It’s the end of Q1, which means it’s once again DIVIDEND SEASON! I look forward to it every 3 months because even though I know this is a distribution from the 3,000+ businesses I partially own it still feels like it’s free money that’s dropped into my account.
So how did I make out this quarter? Like a bandit if I do say so myself! I made $787.04 from my investments. That’s a 43% increase from last year! Yes my investments have increased 56%, but that’s besides the point 🙂 . Just assuming an overall 43% increase from last year’s dividends of (even though it will be more) I’ll receive $3,916.04 in dividends in 2018. Woah. That’s like 2 weeks of salary! And I’ll receive it no matter what the market does (we’re down 1% for the year at the time I write this). An extra half a month’s salary no matter what. I like the sound of that. To next quarter!
One of my favorite bloggers GoCurryCracker has a wonderful article on 
Well that happened. Apparently I now have a 800 credit score according to Equifax (not that I trust them at all – so many breaches. Goodness people). Nevertheless it’s fun to see and hilarious since I’m such a credit card churner. An 800 credit score with an average credit card age of less than 2 years 🙂 . It’s possible. To 850!
As part of my many retirement charts I’ve created one that shows visually how much I’ve saved in $10,000 increments. The market is already going gangbusters in 2018 (though who knows how long it will last) and as a result without any paycheck I have more than $250,000. Originally I was just excited to fill in another bubble on my visual net worth sheet and enthralled by the fun of thinking about having “a quarter of a million,” but I just realized something: $250,000 is half of what I need to retire. I’m halfway there! That’s crazy! And based on the magic of compound interest my money will keep working for me and start earning money faster than I can. It looks like I’m halfway to retirement money-wise and less than halfway in regards to time: 2 years and 11 months to go!
It’s about 30 days before my trip to Singapore: my first time in the country. I’m visiting because I was invited by a Seattle friend of mine (and former colleague) who grew up there. We’ll be staying in her Mom’s apartment in its many empty rooms. Luckily I’ve met her mother and got along with her well. It should be a fairly frugal trip all things considered. 
This year I had more than just monetary goals. They were: