We go on a wild run again and learn how to burn AA miles to Europe, check out Nightline featuring Mommy Points, end the nonsense about the IRS is about to tax miles, travel to Mount Blanc, Scotland and Italy’s Coastline, read about North Korean defectors in London, peep into some buildings by Stasi, and end with one of the angriest Blog Buzz sections…this weekend was just too much BS to deal with…so I did!
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MILES/POINTS
Looking Up: Europe for Next Summer With AA Miles. By Miles4More. Great post about getting to Europe next summer! 4 Business or Coach seats, thank you!
How This Mom Travels the World With Her Family for Almost Nothing. At ABC News Nightline. Congrats to Mommy Points for the marketing score! I may do a separate blog post about this on Top 10 things the authors got wrong. Happy credit card churning spending you guys 🙂 The comments are hilarious!
I see posts about frequent flyer miles getting taxed. A recent Tax Court decision [Shankar, 143 TC No. 5] concerned an idiot who set up a bank account at Citibank and got a round trip plane ticket out of it. The Court decided the ticket was a premium received for making a bank deposit, treated it as interest while Citibank issued a 1099. Nothing new folks! I want to reiterate that the miles earned on travel and from credit card puchases remain tax-free and from what I know the IRS has not changed its position since….2002! I guess I can make whole blog posts about this but I think a short paragraph will suffice as the whole TBB organization (lol) always remains mindful and respectful of your time!
TRAVEL
Precision Wingsuit Flying on the Mont Blanc Massif. At The Adventure Blog. Almost touching the trees, wow!
23 Pictures That Will Make You Want To Visit Scotland. So beautiful…and I hope they vote No to independence!
29 Aerial Photographs of Colorful Patterns on Italy’s Coastline Bring about Summer Nostalgia. By Dashburst. The pictures are breathtaking!
ODDZ & ENDZ
I think I will alternate in here this section and give the Personal Finance links a break once in a while…
25 Photos of Powerful examples of human compassion throughout times of great conflict. Shut up about your shredded lettuce in your salad!
This London Suburb Has More North Korean Defectors Than Anywhere Else in Europe. By Vice.com. Interesting article about them North Koreans again. The assholes in their embassy in London have ran up $400,00 in unpaid parking tickets!
Peering into the secret, spooky world of the Stasi. At Quartz. More pictures from that bizarre world in the photograph exhibition by Daniel & Geo Fuchs here.
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!
“The Lights Went Down, a DJ Appeared Out of Nowhere, Strobe Lights Came on and the Restaurant Filled up With Dancers” – Million Mile Secrets [Another Friday interview. Another prop to serve credit card affiliate links and give hope to a new blogger who, like most of them, has a drawing for the incredibly life changing reward of…a $25 gift card, yippeeee! We are getting amazing insights on how they started collecting miles seriously in 2013 (gasp!) after they were inspired by MMS (WTF!). Pssst, sign up for credit card bonuses and put all your monthly expenses on the cards, WOW! The DJ story was funny! Blogger likes to read MMS blog interviews, I don’t…I only do it as part of our blog reviewing duties here at TBB to entertain our readers and hopefully they take pity on us to use our incredible Amazon and referral links…to keep us going lol.]
Don’t Transfer Your Points! – One Mile at a Time [Notice the exclamation mark, learned that from MMS. Another template to sell 15 credit cards in one shot. To the person who keeps emailing me this blog does not belong in the TBB Ignore list, what else can I say? Please leave!]
If We Don’t Like American’s New Catering, They’ll Think Customers Are Telling Them They Don’t WANT Food – View from the Wing [And just when you thought the bitching about non important things could not go any lower, we get gems like this: “It turns out though that it’s a different cookie — smaller, no choice of kinds, and not nearly as gooey or delicious.” WTF to the nth degree! Hey, how about laying off that cookie! Thanks for letting us know that enchiladas were fine, phew! The Top 10 Credit cards post coming up soon, can’t wait!]
Welcome ABC Nightline Viewers, Start Here… – Mommy Points [Time to cash in with the newbies folks! I think The Points Guy Inc. should fire its PR staff pronto! The marketing pump here is superb! We are talking MMS quality folks! Wow. Get cards, spend spend spend, MP will save you time, it is a piece of cake, anyone can do it…click on my credit cards. Zzzzzzzzzz. Hey newbie if you are reading me….It’s a bunch of crap! You are not cut out for this most likely and you can greatly harm yourself plus waste a bunch of time keeping it all straight! You are welcome. Click on my Amazon link, an average order brings me 1/300th of what ONE credit card approval brings the salesmen bloggers. Capiche? Can’t wait to see the Maldives trip report because, you know, this is what regular families can do if they click on my credit cards….%$#^* ]
Why I Don’t Like Suites (Sort Of) – One Mile at a Time [A few paragraphs of nonsense. Look at me, I don’t write about credit cards THAT often…so there!]
Bonus Starpoints For Weekday Dining – One More Credit One More Time [ Hey, click on my credit cards and earn points eating out. Thank you! ]
Southwest Companion Pass Will Take You to Costa Rica! – Million Credit Cards [Template, added word “Costa Rica”. Patent the exclamation mark in headlines, will ya? May create yet another passive income stream for you…because you just don’t have enough. I need to wear goggles before I look at this website. I wonder when Spartan will make protective goggles!<———-exclamation mark to increase your excitement!]
Is This The Worst In-Room Coffee Ever? – Points, Miles & Martinis [ A picture. Two short paragraphs. A question. Shaking my head.]
A Pilot and a Priest Ascend to Heaven. You’ll Never Believe What Happened Next! View from the Wing [We need to keep posting so we cut and paste a lame joke….]
Hong Kong Removing “Cum” From Trash? – One WTF at a Time [ What was THAT? And TBB has been accused of tabloid stuff, huh? Shaking my head…]
Top 5 Credit Cards for Travel Rewards – September 2014 – Reward Boss [Just because we did not have enough blog posts pumping credit cards. Barf time, thanks for keeping my weight off!]
Last Call: Register For Chase Freedom 3rd Quarter Bonuses – More Credit Cards One More Time [Told ya the few posts before this were an excuse for the next credit card pump. Last call…is your blog a bar?]
How Does Barclays Decide Which Version of the Arrival Plus Card You’ll Get? – Millions of Credit Card NonSecrets [You were dying to know that right? You can rest assured crap like this would never see the light of day if it was not for suckers who click on this bowtie branding businessman. I wouldn’t click them if I was his mother in law, nothing personal! There is just one comment who links to a The Points Guy blog post, hilarious!]
Is There a Way to Tell If a Card Number Is Debit or Credit? – Millions of Crappy Secrets [Who cares?]
Reader Success Story: A Rookie Has a European Adventure – Frugal Travel Guy [FTG Staff are so overworked they don’t have the time to insert the affiliate links, what’s up with that? Author is a blogger who posts the one and only comment with a back link to her blog, lol. I wonder if she got $25. I expect someone in the staff to go back and insert the affiliate credit card links. Because this is what this business does, seven credit cards or more at a time!]
Which Credit Card Is Best for Economy Awards to London? – The Credit Card Guy [Oh oh, I see a series. I am sure a staff member is working on a template “Which _____ card is best for ______ Awards to _______” ]
Which Credit Card Is Best for Miscellaneous Travel Expenses? – The Credit Card Dude [You can rest assured a card that does not pay this business a commission will not be offered. Because doing so would not allow to keep pumping credit cards every day. Hey, we need to eat well and pay staff salaries so pushing credit cards that do not compensate us makes us look like communists like this crazy TBB guy. We live in America, we love capitalism, profits above all and stuffing credit cards in the throats of all who are buying our marketing “expertise” in selling this stuff. I am 6.7, yo!”]
An 18,000+ point Delta Mileage Run: A review of the SPG Sheraton LAX – Part 3 – Delta Points [ Oh God, we are only in Part 3. Haven’t I seen this property reviewed before? Yes I have or maybe all these “reviews” look the same. You sure can’t tell with the tiny pictures that you have to click on them (hey, double hits!) to see anything! Of course it would not be a DP post without pumping something. This time it is the SPG cards and Uber referral link. This is the blogger who seriously thinks I am pimping my Amazon link more than all Boarding Area bloggers pimp their credit card links COMBINED. Yes you read that correctly, let’s shake our heads together in unison now. Five more parts to go ,see what I am enduring for YOU? 🙂 ]
Booking Free Nights at the New Conrad St. James London – The Miles Professor [Not to be outdone, time to make some dough selling a credit card like the others.]
Last Day to Activate Chase Freedom 5x Points Earning! – Mommy Cards [Sure hope this was a template]
Last Day to Activate Chase Freedom 5X Points (5% Cash Back) 3rd Quarter Bonus! – Million Mile Cards [Have you noticed the big credit card pumpers all belong in the TBB Blogs to Ignore list? Coincidence? Nope!]
If You Want to Upgrade to First Class, Don’t Make This One Simple Mistake – One View from A Higher Class [ FT alerted me to the comments, like this one by Sam: “Love the blog – but I feel like you took a “how to write bad clickbait titles” seminar recently…” and Marc: “I agree with Sam. Love your blog too but what’s gotten into you lately.” and Julian: “Love your blog, but those headlines are really becoming obnoxious.“. Hey, it wasn’t just meeeeee!]
I think I have a problem. Why am I keeping up this pace for a few dollars per day? Makes no sense at all, am I insane or just an idiot? 🙂
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First!
1st?
Second loser
Fourth…but posting from up in the air, so I consider that to be worth at least a Bronze!
Looks like fourth. Scotland is absolutely beautiful, I was fortunate to visit 2 years ago on a business trip to Edinburgh that allowed 2 days of exploring. I think they would be screwed if they vote to leave the UK. They have a certain degree of self-governance, why mess with that?
Not even close. [Insert 5725 affiliate links here]
Vintage post, Buzz. You were clearly on a roll in the Blog buzz section.
16 vacations this year so far – okkkayyy….some of the lines in that ABC post were downright cloying – “this is not about me but about you saving on your vacations” or some crap like that.
Btw, I dont know if you saw MV’s post about getting on the plane early, and lying down flat in the middle row of 5 seats (in a 2-5-2 plane) so no one else picks those seats, and you can then have a ghetto first class seat all to yourself. MV is just downright a terrible person – with the other bloggers, I tend to give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that it is just the blog that is plumbing new depths, but MV is in a different league altogether. A complete douchebag.
I’m going to need more popcorn to read all of this 🙂
My bad. MORE POPCORN!!!!!!!!!
There, now we’re templating!
I will save it to tomorrow’s morning coffee time 😛
How about this one from BoardingArea blogger Points With a Crew: “Why is renting a car feel like such a scam?”
Buzz Question: ” Am I insane or an idiot”
Answer: Both
If anyone knows how to get the stuff on the right side not to appear at the bottom please let me know! I remember screwing around with the code last night trying to get the spacing correctly (again) and may have deleted something!
And this is why going it alone is tough…no tech dept to take care of things like this like they have in Boarding Area 🙂
@tv7: Congrats, is this first First?
@ Sam: That was probably the closest finish ever!
@ Helixcardinal, The Common Man, Spencer F: Thanks for playing along!
@ Erik: Yeah, it looks so pretty. At first I thought this independence vote was a joke. I can’t believe the polls…It will be weird! And screw up/expedite the EU dissolution. And what if Wales invades? 🙂
@ icicle: One of my New Year resolutions was to quit popcorn. I have not had any this year. I used to be obsessed about popcorn and ate way too much of it!
@ Mia: Sounds like a plan. I need to lay off on this stuff. But they are not letting me and my therapist is encouraging to “let go” all the time 🙂
@ Hua: Haven’t seen that one…or maybe I just ignored it is more likely.
@ fan of Mommy Points: Thank you, I appreciate that!
In reading these blogs, George, you’re just reading ads. Dan’s comment warrants re-posting: they’re just well-paid amateurs writing advertising for banks. And they have no (financial) incentive to change.
I did click through to MMS recently (I forget why), and one thing that struck me is just how lazy he’s become. I saw the post on Hyatt in Vegas. There was no effort to update that THEhotel is now a Delano outpost (like the South Beach original), and no effort to explain to clearly confused commenters that all of those perks were only transferred for high-level Hyatt members. I can’t imagine what he and Emily do all day; writing these posts can’t take more than an hour at a time, and I don’t think they have an award travel booking service. I think Paris Hilton may contribute more to society.
I think MMS may be all ghost written these days. Best template of all. I agree about Paris Hilton contributing more to society lol.
Pretty sure he’s farmed out the site to paid employees.
OMG, how many bottles of vino, I mean ouzo did you drink creating this fine post? LMAO
Taking the fifth…
…the fifth bottle?!?
more like the fifth (small ) glass….it is well known I am a light weight 🙂
Hola Senior Jorge, My English is no good for this I am sorry. Donde esta Senior Ramsey? I read on his twitter account #thehorneytraveler he was busted in Stuttgart, Germany at ‘DAS HAPPY ENDING MASSAGE PARLOR’. Claims he was researching a piece called ‘Getting Schtooped in Stuttgart’ for his blog. I wonder if he used points or miles.
Maybe he used the Barclays Arrival to reimburse himself instead? 🙂
@Levi, thank you for your concern. I am out on bail and was able to use my Barclay Arrival card for that. It is true I was arrested at ‘Das Happy Ending Massage Parlor and Schnitzel Haus’ the other day. I refused to pay them when I was set up with a masseuse named Wolfgang. I was not there for a neck rub.
or Schnitzel
Wolfgang LOL
Not a fan of Mommy Points. I’m sure that video was worth another few thousand dollars to her..
I think you are WILDLY under estimating the dough!
Watched the MommyPoints thing on ABC and it didn’t sit too well with me either. Aside from there being a huge conflict of interest duping newbies into signing up for credit cards a lot of the stuff she claimed is FREE really isn’t. For example:
The United Club: NOT FREE. Yes, there are targeted offers with the United Club card that gets you in for the FIRST YEAR, after that it’s $495. The United Mileage Plus Explorer card only comes with 2 passes. They were traveling as a family of 3. There are other free ways into the United Club (shhh!), but they have nothing to do with credit cards.
FREE Upgrades and Status on United: Where do I even start? Again, not FREE! Not even close to free. You earn status by flying on REVENUE tickets (i.e. you pay for them). I also believe they were flying on paid tickets that day.
The hotel she stayed at was a prize from winning a some sort of travel contest? WTF? What does that have to do with travel hacking or rewards credit cards? But ok, that might have been the only thing that was FREE.
As a MSer I about died when she took the camera crew to the gift card rack at the grocery store, but luckily she didn’t reveal anything. There’s no way you’re going to fly your whole family to Paris in First Class by buying Outback and Sephora gift cards. But what if people believe that?
The entire presentation was very disingenuous I felt. She sells credit cards for a living, credit cards with one-time sign-up bonuses that might get you a domestic saver ticket…if you’re lucky. Without churning and/or manufacturing there’s simply no way to get there from here. In the meantime she’s earning a HUGE commission and freebies from the credit card company which I guarantee you helps fund much, if not all of her travel. I’ll give Nightline credit for it being a relatively interesting human interest piece (or at least for me as a fellow “mommy” frequent traveler) in which she comes across as a very likeable person, but for those of us who know better, it’s just so, so dishonest.
It was the word “free” over and over that got to me. Besides the examples you mentioned, the piece just raised the expectations so high and placed the amount of work required so low as to be laughable. Heck of a marketing coup, though. Good for her.
I think you both nail it! That’s exactly what drives me nuts!
Then I am called angry and all that…WTF 🙂
Hey, it’s network television, they like soundbytes.
I miss Ted Kopell…stuff like this would not be broadcasted.
ABC, bring back Ted Kopell….Nightline totally SUCKS ever since he left.
I feel better now 🙂
Take that fan of Mommy Points.
But we all agree…a heck of a marketing coup…and she is milking it now…I probably would too….Free 🙂
I agree that MP is a cc selling website. Free was OVERUSED, but this was an edited piece. The producers decided the direction of the piece, then edited it how they wanted. Now, it would have been nice to see her explain in detail, point by point on her blog in detail how everything was free. That didn’t happen.
Yeah, they probably had lot more tape and edited it to death to push the catchy angle. Anyone counted how many times the word FREE was used? Wow! I don’t expect to see a point by point in detail. Instead I was expecting to see exactly what I am seeing…a mega cc push to catch all them newbies. Frankly, IF I was her…I would have done the same…But I am not her 🙂
I liked the valuation of 3 United Club mini muffins at $15.
Yeah that was hilarious.
FREE
The thing that annoys me about Mommy Points is that her blog is not really about family travel. The mommy angle is just a gimmick to lead people to think that she has a unique perspective on family travel. In the first few months she seemed like she really tried to discuss family travel. Now there is really nothing that differentiates her blog from all the other pumperization schemes. And I bet Little C would rather go to Disney World than fly first class to Paris.
I think little C would be perfectly happy doing small things close to her home. It’s just the parent’s ego that forces the kid to go Vendoming in Paris.
Maldives trip report is coming I hear…Because, you know, this is what brings families together…for FREE 🙂
Now let me go and do some…”stacking” lol.
Her last post had six credit card link referrals, lol.
Six, in this space, is like having breakfast without coffee. The record is 42 if I remember correctly by TPG. MMS had one with 39 some time ago.Pumping pays…sadly!
Just saw Tom Cruise’s latest movie, Jack Reacher. If Tom ever has the balls to finally come out as Gay, he can make a sequel movie called Jack Reacher-Round…………………………………………………
I think your next avatar should be David Berkowitz.
I am still laughing at Wolfgang lol!
How do I get my Amazon link and the rest away from the bottom of the post and back up to where they used to be? Anyone?
At times like this I wish I had a tech dept to take care of this crap 🙂