I think I mentioned it here, DH found out that through is work we can get a discount on my cellphone.

I just got my bill, the discount his almost $5 after taxes.

YAY!

Now, if he can decide that he wants to join mine and do a family plan, we'll have that bill to a reasonable level.

I'm going to call this income because it is an expense we already had.

It was our lunch meeting today. It was a good meeting, I feel like we got a lot accomplished. The food, well, they had said Olive Garden but today decided to order from the deli. I have a thing about sandwiches - I HATE smoked meats and have found that most places don't really say "smoked turkey" when it is - so turkey is out for me. I ended up with a steak sandwich, which was pretty good, but I was very full.

But that's not all the free food I got today. One of our clients stopped by and gave me a $50 gift card to Chili's. I was shocked and so happy.

We have 2 cards that pay cash back - Discover and Citibank Dividend.

I realized that my special 5% had posted, so I had $40 to apply to my balance.

Then dh got something in the mail today. Turned out he had requested his dividend check from citibank - $83.16.

We have cut our spending way back, but we maximize our cashback and dividends by making sure to take advantage of any special deals (the 5% cashback deals on discover, etc).

In other news, I purposefully did not take cash with me today and I'm glad I didn't. I was tempted by the chocolate bars that a client brought in to sell for charity, but I didn't have any cash so I couldn't buy any.

I belong to a credit union in Oklahoma. We haven't really been able to use it for several years now (because we don't live in the same city) but we maintain a small-ish savings account there, accounts for our boys and my IRA (paying a whopping 2.5%). This year they had a great year and paid a bonus dividend. Because the dividend is taxable, the bonus on my IRA was paid into my account tied to the IRA (I had to open a separate account just for me). That account had the $25 I was required to deposit to open the account. I opened the account in July and I ended 2005 with $12.50 in dividends. So, that little $25 account now has $37.50. LOL.

I need to talk to my bosses about what paperwork I need to do to open an account in their profit sharing plan. From what I understand it performs very well. They buy real estate notes (for a substantial discount), collect on them (at 10-13% interest) and if they default, I foreclose on them. Since we do all the work in the office, we don't lose much. We have no attorney's fees - it costs the $9 for certified mail, $2 to post the notice of sale and $65 to record the deed and affidavit - so less than $100. We then have a real estate developer who sells the property for us for a discount on his attorney fees (he carries notes and we do the closings and foreclosures for him). So, the profit sharing plan is generally paying out at 7-8% or more (they do have some administrative costs). I haven't been there long enough to get a match, but in April, I'll start getting a match.

I love my job, my bosses are great. My co-workers complain all the time about how cheap they are, etc. They have no idea how great they have it. Having worked places where the bosses seemed to think their job was to reduce you to tears and destroy any self-esteem you have, I almost cry when they praise me. They trust my judgment and turn me loose all the time. "We need such-and-such, bring me a draft when you're done". They just assume I can draft the document and be right. And I surprise myself by what I can do. It gives me great satisfaction.