a Wednesday holiday. Do you treat Wednesday as a last day of a little break or the first day of one?

Picked up some in the in-the-ear earbuds to give my ears a rest from the headphones. The headphones are great, but the ear cups press against my ears which pinch against my glasses.

The image today is in honor of Dollars for Dough Nuts for her quest to find vacation lodging.

Just three events:

1.) Sister and I will be formally deeded the farmette on July 8, so we have to transfer and get property insurance in our name by that time. Sister talked to one of our great aunts in the area, and she got a good estimate that we probably will go with. (good enough, I think, that we probably got the family estimate) Another insurance agent will drive by this afternoon, so we'll know what the non-family estimate is.

2.) In the high-interest account that I'm using to my sister for farmette use, it has already made $27 in interest.

3.) After paying off all my top of the month obligations and looking at my slightly increasing savings in teeny brick and mortar savings account, I transferred 200$ into PayPal.

Yesterday, I made my first political contribution. $100.

The day before, during the co worker going away lunch, I sat next to another co worker who I had worked with off and on for about 6 years (right now, off). I was pleasantly surprised to find out two things - 1.) he lived fairly close, in the Licton Springs/Northgate neighborhood (another North Seattle neighborhood) 2.) he was running for the Seattle school board.

I found out some interesting things. It costs about $30,000 to run a school board campaign, and currently he has about $2000. He has nearly got a website up and running which means that he can take PayPal, however, he's running into a chicken and egg problem (needs money to get the website up, but the average high-tech Seattlite is loath to write a check). We had interesting chat about the Supreme Court decision against the Seattle Public Schools.

I asked him for more information, he provided it, I wrote him a check large enough so that I'm memorable. I consider it my version of Prosper.com. We'll see what happens next.

I also promised to link his campaign site to my blog. I'm only going to link it to Sites I Frequent so as not to be too obtrusive. (this blog's about me, darn it!) If you are reading me from North Seattle, check the link out.

Snapshot of net worth, first half of 2007

$128,217.03 IRA/403(B)*
$13,387.24 stock (4 DRPs)
$25,812.64 EE bonds, I bonds, T bills
$7,227.60 ING, PayPal savings
$1,777.12 immediate cash in checking/savings
----
$176,421.63 grand total

*Again, I've added about 40K to Vanguard, which I plan put into Roth IRAs in subsequent years.

I received the 3rd disbursement of the inheritance in March, which is why it jumped so. (No brilliance of my own, only the ability not to spend it!) I received a 4th disbursement in very late June. Because a chunk of it will be sent to sister to fund the joint account that will take care of the farmette, I decided to wait and count what was left of the funds in December 2007.

My ING/paypal accounts dipped a bit due to the Paris trip.

June 2007 ($176,422 total, $48,205 in taxable accounts)
By comparison:
Dec 2006 ($132,062 total, $40,329)
June 2006 ($120,261 total, $65,148)
Dec 2005 ($67,778 total, $23,740)
June 2005 ($46,115 total, $11,293)
Dec 2004 ($38,338 total, $7,558)
June 2004 ($29,050 total, $4,533)

Saving log - $7
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $10 lunch

Heard a funny, semi-financial story at lunch today. An acquaintance (just met her, not a friend yet) told us her boss was so, ahem bossy, that she took her laptop on her honeymoon to read emails. Actually, she only could plan to take her laptop to read emails; her admin got a call from said boss that she accidentally left her laptop at the security line at the airport. The boss said, its an HP, security knows about it, please have them ship it to me at the hotel room. Fine, the admin thought, and did what was asked.

The next day the admin got a call. The boss again, a bit chastened. Got the HP just fine, but it turns out that she remembered that her laptop was really a Dell.

Wow, I thought. This is a genius way to get an upgrade. Pick a laptop you like, leave your own crappy laptop in the security line, and just arrange for the TSA to make the delivery.

So later on at lunch it turns out that the acquaintance is sitting through interviews. The admin is leaving.

I leaned in and said in a low voice...
You can tell us. Is she keeping the HP or the Dell?

Saving log - $0
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $4.34 girly supplies + $15 lunch

Two coworkers going away parties - one a lunch, one an afternoon cake and ice cream party. I claimed that I couldn't have too much cake and ice cream because the trainer could smell it on my breath.

On the more interesting front, sister and I will be deeded the house, barn, sheds and 7 acres Saturday June 30. Sister thinks that half and half on the joint account is a fantastic idea. She's into thinking about the upgrades - solar panels and electrical, which is okay, but I'm more interested in covering the taxes, better security and insurance. Cover the bases and ease into ownership, nothing too crazy. My fear is that while sister is there weekends and dad's friends keep an eye...its just not enough. We improve the electrical, which means copper, great, but copper prices are now high; copper turns into a "magnet" (hah couldn't resist) for thieves. If you put good stuff in, you now have to live there. Its not like they will give you a break and try to rob you during daylight.

The Wisconsin DNR (Department of Natural Resources) is already doing stuff. (Of course its now their property!) Sister asked and they've told her, which she's getting a big kick out of. They've sprayed the old fields with roundup last week, and are re-seeding with prairie grass and flowers, will cut 2-3 times a year, and burn the fields once every 3-5 years, to simulate wildfires. They're going to assess how they will restore the wetlands this fall. They seem to be very communicative and open - a very welcome development.

That's a penny embedded in the black top. I walk in that crosswalk every day and pass it by. Sigh. Its dead, Jim. Let it go!

Saving log - $4 tip box
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $10 lunch and groceries

Deposited my tip box money today. It was a little lighter this month - $40. I found .58 cents in the oddest place today, at work, right where we touch our security cards to get into work. The coins were just sprayed out in the hallway. I mean we are a non-profit, but cripes that's weird.

Saving log - $5 tip box
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $5.45 lunch

Nothing, nothing, nothing happened today. I mean I always think of something to write about, but today absolutely nothing financial happened to me. (Okay, when I got back from an hour of gym, I got 22 messages, all from a fax machine.) So little has happened today that all I'm going to do is post the image, tell a story, and get outta here.

Its summer, and the poppies are out...


Which reminds me of a story.

Back in the 80s, I went to a housewarming party in West Seattle. It was a charming little place, tiny front yard with a little deck, and a high fence. I went into the backyard and came chest to face with a clump of 4 foot high red poppies, the flower and ovary capsule swelled up the size of a baseball. The real (ahem, illegal to grow in the US) thing, if you know what I mean. I remarked on it to the new owner ... how could I not? He smiled and told me that when he moved in the entire garden was comprised of two plants - these huge poppies, and dill (!) While he enjoyed opium poppies as well as the next knowledgable non-DEA agent, he wanted a little more variety. So he dug all of the dill and most of the poppies out and composted them.

A couple of days later, some of the older neighbors came to visit, and were very, very disappointed to find that the new owner had dug most everything out. It turns out that the old owner was the daughter of a Chinese missionary and used to make a "medicinal tea" with the poppy leaves. The neighbors remembered with a certain amount of fondness that they would all sit around, sipping tea and dreaming about how they would renovate the kitchen.

So I say to you ... if you want to get away with something, have a good story. Don't want your opium den busted? Invite your neighbors over for tea and dreams.

The credit card check got posted to my account. I'm caught up, with about $60 in total debt. Hah.

I have about $300 left in my checking account to last me 4 days, so I put in another $150 into my Paypal account, which is in itself paying 5.02% interest. If I have $300 in checking by this time of the month its really not doing me any good. I'd much prefer $100 - $150.

Will be seeing what this paycheck is going to look like - I couldn't get a fix on the last paycheck because it has retro pay on it. With the pay raises, I plan on hiking up the monthly amounts I put into savings. How much depends on what I see in the next paycheck.

My newspaper subscription is going up by an estimated $3/month.

From Friday
Saving log - $4 tip box
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $15 lunch + $40 DRP

Saturday
Saving log - $0
Spending log - $11 breakfast (all meals include tip, FYI) + $44 groceries + $1.85 iced coffee

Friday, not much big happened, so its cleanup of a couple of things. I seem to have lost 3 lbs, so I'm at 184, and now I seem to be back at pre-Paris shape. I'm on a little roll, so I'm aiming to be in the 170s by mid-July.

DJ friend is now in New York, so its time to develop a tight working relationship with my other employee, getting her started on a couple of important projects.

Got a chiropractic adjustment. So much for the "neck adjustment of death." I feel like a daredevil.

Saturday, DH and I checked out a new-to-us large chain Chinese grocery. So far, the best prices of produce. I'm happiest when the produce prices are under $1/lb. I eat more in season that way. Found a splurge - $5 screw container of tea-flavored pumpkin seeds. (Gotta be careful not to eat them all at once!)

I've made it another goal to use fewer plastic grocery bags. It's not a crime to get them - I reuse the bags as wastebasket liners - but the grocery baggers seem to put five items per bag, leaving you to carry 8-10 bags. When you walk out of the store, with your 4-5 bag handles on each wrist, you look like a dog walker of plastic bags. Then when you get home you have to bag up a zillion bags. Its all just so wasteful. Anyway, I've put a collection of 3 cloth totebags in the car on the passenger side floor. If we bring them, we'll use them and if I see them when I get out of the car, it reminds me to grab at least one. The final step is to get the baggers to fill them.

Made it to the Greenwood Car Show in our neighborhood. Nicely restored cars and admirers for 20 blocks, but I was tired and looked at just the ones along my two blocks, then got an iced coffee and people watched for a half an hour.

the lawyer friend's partner (lfp). Just the two of us. Lawyer friend is on the east coast. We went to a 20 yr favorite place of mine - my hideout - and chatted about blogging.

Blogging is such a weird activity, when you think about it.

Are you writing for you, audience be dammed, or are you writing for a following?

What if nothing happens that day? Or if you only like posting 1-2 entries/ day, what if a lot happens?

How anonymous, that is, how descriptive should you be? Lively descriptions and observations make for good reading, but it makes it easy for the real life people to find themselves. Then if an entry is heartfelt - when the word gets out, klablam! Actually, if a blog gets big enough, that issue gets a little easier. Imagine pawing through 502 entries of mine to get to the 1 entry that I skewer you. Just ignore that search button. Please.

And on top of that, it does take a certain strange dogged quality to keep these logs up.

At the end, I bought, which is why I logged in a $20 lunch. lfp will have my back at the next lunch.

Saving log - $0
Spending log - $1.25 coffee + 20$ lunch

I was sort of a bad girl today, along with all the other bad girls today. Our workplace has an all-staff meeting once a month. I planned to miss and I slept in a bit. Evil, no? There was only one piece of info at the meeting that I wanted to know, and I found it out after the meeting. (if you got an evaluation rating of 3 or greater, 4.5% raise). Whenever I do miss those all-staffs, I claim that I'm doing everyone a favor - the room limit is only for 120 people, yet if we have everyone in, its 140. Missing the all-staff makes the room safer.

But I didn't sleep in too much. The large inheritance check from last weekend had been kicking around the house for a few days and it really should be put to work. My plan was to deposit it while the all-staff was happening. And the larger the check, the longer it takes...you have to say no many more times.

One of the local banks has an ad in the window for their CD rates visible from the bus. 5.6% for 11 months. Best rate I've seen for a brick and mortar bank in Seattle. So I stood at the door at 8:59am, and I must have looked prosperous, because the manager came and unlocked the door, and we began.

It turned out that 5.6% CD was the rate if you had a number of accounts with them and you banked with them before, but I did manage to get 5.4% out of them, splitting my check into a 40K CD and the 26K and change in a high interest checking, which I wanted in case sister was interested in the joint account. The manager was friendly, and had a good poker face when I told him about the inheritance and presented the check. I also got a tote bag and a water bottle.

The manager did a soft pull of my credit rating. 808. A little bit of gossip - I told him that I looked for this bank in bankrate.com. He told me that they used to advertise there (they have online banking), but they got too much "east coast" money. So Tony Soprano banks here, I joked. He laughed, but it turns out that the real issue that it would come in easily and electronically due to the high interest rate, and it would flow out just as easily if someone else gave them a better rate. So they just advertise in the window for local money.

All in all, it took about 40 minutes of signing and printing out materials. Pretty easy, and they were very friendly. I wonder if after I left and turned the corner that the manager whooped for joy. The romantic in me likes to think so.

N.B.: tote bag is in the car. Sturdy, well made, good green color, its turning into the grocery produce shopping bag.

Saving log - $1
Spending log - $1.25 coffee + $7 lunch

A mostly workplace entry.

Got a note from the payroll person that there was a possibility that I was underpaid in the retro pay. I emailed back that what I got was a bit higher but pretty close to what I thought I was getting. Turns out she got over excited.

And I still get asked whether I use my science degree. Of course I do - I make predictions and then I test them. I'm sometimes right, even.

I missed my chiropractor appointment - the night before, I read an article on MSNBC about neck adjustments and freaked. Took me a couple of days to reconcile the article with my experience. Used my science degree for that one, too.

Every quarter we can adjust our 403B withholdings. What with the promotion and a new upward salary adjustment I shot the moon and went for 15%.

And right now I know of two other co workers who are leaving, 1 a surprise, 1 not. Lawyer friend is back east with his dad.

The Internet radio station is up and running!

Saving log - $0
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $7 lunch

What's left on the inheritance is for the proceeds on the property that the Wisconsin DNR bought are to be divided up between sister and I. Then the house, barn, sheds, and the 7 acres left (aka the farmette) are to be deeded to the two of us equally. I emailed my sister a proposal that we form a joint savings account that each of us contributes equally to pay for insurance, taxes, maintenance and upgrades.

I figure that this account would give sister some flexibility to pay what needs to be paid, it earmarks money to the farmette, it would set up a natural limit on spending, and it wouldn't hurt to put it in a vehicle that will pay us in interest while we make thoughtful decisions.

Sister mentioned the possibility of "buying me out" of the farmette in about 5 years. I also think if each of us puts equal amounts into an account like this it would make the accounting at that time a lot easier. Nothing like avoiding a "you spent this, but I spent this" fight.

Wonder what she thinks about this?

I couldn't resist! I can't imagine that I even had 500 things to say...

Saving log - $0
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $6 lunch

Just thought I'd write up something different...

Saturday my bus stop got a shelter that it didn't have on Friday. It was amazing that it was built so quickly, but it was a bummer too. It means that this so-called temporary bus stop is now the permanent bus-stop. R.I.P former, convenient, all buses stopping bus stop. Sigh.

Oh yes, note to Metro transit: with the shelter we now need a big wastebasket. When you have people sitting down away from the elements, you get litter.

So last Saturday I felt (and might have written) that I was riding with the transit amateurs. Transit amateurs just don't know the rules of the bus - boyfriends stand in the aisle next to their girlfriends even though they are corking up the aisle for other people even when the driver tells him not to - people looking confused when they pay (to be fair, a bus going toward downtown you pay getting on, a bus leaving downtown you pay getting off. Not foolproof) - people even not remembering to hang onto rails - people really, really wanting a window or an aisle - and everyone with a duffle bag or a backpack that you're just wearing. Cripes, its Saturday, and you're heading to festival in the city. Whatever happened to the wallet and the clif bar?

So some new professional bus transit tips...
1. Use the penguin hold for your backpack if you are standing in the aisle. Its simple - take your backpack off, pretend its a penguin chick and stick it between your feet. You won't bash someone in the face.
2. I hate the window and being constricted and I'm going to sit in the aisle seat and sigh loudly if someone goes to the window seat. Get over yourself. You're in a community of transit riders for a 30 minutes. Play with others even if you're sitting in a seat you hate.
3. Couples - its okay if you aren't sitting or standing together. Just get off at the same stop. Are you that worried that another bus rider is going to steal your girl away? And we are all going to laugh if you call each other on the cell phone.
4. Don't annoy the professional riders by asking us "what's this bus like during the week?" or "I'll bet its real quiet on the weekdays." If you want to know, ride the bus during the week.

And here is the best tip for busriding in Seattle.

1. Watch and learn where your bus goes along its route, and look at other bus numbers at the stops it stops at. It means that:
The more routes you know and the greater the willingness to walk means you have more flexibility in the buses you can take.
If there are a ton of people at the stop you are waiting at, backstep and wait at the stop before the stop with a ton of people at it. (You'll probably get a seat.)

Saving log - $lots, see later in the post
Spending log - $20 for 2 breakfasts, $5 lemonade

This weekend's the Fremont Fair, which I usually don't go to even though its free - it just concentrates badly behaved people - but I wanted to see the art cars. I didn't realize that Seattle hosted the 3rd largest art car gathering in the US.

Here's one using materials familiar to a blogger:


This one can only be described as a tart car, with black bras and curlers on the top:


A working fountain on the hood?


This one has a wicked sculptural quality to it - the top of the windshield has the words 'outta my way' in mirror image, so you could see them that way in your rear view mirror.


Art cars intersect with frugality in weird sorts of ways. For instance, the one thing that art cars share is that the car part is all paid off; I'm sure that GM Financing takes a very dim view of gluing black bras on the hood of a car that you are still paying on. . In most cases, the materials used as a motif for the car - discs, lingerie, beads, chalk, paint, match box cars, pennies - are usually cheap or worthless. Making something out of nothing, as it were. And you have to be very, very willing to live with and still use the results.

Today I also received the 4th payment from dad's estate. The state of Wisconsin signed off and is buying our 2nd piece of property, but that money hasn't come into the estate yet. With this 4th payment, the sale of the first property is now divided up between sister and I. The amount is small enough so it would be FDIC insured as a CD, but large enough that its weird to see it as a simple slip of paper. Shouldn't it have a gilt frame or something?

Saving log - $5 tip box
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $15 lunch

Had to do work that required a lot of thought, so I had the expensive raw fish chirashi lunch today.

We switched to electronic payroll, so no more flapping paycheck stubs, but it was different to get the settings to log in, set up the account, set up a password. But it was worth it in the end, because I could see 9 months worth of paystubs, my 2006 W2, and a couple of paycheck calculators.

The pay raise was a bit higher, and the current paycheck with that little bit of retroactive pay slightly higher than I predicted.

Made a new category called Paris and put the photo entries in it, so the trip and pics are just a click away.

Wednesday
Saving log - $3 tip box
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $7 lunch

Thursday
Saving log - $0
Spending log - $1.84 coffee, milk + $5 lunch

In Paris, DH was quite taken by the number of 2-seat Smart cars on the streets. Today, I saw something one better - a Sparrow in the street.


Its a one-seater; one bag of kitty litter would have to drive itself home.


And another shot of the stickers - an electric car. The caption underneath the Sparrow says, "Ruler of the City Streets".


Tomorrow I see what my new paycheck will look like. I've learned not to form an expectation, otherwise I'll be disappointed.

Saving - $5 tip box
Spending log - $0

Actually, I spent $5 on myself by putting it in the tip box, hah hah. Today, the department treated our newest member to a lunch, so lunch was covered. I was going to go and get my typical coffee and milk, but I thought about it and decided to go with workplace coffee with creamer with my breakfast bar. Not the healthiest and tastiest, but its time to take advantage and convert a low spend day into a no spend day.

DJ friend is so, so, so close. The logging works properly, but every so often the sound card gets wonky when you try and control it remotely. In other words, try not to control it at work.

Got a letter from Vanguard. I have enough money in it and took the all electronic route so I'm not going to be charged fees. Yippee!

Sister and her partner sent me the book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year in Food Life by Barbara Kingsolver. 15 pages in and I'm already engrossed.

My poem did not make it onto the Seattle buses this year. Ah well.

Saving log - $0
Spending log - $3.44 coffee, breakfast + $5 curry lunch

I usually bring (5) .99 clif bars on Monday for breakfasts throughout the week. Today I forgot, so I bought one where I buy my coffee. $1.69! That'll be incentive to remember to put my week's worth of bars in my purse.

Sister called at work. The state of Wisconsin signed off on buying our 73 acres on the second property, so things are moving along. Makes sense, it is now close to the end of the fiscal year (June 30), and the beginning of the next fiscal year. It turns out that I'll be getting slightly more money than sister because sister already got some of the proceeds from the house, etc. The gang apparently has a little betting pool to predict how much the executors and the lawyer will take in fees. Hah hah.

Paypal mailed me the code to unlock my account, so yay, my account is now unlocked and I can put money back into it. Its paying 5.04%.

I signed the letter describing my promotion, so soon I will have something to slip into Paypal.