I sat down to do an actual post but lost interest, so…
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Some thoughts late on Friday night at Starbucks. I can not access my blog at home for some reason. Maybe my wife finally installed parental controls on my desktop to stop me from blogging…or something.
It is Ann Arbor Art Fair DO time! Always a great time being around miles & points enthusiasts and catching up with old friends and meeting new ones. I mean, where else can you find people who think like you? Or, if you prefer, where else can you find hopeless fellow addicts who think miles/points 24/7? Where else can you hear stuff like “I wish I was a polygamist so I can MS more” or stuff you hear in line at Wal Mart “Hey dude, you wanna buy a gun?”
Hard to believe it is year #11 of this small DO. I have been to every single one except one when I was in Greece for my father’s funeral. Huge thumbs up to Dave (FT: Bikeguy) who has been organizing it each year. It is FREE and he always tries to keep the quality level way up. You know, keeping it non commercial and eclectic and we (me) here at TBB like eclectic… a lot!
For a day I thought maybe I should start posting daily. Well, it didn’t last long I guess. People, this is not my job. It is my hobby and I do my best to produce a quality blog. You know…entertain, educate and rarely inspire. I can assure you it is not for the clicks. But please don’t let that stop you from clicking all right? hehe.
We interrupt this blog post so TBB can post a travel leading thought: It is NOT ok to go to the lavatory if the seat belt sign is on.
I have no idea why people think I am angry all the time. From the time I banished all my “favorite” blogs to the “Ignore List” the anger has gone way down and the quality of my life has gone way up. I suggest you try cutting from your daily routine things that make you angry. Wow, another leading thought, I am on a roll tonight!
I really like being told ‘Hey, you lost a lot of weight since the last time I saw you”.
It is amazing all the speakers that have come through the Art Fair DO. All the bloggers you know who have been around for a while got their start presenting in the Art Fair DO. Some of them have even become Titans that are perceived as travel thought leaders and make it regularly into mainstream media (say Rolling Stone). This year all the speakers are in the Blogs I Like list. Yeah, the eclectic part.
Meanwhile…in Portland: Warning: Dildo epidemic hits town!
This post was made for my own entertainment and to help out my sinking Alexa rankings. I miss Rick/Ingy/FrugalTravelGuy(the person) giving me the updated Alexa ranking numbers and the very entertaining times at the TBB comments #goodtimes.
I had some links ready to post but I will save them for another blog post, I am tired and need to wake up early tomorrow to work on my physique before I spend the rest of the day among some quirky people who talk about stuff like miles, deals, MS (NOT S&M), points, travel to anywhere you can imagine, 2x 3x 5x 7x 15x 50x (!!!) using all kinds of plastic, retentions, bonuses, Diamonds and Platinums, flat beds, upgrades, suites, etc. In the meantime, I felt so inadequate when Chase did not even try to retain me while canceling both United Explorer cards, whatzup with dat?
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Mobile first!
2nd ? Anyone can throw tennis shoes
3rd? Well darn…maybe I should log into Flyertalk occasionally. Totally missed the announcement and forgot about the Art Fair connection. Drink lots of fluids, I think you guys also have that heat advisory where it is supposed to feel above 100F due to temp + high humidity,
Wish I was going to AnnArbor!
I personally don’t think you’re angry, I know you’re a nice guy. (Although you’re leader of the angries lol).
But imagine you have a friend who always comments when you make a mistake, he makes fun of you and calls you names (I’m pretty sure you can find name calling all over your writing). Imagine you have a friend who criticizes how bad of a person you are and then says, “I don’t understand why you take it personally”.
Or imagine you play on a sports team and you have someone who calls you names, makes fun of you, criticizes you, and does it in the name of “the team”.
You’d probably be willing to listen a bit more if that person spoke with kindness, didn’t use abusive name calling, was friendly the rest of the time… and if they reserved their criticism for the most helpful things instead of criticizing every little detail.
If that guy was on my team… I’d leave that team and avoid him. What would you do?
Let’s not be naive, TBB’s criticism has historically been targeting corporations and sales reps.
It’s true Portland has a sex toy fairy. http://www.oregonlive.com/portland/index.ssf/2015/07/sex_toys_hanging_from_portland_1.html
Also little known fact. In addition to have more breweries than any other city in the world, we have the most strip clubs per capita. Good times here in PDX.
And there’s also the now legal marijuana as another claim to fame….
I enjoyed last year’s A2DO but won’t be going this year. Have fun!
How about that insane PDX traffic, California please stop sending us your fruits and nuts.
Blame terminal 6 closing. It added about 2,000 semis per day to freeways.
I was in PDX for the July 4th weekend. Visiting family, craft beer festival, etc. Looks like we should’ve stayed longer.
Hello from Ann Arbor from my local Panera. I need to leave here and go to the gym before the festivities begin.
We had Julian and Shawn grill and serve the Korean BBQ last night. Bet you didn’t know that. They did fine by the way.
Where is Spencer F?
Whatzup with the dildos in PDX? 🙂
@Drew: Love your blog and I have the highest respect for you and Carrie. If you ever need anything please do not hesitate to ask.
I think your comment is way off. You clearly don’t get what TBB is all about. I have written many times where I am coming from, it somehow did not register with you. And that’s okay, we are all entitled to our opinions. TBB came into being to be a miles/points blog critic. It’s not about making friends or kids’ sports teams dude. It is criticizing businesses, praising the ones that deserve it (based on my judgment and long experience in this) and speaking my mind against the ones I think are harming the interests of my dear hobby and putting the hurt in real people (get 7 travel reward credit cards at once when you are looking for one cash back card!). Anyways, I am out of this as I found getting angry for seeing the 169th post in a month about the “amazing” Chase Sapphire card was not too healthy. Health always comes first, without it we have nothing. So, now I update my three blog lists and will let readers give me feedback on them (which has been 99% positive).
I want to avoid all the businessmen in the TBB Blogs To Ignore list. No doubt they are all nice people and all, I just don’t want them in my life anymore. And HELL NO do I ever want them on my team!
Hope you continue to post great content, your blogging quality is amazing. You deserve financial success before all them plastic salesmen. This is not angry. It is what I believe, it is my blog and I am no bitch to play nice. I did that working for a big corp for 7 years and absolutely hated that I could not tell the boss I was reporting to that he was an asshole. People who know me personally can vouch if I am nice or angry or whatever.
George
doing his own thing for decades
P.S. If this was in FT Delta Points and Rick would jump all over it to show their support 🙂
Friend, I agree. There is space for criticism in this hobby. It’s not a coincidence that the cards most written about tend to be sprayed after the commission goes up. I’m not sure if that’s ethical journalism, but I’m not passionate about it.
So “get it”. And my analogy isn’t trying to suggest that you should be on a “team”. I get it.
You asked why people think you’re angry, and let me ask you something.
Have you ever made any personal attacks, made fun of someone or their character? Outside business, outside blogging. Rather, have you said anything that could be seen as derogatory to someone personally instead of just their business. Do you think your readers will be able to recall derogatory personal attacks.
If yes, that can set the tone for the 99% of the content that criticizes the business. I think the majority of it is a good idea. I think this hobby is void of respectful dialogue on ethics in the hobby and ethical journalism and this blog was a grounds for that dialogue. You asked why you’re perceived that way, and I answered honestly. To say that I don’t get it or I’m against the concept of TBB is just skipping over what I am saying… because I’m not saying any of that.
Gotta run. See ya soon.
Cheers
Drew,
Thanks for clarifying. Frankly, I am confused what you are saying and I am just not following you.
It is what it is. I speak my mind. People thinking I am angry is kind of hilarious to me, they all change their mind when they meet me in person.
I think my blog has contributed to improving this space which just happened to be my (obsessive) hobby.
Typing this from the FT A2 Art Fair DO! We say hi!
So, what are the latest deals?
I agree with George and Buzz.
The dildo tosser speaks – and it’s a she who has thousands of toss-able stuff left from “a mother lode of factory rejects—and she’s nowhere near done.”
http://www.wweek.com/portland/blog-33479-purported_portland_dildo_tosser_were_nowhere_near_done.html
Wow, this article is hilarious! “”Dick-tossing is an exercise in happiness,” says the dildo lady…and more. LOL
Drew-
I too find your analogy weak. Blogers may potray themselves as friends of their readers or on the same team, but at the end of the day, they (or at least the commercial ones, meaning every blog we are talking about) are selling something to make money. They sell, you buy-that’s the stage for a conflict of interest straight to the core of the relationship.
Like any potential conflict, how it is handled is the key. In the case of bloggers, some state they will always show the best deal, the best card offer, etc., and if they really do that, then I have no problem. But that’s not always the case.
Case in point: This spring, Chase came out with an offer on the UA personal card offering 50k bonus, plus other goodies. Bloggers went at it with long articles, where you can fly on 50k, the whole smear. Fine so far.
Then someone figured out that by logging into UA and starting to book a trip, you got a banner offering the same card with the same bennies plus a $50 statement credit. People raised this better offer in the comments section of a few blogs I saw.
Whadayaknow-After that, I saw hardly any mention of the formerly fantastic Chase UA offer, even though those old posts (and their links) did not seem to go away. One cynical reader (perhaps on a break from reading TBB) asked a blogger “Why don’t you just leave a tip jar with a note to ‘drop $50 here?'”.
Do you think that’s right? I don’t that’s how you and Carrie conduct yourselves.
It’s this type of behavior that made TBB unique-calling out that the king has no clothes. I understand George not wanting to live in that whirlwind, but he did provide a valuable resource-and still does.
By the way, on the UA $50 episode, I must mention that Summer Hull (Mommy Points) went out of her way to mention how to get the $50 credit, even though that led people away from a link that would earn her a commission. Good for her.
maybe that time she did but mommypoints is a snake. Out of 100 posts, 99 of them are going to be bs credit card posts and a lot of times she pushes her crappier offer or claims that delta or marriott cards are awesome deals.
Coming from a blogger who stays at Hyatt only, it reeks of hypocrisy
I have had many posts exposing the vast hypocrisy in blogging practices in this space….and just got tired, not very healthy.
I am intrigued to see what Drew is cooking up going for one week lockout in a hotel room….
Now there’s no reason ever to put spending on the Delta Amex or mileage run (snort) on Delta because a SkyMile is now worth $0.0__. The uncertainty created by revenue-based redemption, in which they don’t even give you a conversion of dollar price to miles needed, undermines partners like Amex. At least Capital One gives a one cent baseline for redemptions.
Guess it’s time for that blog named after SkyMiles to close up shop, no?
The SkyMile motto should be, don’t spend on Delta, use our partners!
I was looking at award ticket from EU next summer, routing through SVO makes it “cheaper and a much longer trip.
Harvson3……you were missed, welcome home.
I am amazed how Delta gets away with the crap they do with Skymiles.
Well, the hard date (if they don’t move it up that is) gets me a perfect excuse to burn the last of my Skymiledrachmas. Been trying to get to SYD but the %$#$%^* don’t want to let me do it! (long sad award booking story).
The best takes I have seen on the SkyMiles debacle come from Stefan at RTC and Matthew from Live and Lets Fly who suggested it is time to buy Delta stock:) But seriously, I got the 50K Delta card a year ago and got one use out of it, a domestic round trip to get one of my kids to her brother’s college graduation. That is absurd, but I knew going into it what it was worth. To my daughter on a tight budget and our family to be together, it was, to quote a credit card commercial, priceless. I truly feel sorry for people who fall for the hard sell on some of these pieces of plastic that are not worth much more than the plastic they are made of.
I too am looking forward to seeing what Drew has in store for us.
I dropped that Live and Let’s Fly blog off my Feedly in the grand purge some time ago. Have not added it back.
I so agree with Delta Skydrachmas!
So I was at a party today at the home of a city commissioner. One of his staffers told me that the dildo story was picked up by the BBC and his Welsh grandmother – skyping in Wales – asked him about it! The staffer said they are hanging on his street, making it significantly easier to give directions, as in “Turn left at the dildos….”
Another guest commented that she wondered how parents of young children were responding when their little darlings asked about them. Someone else declared they are street art. Yet another noted that the WW story was just so typical, ending with a PSA to not use them should they fall to the ground!
Our city motto is Good Citizens Are the Riches of the City. Guess the dildo tosser is just trying to be her version of a good citizen, spreading happiness with each toss. There’s another saying you see a lot around here, and that’s Keep Portland Weird. Fun to see the two dovetail so nicely….well, except for the curious kids, that is!
Turn left at the dildos
LOL
Yeah, I see the horror of the parents driving by & wishing little Mikey does not ask “Hey mom, what is that hanging?”. Gulp.
Stayed late at the Sheraton lounge last night…and moving slower today. Wish you were there!
Yeah, I’m kinda sad not be in in A2. Maybe next year!
3 billion miles? If you bank them to Delta, you should have enough for a flight to Kalamazoo. One way.
Man, I was hoping to get a RT trip to Topeka, Kansas!