Another TBB post featuring the most eclectic links around the web such as an advance child tax credit payment FAQ, all you need to know about the Delta variant, disturbing photos from history, get more American Airlines miles by transferring your Citi ThankYou network points, travel to places to love and check out some incredible wonders, check out cute puffins in Iceland, learn about US household debt levels among generations, which countries drink tea or coffee or soda, learn how gravity works in space, we keep it very light in Blog Buzz since miles/points action in weekends goes way down and more!
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TRAVEL
If you do not have time to love all 52 how about you loving my blog instead lol: 52 Places to Love in 2021. Which one is your all time favorite?
I need to get going on these! 10 Incredible Natural Wonders to See in Your Lifetime. You will stay in a luxurious chalet surrounded by wolves… Love the first part but not that thrilled to be surrounded by wolves you guys! 🙂
This Twitter thread will educate you all about mud volcanoes in Azerbaijan, there are hundreds of them there!
Check out puffins in Iceland!
PERSONAL FINANCE
It has started…Guide to IRS online ways to get, track or change Advance Child Tax Credit payments. And of course scammers are going nuts, be careful out there!
Podcast with Howard Marks talking about one of my favorite subjects: Embracing the Psychology of Investing. This is mostly for experienced investors.
Very interesting: Visualizing US Household Debt by Generation. You should visualize it too…as in eliminating it! —–>Freedom!
COVID-19
Must read: Delta Variant: Everything You Need to Know.
Depending on which figure you use, it would put Delta’s R0 between 4 and 9, which could make it more contagious than smallpox.
But some communities in the South may prefer to chance it I guess smh: Delta Is Driving a Wedge Through Missouri. Latest by Ed Yong. Archived link.
Almost every COVID-19 patient in Springfield’s hospitals is unvaccinated, and the dozen or so exceptions are all either elderly or immunocompromised people. The vaccines are working as intended, but the number of people who have refused to get their shots is crushing morale. Vaccines were meant to be the end of the pandemic. If people don’t get them, the actual end will look more like Springfield’s present: a succession of COVID-19 waves that will break unevenly across the country until everyone has either been vaccinated or infected.
ODDZ & ENDZ
Very cool: A 1 Kilometer “Ball Drop” On Solar System Bodies.
Very interesting: Coffee vs Tea vs Soft Drinks: What Caffeine Drinks Do Countries Prefer?
Some creepy, some disturbing, some awfully sad, click on your own risk, you have been warned! People Are Sharing Disturbing Photos That Look Normal Until You Find Out What’s Really Going On.
MILES & POINTS
HOT CREDIT CARD OFFERS: 100k CHASE Sapphire Preferred, 100k CHASE United Quest, 75k CHASE Ink Cash, 75k CHASE Ink Unlimited, 100k CHASE Ink Business Preferred, 60k CHASE Sapphire Reserve, 80k CITI Premier, 20k CHASE Freedom Flex & CHASE Freedom Unlimited, 150k CHASE IHG Rewards Club Premier (& a free night) and many more, including many American Express cards! Please check out my Affiliate links. Terms apply to American Express benefits and offers. Visit americanexpress.com to learn more.
If you do not see a credit card with my affiliate links, perhaps I could refer you? Contact me!
This section is about my hobby addiction of collecting frequent flyer miles and hotel points since the early 1990’s! Feel free to skip this section and parts of the next one if this is not for you.
Newbies: The 100k Chase Sapphire Preferred card is now available with my links. If you are totally new and looking for a keeper card I think THIS is the card. Apply for it, get approved, do the required minimum $4k spend, get the 100k points signup bonus, transfer the points to United or Southwest or Hyatt or just cash out for $1,250 spend for groceries using the “Pay Yourself Back” feature assuming you do eat, right? For the annual fee of only $95, COME ON, do the math! Ok, here is the math: $1,250 – $95 = $1,155. So, if a bank offers you all this money what is your problem? Just ALWAYS make sure you NEVER EVER carry a balance ok? If you currently have the card, you can refer your spouse or significant other or third cousin or travel starved friend and you the referrer can earn 20k Chase points for the referral and the referred still get the full 100k bonus. You may even get the annual fee waived if you go inside a branch if you are that brave and have that much free time.
Well, this was surprising! You Can Now Transfer Citi ThankYou Points To American Airlines, But Only For A Limited Time. It has always been tough to accumulate American Airlines miles as they are not transfer partners with any of the banks. Until now that is. Only until mid November. Who knows, this may become permanent. Well, the 80k Citi Premier card just became more valuable then, get it with my links!
If you play this game right you should never ever care what the “APR” interest rate is. We never EVER carry any balance in all credit cards we hold so we never pay any interest so it does NOT matter, period! If you ask about it, well, find another hobby please.
Today is the last day for the 100k Capital One Venture Rewards card. It is most likely not your last chance as it comes back periodically. It first started years ago when this card paid for a free family cruise trip to the Western Caribbean. Each dollar spent earns two points. You can cash out for travel expenses at one cent per dollar or transfer your points to 15 travel partners. You get 50k points when you spend $3,000 in the first three months and the next 50k after you spend a total of $20k in the first twelve months. Obviously, the amount of required spend for the second 50k batch is ridiculously high. Annual fee is $95. Obviously, not for everyone. If you can handle the high spend and have room for another card to get your ridiculously high car rentals for free maybe consider it. Always do the math. You know what to do if you decide this fits you, thanks for your support.
All Southwest credit cards are again back down at just 40,000 signup bonus territory. If a blogger sells them enthusiastically you can be self assured they don’t give crap about you and only care to sell them so they can earn more money from the sales commissions. Ignore them and just know that these cards almost always come back with much higher signup bonus offers. Usually 60,000 and even recently 80,000!
BLOG BUZZ
We are now entering BLOG BUZZ, a section for advanced hobbyists and veterans of this fast imploding hobby and also a section where I go on and on about some stuff that happens in my life because it helps me feel better about myself.
I agree with this post, an AA devaluation is a sure bet at this point after the AA transfer window came into the big picture!
Thanks to TBB reader Sam for sending this one in: His Status is Preferred. If you don’t laugh I don’t know about you…
The Milwaukee Bucks are one win away from becoming NBA Champions. And you know I have been a fan of the Greek Freak for a while, how can you not love this guy! Here he is talking about ego, pride and humility. And here are announcers from all over the world in that amazing last play!
Well, you guys, I said no 🙂
Fun day in Detroit this weekend, will try to pop in a few pics here and there when things slow down…
Let me leave you with this…
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TBB
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More cat stuff!
Lots to read today. Perhaps non-vaccination ought be considered contributory negligence when the hospital bills roll in.
Actually, DML may be on to something. I’ve read insurance policies that disallow claims for intentional acts by the insured which induced the damage.
Calling Ron DeSantis.
Happy Monday.
Interesting idea but I am not sure how feasible it is to do legally/constitutionally….how do you prove “intentional act”? I don’t know. Meanwhile, back in my hometown in Greece, several hospital medical staff held a protest protesting, please sit down, being forced to vaccinate…
Sometimes I wonder about the human species…
Meanwhile, Trump could save a lot of people if he put out a statement to encourage them to vaccinate like he did which saved his fat ass. Then again, maybe this is too much to expect from this despicable buffoon…
Be careful out there, avoid the suicidal morons
Wow! I could NOT tear myself away from that series of photos. Disturbing is right!
I had a beloved cousin visit recently and she and I had a long discussion about travel and cards, etc. Good candidate to start getting into this…hobby (?) thing. I am going to try to steer her towards you for cards when she does. RV-ing right now across the country but I think she learned a lot. I swiped a lot of advice from what you have written over the years I have been reading so we shall see what happens!
Looks like you had a good time there in Detroit! Enjoy the summertime as best you can!
Yeah, disturbing…very!
This is NOT for most people. At TPG it is: This is for everyone breathing 🙂
Had a client meeting today. In person. Felt good.
Just got back from Chapel Hill, NC. While we stayed at my parents’ house and not a hotel, my wife and I did make a quick drive to check out the Rizzo Center, a category 3 Hyatt via the “Destination by Hyatt”. I wanted to see it on account of the fact that it’s not a typical hotel; it’s used by the UNC Business School for their executive MBA program and other conference functions. I figured it would be quiet on a summer weekend and I was more right than I anticipated. It’s a really nice facility, well-maintained, with beautiful gardens on fairly large chunk of land (30 acres) and it was weird because we saw only *one* other person (reading by the pool) in the 45 minutes we were strolling the grounds. We didn’t see a single staff member the entire time, not even at the front desk. My wife said it felt like that Disney movie (Beauty and the Beast?) where there’s a really nice castle and nobody’s around.
All of which is to say, if you want some seclusion, book the Rizzo Center on a summer weekend. The FT reviews I’ve read have been positive and I have to say, it does look nice.
https://www.hyatt.com/en-US/hotel/north-carolina/rizzo-conference-center/rdudh
Looks interesting. Only seeing one person in 45 minutes and no staff is WTF territory, WOW! I think category 3 is fair. This is the place I am going to lock myself up to finish the Iran trip report 🙂
Thanks to the readers who got two cards. At six this month to date is it too soon to start thinking IPO? Or…maybe via SPAC lol
If you just want to quite time/sleep, go for the Hyatt Place/house down the street for just 5k/night! University towns are dead during the summer.
SPAC over IPO, only if you have something to hide. DD is lower for SPAC.
“US Household Debt by Generation” – I thought the rumor was that folks got so much money by the government in 2020 resulting in debt reduction, no?
Transfer Citi ThankYou Points To American Airlines – will be extended if AA needs to raise more MoNey.
Unlike Missouri., 40% of COVID-19 hospitalization cases in the UK are among people who are partly or fully vaccinated people. Delta has been moving quickly. Returning 100% to the pre-COVID days isn’t the greatest idea. This fall/winter may be tough.
At least universities can require you to be vaccinated if you want to be on campus.
BTW,
Frontline PBS The Power of the Fed
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/the-power-of-the-fed/
Great show!
Thanks for the link, will watch…eventually.
>>>>>>>40% of COVID-19 hospitalization cases in the UK are among people who are partly or fully vaccinated people.
Starting to think we may phuck this all up again….Maybe we isolate all these knuckleheads so they, you know, die off and spare us spreading new variants outside to us? I bet you many did not vaccinate to show Biden failed to meet the goal…I mean, we are at that stage now smh.
Go Giannis tonight!
Regarding that comment
“ Unvaccinated Trump supporter who spread coronavirus conspiracy theories dies of COVID-19”
https://www.rawstory.com/unvaccinated-trump-supporter/
Yes, let this be the last NBA game!
Got approved this month for the 65K SWA Card using your links. Thanks for your blog.
Thank you!
Your U.K. covid comment is simply a failure to do maths, surely?
If the U.K. had 100% adult vaccination then 100% of people in hospital with covid would have been vaccinated.
Unsurprisingly this does NOT mean that the vaccine programme doesn’t work because you are ignoring how low those numbers are.
Not sure which comment you are referring to.
We are starting to worry about the pandemic path again…