We go on another wild run and learn all about the airline options in the Citi ThankYou Points program, read Mile Nerd’s follow up on the Wal Mart post, travel to Latin America for free, sign up for the best promotions, check out the Million-Mile Club, Thailand temples, smartest cities and then get educated with the best Personal Finance links and get happily angry laughing at the Blog Buzz rant section!
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MILES/POINTS
Best Use of Citi ThankYou Points – Airline Transfers. By Travel is Free. Everything you wanted to learn about the subject.
Mile Nerd responded to the haters about his Wal Mart blog post. I say ignore them. They are not ruining my breakfast…they come with the territory!
$0 Trip To Latin America: Booking the Flights. By Travel is Free. While so many are cheer leading the latest bank product credit card, Drew is in the zone.
Time to make sure you sign up for the following promos. Just do it because…ya just never know….because if you don’t you will likely forget….so just do it NOW:
Starwood More For You Promotion for double or triple starpoints. Ridiculously long list of non-participating hotels is here.
The IHG Rewards Into the Night promotion. Check out your offer! Probably one of the most exciting hotel promos recently! Here is a complete map of all the IHG hotels.
Double Amtrak Guest Reward Points on all Amtrak routes through November 14, 2014.
Even after managing to burn 828,314 year to date I am still finding my miles/points balances north of 3.5 million...3,596,845 3,606,357 to be exact. This makes me angry…but not so much lol.
TRAVEL
The Million-Mile Club. By Slate. Which athlete and team traveled the most? It is Mark Messier and the Los Angeles Lakers (HT: harvson3)
25 images of Thailand’s most beautiful temples. By Matador Network.
The 2014 Traveler 50: World’s Smartest Cities. By National Geographic.
PERSONAL FINANCE
The Strange Allure of Higher Fees. At the New York Times. This is so right on I can’t emphasize enough. I see this daily and keep shaking my head.
Retiring Boomers Still Have Mortgages to Pay Down. At BusinessWeek. This is really sad.
9 Things Money Cannot Buy. Healthy sense of self-worth, more time, skill, real respect, work-life balance, a good reputation, innocence, health, enough.
ODDZ & ENDZ
Let’s try to help a fellow FlyerTalker who was struck by a terrible tragedy. The Gate has the scoop in this post and is kindly asking: “Can you help with this simple request of finding a support forum on the Internet where this person can share his tragic situation with others who have unfortunately endured similar experiences?”
BLOG BUZZ
Note: This section is for long time followers of this hobby and references to blogs/bloggers may not make much sense if you are new to this. You are welcome to stay and read it of course but if you go WTF just remember this note! I think of TBB as the SNL of miles/points blogs and the content here is intended to be satire. If you get hurt I can refer you to my therapist!
I must admit I have been impressed by the Magic of Miles blog in Boarding Area. Really good coverage of hotels, great pictures and consistency in blogging frequency. Getting crowded in this (hotel focused) lobby blog land!
I see things and I just can’t help myself commenting on them. I am trying really hard to break this habit and limit the time spent on this crap. Like what you say? Crap like the following:
American Express Platinum as a Great Business Travel Tool – View From The AmexSuite [We are talking this is almost complete copy and paste of the text provided by Amex!]
You Can Spot a Fake Credit Card Yourself! – Million Credit Cards [OMG, just when you thought a blog could not get any lower!]
2014 US Open with SPG Amex – Johnny Amex Jet [If you want to lose any credibility you follow this up by tweets selling the SPG Amex card! Post starts with “Every traveler I know who has the Starwood Preferred Guest Credit Card from American Express loves it! I have it, and I love it too,…”. Remember this blog was selling the Chase Sapphire card recently, that is a favorite too! Incredible. All from the US Open, thanks Amex!]
A 18,000+ point Delta Mileage Run: The planning of the run – Delta Points [Yep, just when you thought this blog could not use yet another mileage run as an excuse to sell more credit cards, you were dead wrong! Credit cards sold today: Barclays Arrival, SPG Amex and US Bank Flex cards. Mileage runs…on Delta…LOL]
Yes, You Can Have Too Many Credit Cards And Too Much Credit – Frugal Travel Guy [Howie reaching deeeeep and, wait a minute, this looks like the same old arguments and the same credit cards being pumped. Yawn ]
Rounding the Corner on Elite Status – Mommy Points [You know, most of what appears here in the Blog Buzz is blogs that have graduated to make it to the world famous (actually friends and family and all you “angrys” lol) TBB Blogs to Ignore List for consistently thinking of what feeds them first and the readers second (or third or whatever). Well, this was a typical post finding another way (hotel elite status) to push more hotel credit cards. And here is what really pisses me off and I do not think it is right. You take all the effort to insert the credit card links that pay but then you mention and do NOT insert the link for the IHG Rewards Club credit card. Is it really so hard to enter the link here to help the readers apply for it? Or is that going to be flagged by the bank compliance department? THIS drives me crazy. I think it SUCKS! I feel better now. Dang it, I am out of wine, oh no!
So screw it…I am done for tonight.
Check out my updated blog lists: Blogs I Love, Blogs I Like, Blogs I Ignore
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TBB
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Go Ducks
Go Kings.
Go Lions. Roar!
*cough*
Go Redwings!
(George, it’s hockey not football.)
Ugh, November 1st can’t come soon enough.
It’s early and not enough coffee in my system…What’s up with November 1st??
Go Utes
Ut what?
The University of Utah Utes, my alma mater. They’re actually coming to Ann Arbor to play Michigan on the 20th; last time that happened it turned out to be a good season for us and I was there for that one.
I hope you lose, nothing personal 🙂
Actually I don’t care for college football. I live here but the Wolverine bug has avoided me 🙂
Great Blog Buzz tonight.
Thank you, prefer this type of comment than really angry ones 🙂
Go university of Hawaii warriors?
Why not?
So, 7th is all i could manage for today? Never mind. Sorry folks. It has been hectic few days at my new job as Ramsey’s intern. As i learn the nuances of my new job, i am awed by the dedication and professionalism of my new boss and it is great experience working with him as a touch up boy. Though i am paid only minimum wages, this experience will surely add a lot of value to my profile and thus i have decided to stick with this job for some time. I learn new things every moment dealing with some great looking people on earth and this is really an experience of my life time. I can sense the envy in most of you guys as you read it but i cant help it. There is no more vacancy at Ramsey LLC for now at least until i resign. And if you want me to resign, you need to send me a big fat check of at least a million dollars to qualify. Well, i guess i have let out enough secrets about my work and my company and thus will stop for now. Well George, i am sorry to say he is extremely pissed off with those pictures and i think it will take some time for him to cool off and return.
Just remember to update your Linkedin Profile so some headhunter can track you down with those $1 mil offers. Anything under $1 mil you pass to me, deal?
Good job picking the Avatar pics 😉
Wow, great info from Travel is Free. Quite the contrast from the usual problem x solved by CC a, b, c, d through z formula over at Affiliate Area! Anyhow, I think that pizza plane is a Southwest jet but not 100 percent sure.
Yes, quite the contrast isn’t it?
I was thinking Spirit but probably you can not do that without paying a “pizza box” fee 🙂
Mile Nerd’s Walmart post was spot on. The one caveat is that some rural WMs are a lot better. I find the smaller the town, the better the WM.
Yeah I agree. Some guy in front of me yesterday was not going to be denied running One Vanilla gc’s through Kate. If you are reading this, I let you use the machine again…you could have done the same you know. You are making the ladies upset with the continued Kate warnings “Your card was not recognized” warnings
Meh – MN sounded like an entitled douche. He’s “famous”? Yet is out doing MS? Roll eyes.
He is a good guy. Sometimes what gets written does not effectively portray the true intentions and gets misunderstood. I mean, it happens here all the time. Doubt anyone is angry around here, certainly not me LOL
You were out of wine?? That makes me 🙁
It was a terrible mistake!
‘Healthy sense of self-worth, more time, skill, real respect, work-life balance, a good reputation, innocence, health, enough.’
Confused. I can promise you that, having accumulated enough money working in finance for 16 years to be able to potter around writing a blog, that the things a pile of money brings you ARE work-life balance, health (to the extent you can pay to fix stuff), more time and a sense of self-worth (as you have achieved something in life, even if it is as ultimately pointless as making a pile of money).
You can even ‘buy’ a good reputation by shoving a few quid at the right charities, not that I do that – but I have friends who do. I can show you pics of an ex colleague of mine with Prince Charles after funding one of his charities.
The article was more specific on the Quore users’ answers.
I thought people in the UK do not worry about paying for health care. Unless you mean cosmetic stuff lol.
Regarding time, we all can not live forever. And since we can not know when we go…we simply can not buy more 🙂
I think when it comes to bloggers, “real respect” and “reputation” are the best on the list as it is clearly evident more money has nothing to do with them (i.e. – check the TBB Blogs to Ignore List for proof!)
The UK has a cap on what it is willing to pay to keep you alive. They assume, correctly, that if given the choice between spending £200,000 on a cancer drug to keep me going or building a school, everyone except readers of my site would choose the school.
Raffles,healthcare is capped in most if not all OECD countries (including the US), as it should be.
After we solve the healthcare problem here at TBB Comments…I think we should move on to solve the Middle East problem, how about it?
And what’s up with them Scots over there? I thought this was a joke but it certainly does not look like a joke now.
Raffles: Which company do you use for email newsletter. Saw at FT you were looking at all the different providers.
I use the free WordPress service at the moment via JetPack. To be honest, I would stick with it George. It works, its free, it takes zero time. What more do you want?!
My need are different. I want to start slotting ads into the emails and I want to have data on open rates. This means using a 3rd party service – ideally one with an iOS app for tracking open rates on the move.
Still not sure which way to jump. I initially ditched most of them because they only let you do one mailing per day. I want my 3 daily posts sent as separate emails when published.
What I realised in bed on Monday, though, is that I can get around this. I can add a tag to each post (ie 1, 2 or 3) and set up 3 emails with a provider – the first using an RSS feed that just contains posts tagged 1, the 2nd posts tagged 2 etc. Further upside is that I could have a different ad in each of the 3 templates.
I am now back to square 1 as services I disgarded like MailChimp are now back in contention. Mad Mimi looks interesting and their vibe suits my vibe.
Thanks for the feedback. I need to get on with the program as I hardly ever spend any time on activities not related to actual content for my site. I would say less than 5% of my time is on such activities and it is mostly cut and paste my Amazon link lol.
I did not know Jet Pack had such a feature. I use some Jet Pack features so I will look into it.
I hear Mailchimp is good but Aweber is more powerful. But it sounds more techie and they recently had some major hack attack disruptions so not as desirable, plus it is not free.
I checked Alexa yesterday (I know, it has limitations!) and my blog’s rating numbers are higher than Travel is Free and Noob Traveler (who has all them credit cards!!!). Which I find totally insane. I still think of TBB as a joke and a way to escape my personal inadequacies and all the craziness in Wall Street 😉
HELLO MY HOMIES. HOW IS IT HANGING? I AM EMPLOYING THE VERNACULAR IN ORDER TO ESTABLISH RAPPORT WITH CITIZENS AND SELL MORE CREDIT CARDS.
–END TRANSMISSION–
Hello Chase Marketing Machine!
From your word choices, it seems you are targeting “gang-banging academics who are used to sending circa 1880’s telegraph messages”. Need to broaden your appeal!
*snort* Now THAT is funny!
BARCLAYS MARKETING MACHINE
Meow (one dimensional)
George, i may be wrong but i dont think any of the 2% cards will die and that too BA. May be they will become more stricter but i think 2% returns are here to stay.
The exciting part about this hobby is that there is always…change!
I just can’t see how much longer Fidelity and Barclays can keep the 2% (or 2.2% or 2.27% or whatever). I don’t see Citibank’s new Double Cash card lasting long either. I hope I am wrong…
I pray God that you are wrong. Let us all make some money George as long as possible and Citibank’s product has just born. Why are you thinking about its death already? Just one more similar card from another provider and i think i will be correct in my judgement.
I pray that I am wrong too. Unlimited 2% (or more) is not sustainable. We shall see.
2% is here to stay for as long as there are new victims opening these cards and paying interest.
There have always been victims 🙂
I guess time will tell.
You are wrong. There is a huge and ever-growing army of people paying interest to fund these marketing projects.
I’ve been reading the headlines today about Amazon closing down one of those cherished travel blogger deals. Oh wait. Did I say Amazon closing the deal?? I meant to say …(won’t go there).
I’ll save editorial comment for TBB.
I need to crank out some blog posts for that other tabloid journal…TBB will have to wait. I am scared to look at Feedly as soon as the news broke.
Thank you for posting a link to that article about the FlyerTalk member who suffered as a result of tragic circumstances, George. While it is impossible for him to forget about what happened — even for a moment — the interaction he has been getting from fellow FlyerTalk members has been therapeutic.
Regardless of what anyone might say about you, your heart is in the right place.
Yeah I hope he copes with it. I just can not even imagine going through something like that!
I am not sure the ones in the TBB Blogs to Ignore list feel the same 😉
I have always found George to be big at heart and sharp at mind. How about that George? Qualified for this week’s gems? By the way did you notice that the charity forum at Saverocity is in full swing? May be time for you to revisit that in one of your post?
The Gems are picked by a committee under the influence of a cocktail of several chemical substances. They usually use darts to pick em from what I hear.
I have not been back to the Forum in a long time. So many forums so little time. Focusing on my life and TBB blog and…well, there is not much time left for anything else!
This has nothing to do with anything, but if someone starts operating the Lima-Perth flight shown on your logo, I want to fly that route and visit (fly over) Antarctica. Until then I just need like 2.8 million statement credit points to take my family there.
Lol…Just noticed that, you are right!