We bring you the Gamestop stock big losers, hunting deals, amazing vaccines, taxes in retirement, look at mesmerizing tadpoles, travel to North Korea and romantic hotels (definitely not in North Korea!), some excellent encouraging Covid-19 coverage today, best photography links of course, we touch on digital tulips, look at economy recovery charts and marvel at the resilience of the US economy and its embedded entrepreneurial spirit, play a great geography game, laugh at some dude in Texas dancing in the snow, more QAnon deflating coverage and lots more. In the final section I have a question about the length of my posts, are they still too long? Feedback is appreciated, thank you.
TBB Blog Mission: To Educate. Entertain. Inspire. In That Order!
Support TBB by applying for CREDIT CARDS or visiting our LINKS or Donate
You like my blog? Send a link to someone please!
BLOG HOUSEKEEPING:
This goes out to subscribers via email the day it is posted at 8 am. After that I may add something new in the body of the post and I indicate it like this: Update.
If you are not into the frequent flyer miles/points game please feel free to skip the MILES & POINTS and most of the BLOG BUZZ section.
Stay positive, test negative!
TOP PICKS
Top picks are not excerpted at all. I recommend you find time to read every word!
Sometimes you try to inject some common sense into people and warn them about the dangers but…you can not get through. Some of the quotes are just way too…flippant! Be careful out there!
GameStop Investors Who Bet Big—and Lost Big
Get vaccinated as soon as you can, there is nothing to think about!
Mesmerizing!
Tadpoles: The Big Little Migration
MILES & POINTS
HOT CREDIT CARD OFFERS: 75k CHASE Ink Cash, 75k CHASE Ink Unlimited, 100k CHASE Ink Business Preferred, 60k CHASE Sapphire Preferred, 60k CITI Premier, 65k CITI Business AA Platinum Select, 50k CITI AA Platinum Select, 20k CHASE Freedom Flex & CHASE Freedom Unlimited, 75k AMEX Platinum, 85k AMEX Business Platinum, 50k CHASE World of Hyatt, 150k AMEX Hilton Business & Hilton Surpass (and $150 credit!), 100k AMEX Hilton Card (and $100 credit!), 150k AMEX Hilton Aspire, $250 AMEX Blue Cash Preferred, $300 AMEX Blue Cash Everyday, 140k CHASE IHG Rewards Club Premier, and many more! Please use my Affiliate links.
If you do not see a credit card with my affiliate links, perhaps I could refer you? Contact me!
Newbies: To be driven towards this obsessive hobby of earning miles and points so you can fly for free low cost you must LOVE chasing and scoring the deal. Some people (me included) just LOVE this, the dopamine high we score is just better than crack, not like I have ever done crack by the way. Good post here: If it sounds too good to be true… (on Nick’s mind). I left a few comments clarifying that as a veteran in this weird hobby I don’t sweat the small deals anymore. Bank bonuses? I find them complicated because they take mental real estate, customer service issues may come up (looking at Citi), closing/canceling can involve surprises (really Bank of America?) and fees and you eventually forget about them and, wait for it, the 1099 tax forms come and take the fun away getting fully taxed on the bonus you thought you scored (or the 1099 does not come and then IRS wants to have a chat about that non reported income on your tax return) and I could go on. I already manage about 100 travel related accounts in my household and I am extremely picky in adding more into the mix. In addition, if something happened to me my wife will go insane trying to figure it all out. Heck, sometimes I can’t even figure it out, I need to slow down lol. Final point: It is the career of some bloggers to write about deals, you just don’t have to jump on every one, be very selective and…think of your significant other/family members who may one day need to clean up what you left behind…KEEP IT SIMPLE!
You can earn 10 points per dollar dining out! NEW: Earn 10x on Select Takeout, Dining with Chase Sapphire Cards. I will definitely check this out as we do use food takeout a lot more since the pandemic started. In case you were looking to get the solid Chase Sapphire Preferred card, here is my REFERRAL link in case you wanted to earn 60,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards points for $45 (annual fee of $95 less grocery statement credit of $50).
I am not sure why JetBlue took so long to do this but here it is: JetBlue To Eliminate Change/Cancellation Fees On All Fares Excluding Blue Basic Fares. In addition, one of the best Basic Fares airlines is now the worst, no carry on bag for you. Remember how this airline used to be so friendly? It turned out like AA…which is now on a major get friendly mode. Just a weird upside down airline pandemic environment I guess.
TRAVEL
You know I love posting stuff about North Korea. Just because everything there is so bizarre, I mean, they are now in the third generation and the current leader looks like he is addicted to Doritos and has nukes. So sad the love story with Trump is off though. Whatever. Incredible 4.56 mins video: A rainy day in Pyongyang, North Korea.
I am not into skiing. Some of you are. Did you ever think of about that chairlift taking you up in them hills to the slopes? Yeah, me neither. This is why I found this fascinating: The Invention of the Ski Chairlift.
Incredible travel photography by Colin Monteath.
Some do look very nice! The most unforgettable romantic hotels in the world. So sad none appear to be from a major hotel chain so that means we can not use hotel points to stay for free, boo! The one in France looks like it was a mistake to add in this list and the one in Cambodia looks like one I may even consider paying for out of my pocket (from cash back rewards lol).
COVID-19
Can this happen, like, fast? Is that too much to ask for dear God? The Pandemic Can End Without Herd Immunity.
In the analogy of the campfire, our current pandemic is a big, raging one. We might not have enough water to douse it completely, and we might not prevent future sparks from catching, but the water we do have will still help. The fire will burn slower and cooler. Every drop of water matters.
I think we all realize that Covid-19 will be with us for a very long time in some form. I think we will be getting vaccinated for it as routinely as we get vaccinated for flu every year. But what do I know, I have become like so many an amateur epidemiologist too! Let’s look back at history what happened with smallpox and dream about the…possibilities! Smallpox used to kill millions of people every year. Here’s how humans beat it.
We like to bitch about not getting vaccinated fast enough. But maybe we just like to whine, think positive you guys. Ok, seriously, maybe we are doing all right in this department and it should get better going forward: The U.S.’ vaccine rollout is world-beating.
PERSONAL FINANCE
I am no fan of crypto but this is a very fair article: ‘Digital tulip’ or new asset class? Bitcoin’s bid to go mainstream. I am in the digital tulip camp but what do I know?
In case you are looking to move somewhere to retire, here is a a good tax guide: Taxes in Retirement: How All 50 States Tax Retirees.
There are some really good charts here. We can do better. America’s deeply unequal economic recovery, explained in 7 charts.
The entrepreneurial spirit is in the DNA of the United States, period! Visualizing America’s Entrepreneurial Spirit During COVID-19.
CURRENT EVENTS/POLITICS
A reader complained recently how I post a lot about this QAnon crap. Instead of saying thank you for blogging when I could be doing other a lot more profitable things with my time…here is another one for you, sad! ‘I Miss My Mom’: Children Of QAnon Believers Are Desperately Trying To Deradicalize Their Own Parents. Actually, this is a really sad article. I hope this does not happen to you…
Do you really miss your favorite bar? The answer is yes and this site can recreate it, enjoy!
Meanwhile in Texas LOL.
On a serious note, it is really bad over there! Texas Is Now Enduring Its Coldest Weather In Over 30 Years, And The Photos Are Unusual To Say The Least.
ODDZ & ENDZ
I LOVE playing this game: City Guesser. My favorite school subject was geography. When I was in elementary school I had memorized all the capitals in the world… I still remember many from those days #wow.
White shark, hope it is real because it is too epic to watch!
We like photography in the TBB world headquarters my small home office. Winners of the 2021 Underwater Photographer of the Year Contest.
Amazing photography! The Tokyo International Foto Awards 2020 Announces The Best Photos From Around The World.
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 never get targeted for this anymore but I sure try every time 🙂 Amex Pay Over Time Bonus, Enroll for 10K Membership Rewards Points (Check if You Qualify).
And good luck to all who made a certain blogger named One Mile at a Time a lot richer for “exclusively” selling some product by a new outfit named BREX.
Going for the cortisone injection shot tomorrow to see if I can get back to running.
We got pummeled by snow too here in Ann Arbor Michigan. Shoveling is a great body exercise!
I am trying to make smaller posts. This is a small post based on my standards. Do you like them? Aiming to have no more than four links in each section. Approximately. This way I could post more often. Are they still too big to go through? Make them even smaller, three links in each section? Feedback is appreciated.
Best of luck to all readers affected by the snow in Texas. We here in Michigan call that a heatwave. Seriously though, hang in there and stay safe!
And I leave you with this…
Follow TBB on Twitter @FlyerTalkerinA2.
You can subscribe to TBB below, winners only!
Opinions expressed here are author’s alone, not those of any bank, credit card issuer, hotel, airline, or other entity. This content has not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of the entities included within the post.
Best bon mot from my late father: son, you don’t shovel sunshine.
81° yesterday on the side of the volcano!
Award Wallet is pimping OCaaT’s pet project too *roll roll roll eyes*
Photography links particularly awesome today. Make your posts how you like them — my BuzzLinks bookmarks should never be empty!
Perseverance lands on Mars tomorrow!
#TBBon
Buzz-
Snow shoveling is one of the worst activities for your back. BLT-Bend, Lift, Twist. It’s got ‘em all. Seriously.
Do what I did-Hire an eleven year old to shovel for you. Then, after a while, ask him what he’s spending his shoveling money on. Stuff I never heard of. Keeps you young, kinda.
The boy is probably spending it on Roblox. The IPO is coming up soon.
To all Trump lovers, Trump Plaza will be blown up today at 9:00.
Sad!
Smaller post was great, thanks again for all the content!
Thanks for the great link to the vaccine rollout by country. Helps keep things in the right context.
@ GringoLoco: Yeah, in days like this I dream of summer places. But it is okay, spring is just around the corner here. Actually, it has not been too bad winter wise…OMAAT probably made more than Brex than me blogging in 300 years, wait…1,000 years. I am still trying to score conversion #2 this month, thanks to friend Dave again who is still #1, sad lol.
@ Sam: Oh yea, I am feeling it today, rest day! I have a snow plowing service for the driveway but I still do the sidewalks. Damn corner lot, that was just too much! Usually we had boys come around but not many lately…lots of the kids around here have grown and moved on to college and jobs…
@ ABC: I need to google Roblox! Anything that blows up Trump stuff is awesome!
@ Randy: Thanks a lot for the feedback. I need to find that fine line of not making them too long while keeping up the quality and post at a pace that nobody forgets I exist…Always developing and evolving.
@ You are always first commenting…today you are fifth. Come on! Remember the guy who was always posting “First!” for a long stretch…His handle escapes me now, another senior moment!
Long day today, no post tomorrow for sure. Not enough worthy material for Friday…right now, we shall see.
Hey some Greek guy named Tits beat Nadal in the Aussie Open. Y’all are conquering the world again!
The dude was born into tennis! Greek father coaching tennis in a luxury Athens hotel meets hot Russian former Top 200 tennis player who represented the Soviet Union national tennis team. Hot sex took place and they brought into the world this dude who had a tennis ball for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Every day since he was a baby. And the rest is history.
We have a pretty good Greek lady tennis player, she is very attractive!
Scott Castle.
Yes! Miss that guy!
Who’s Drew?
Rest in Peace Scott Castle
Nowhere near close to first today! But that is all right. George, the length of this post, and the *number of links* is pretty much “jes’ fine!” as Grundoon would say in the old POGO strips. I think you’ve got it right. But hey, post as you want, it is your blog and we all appreciate whatever you do.
I’ve been seeing that Brex thing a LOT in Miles To Memories as well. Didn’t really look into it. I am dealing with that “Bandwidth” thing myself as interest in this or that wanes or waxes. I dove in hot and heavy to this hobby a few years ago, made a lot of mistakes and tried to spread myself too thin, mentally and all. Now I am narrowing down what I do and spend my time on to benefit ME, and that seems to work better.
Chases MR from AMEX for a long time, then some other stuff and then this last year when Amazon brought in their 4x/5x everywhere thing, well, I love to buy stuff from them using their points because the “fun stuff I actually do not need” is a lot easier to buy when I use those points!
Is this a good or the best way to gather or use points? Likely not. But, it works for ME and I tend to pass up a LOT more stuff I see going on in the points and miles world. I might even someday get to being under 5/24!
Nick over in FM is right, you can do a lot and save a lot and a lot of deals that sound too good to be true are not, but the main thing is what works for you, where you are, geographically and mentally. Buying craploads of VGCs, etc is a great way to get points, but where I live, disposing of them? UM! Lots tougher than some other places.
It all needs to be what a person wants to do and how it balances in their life.
Keep posting what you want and enjoy the thing! Take care of that back too and get some new kids to shovel snow!
Thanks a lot for the comment Carl.
Yep, the bandwidth/real estate is huge. You do what is best for YOU. You got this.
If I had to meet payroll I would be doing lots of work experiments too 🙂
2 weeks ago I wrote that we will hear some good news about vaccine distribution and C-19 in general. Fake news media is getting some truth through, I’m happy since more positivity is good. We are on a path to 2M doses/day a day (1.8M now). I think we will see some major changes in travel ~April/May. Interesting how it will affect ✈️ since so many routes were suspended.
What is the real news media? I’m genuinely curious to hear your response.
1. Around January 4-8 it was clear that the virus spread is slowing down. The numbers were scary but there was not growth neither linear nor exponential.
2. Government was 7! days late to its commitment to distribute 20M vaccine doses to states. I will take this delay to any government project any time.
3. We went from 300K shorts a day on Jan 3rd to 1M (3x)shots on Jan 20th. (New government in power)
4. We went from 1M to 1.8M since than
5. Many distribution problems were fixed, especially for the Pfizer vaccine that requires a special storage. Once the Moderna vaccine arrives to all states it should accelerate.
6. The US is #5 (6) in % of vaccinated people in administrated ~40% of world vaccine doses. So clearly government bough enough to begin with and was not bad in distributing this.
Now … I am not saying everything is perfect but what Buzz wrote today (somehow optimistic) was known 30-40 days ago. Clearly we was a lot of bad decisions and execution, so many people could be saved 🙁
Yet it was 5x better than … the ObamaCare rollout, when a group of morons (science experts!) had 1 year to prepare and still for 3 months after the launch a simple web site crushing every hour. Moreover, 5 years later that project still so complicated!!!!!
That was so far removed from answering my actual question that I wish I could include a captcha requirement for anything further. Dosvedanya comrade.
Pav:
You are all over the place man, take it easy.
Maybe you should stop watching fake news?
Obamacare is making several of my clients very happy, it saves lives. Every year since the disastrous rollout. And it will be for the duration hopefully.
I find it amazing how we are still dealing with the virus when some people in the media were saying it is going to go away and nobody will even talk about it on November 4.
Despite what you think, the country is in a much better place when the dotard and his incompetent morons left the building.
Ball is now in the new team’s court. Nearing a month. Honeymoon is over. They need to pick it up. It is not easy because the previous team threw money (rightly) to the scientists to come up with the vaccine and then….they left it all to the states to figure it all out…
Yes, it was right for the GOV to fund vaccine development. Do keep in mind that Pfizer/BioNtek’s vaccine had ZERO monetary support from the US government.
@ABC I may be heard differently
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/22/us/politics/pfizer-coronavirus-vaccine.html
There are other sources and articles that PFE received multiple times. Funding for vaccine development or early orders to support it both ways.
@TBB
Obamacare is great program, I expect it to be expanded once we over the hump with C-19. Obviously, Trump and co did not invest but I hope Biden will get it going. My critique was around how unprepared the government was to the actual rollout and how slow it was to fix these issues, even though so many startups in healthcare space deal much better with its: federal and state regulations and nuisances.
@Bill
I am sorry I hurt your feelings
Unlike Moderna (& NIH), Pfizer & BioNTeck did not receive any US gov funding to develop the vaccine. The US gov of course have to pay for the vaccine. The article refers to an order of 100M vaccine for $1.95B. It’s only fair to pay for FDA approved products. And I rather see that the fed gov buys and provides this vaccine for “free” rather than insurance companies.
This seemed like a nice length post! Plenty in here!
About the whole Brex thing: I’m curious what Lucky’s cut is? 20/20 hindsight and all but seems to me the Brex people could have created the exact same promotion without partnering with OCaaT or anybody, and all the bloggers would have blogged about it anyway, promoting it to infinity, and then everyone would blame the bloggers for killing the deal. (I have no connection and am not eligible to join Brex.) I have no idea. Maybe Lucky plays hardball. Maybe it was all his idea…
Agree, this length is perfect. Personally, I prefer 2 short posts rather one a very long one.
bREx is actually pioneerkng a very popular concept here, growth through referral via small/medium influencers. I have it in my palybook of growth / user aquisition strategies but I work mainly with small startups.
Sounds like the 2019 bRex TPG campaign didn’t give a great ROI.
Do you normally pay $x per conversion or % of the sale?
Great question.
In short, I think OMAAT is getting $ per conversion. BREX is too big of company to expose their actual LTV to someone like Lucky. Generally speaking, for such a “product” (not physical) you go with $ per conversion. % of sales are for smaller/early stage products / companies that sell directly to customers. The truth, is that the channels like Facebook / Pinterest / Morning show MSNBC are too expensive not and waaaaay to competitive. Especially the social channels where Facebook/Twitter/Pinterest control how much exposure you get.
T
hat forces many to more creative channels and I make my $ 🙂
Online “creators”: bloggers/influencers/though leaders/podcasts/Clubhouse?!?! (yay Buzz you had a clubhouse mention on your blog!) have more and more value right now and I think TPG was a good example. We can dislike him as much as we want but it was a cash machine for awhile.
I have one conversion today from my friend Dave about four miles down the street. Will I ever be a cash machine? Sounds nice 🙂
Yeah, OMAAT definitely got $ per conversion. No idea how much. Definitely mid three figures is my best guess.
I am waiting for BREX to contact my agent lol.
I am not bothering with Clubhouse. Won’t be around in a year or two. I said that for Bitcoin..so there.
Thanks for the feedback. Got the message. the super long posts are over. Easier for me this way too, more posts, more clicks, more ads….oh wait.
Simple calculations, an average small business with no employees in the US makes ~47K (cash flow I guess), Lets multiply it 1.5x ~ 75K to count in these more savvy business owners who hunt for miles and points (85% of small business make less than 100K).
Business with 1-4 employees makes ~400K in revenue / year on average.
The business model of Brex is based on various streams of income: account subscription, the fees it earns from credit card transactions!!!, a cashback program (Brex Cash). I would just guess (~1-3% of the revenue) its just a guess don’t kill me 🙂 So basically, it goes $750-$2250 on a tiny business and 4K-12K on a bigger one, the usual rule is ~10% for user/customer acquisition should be OK.
So OMAAT could get somewhere between $75-$400 per signup per may calculations.
On the Pfizer funding issue above, as ABC correctly pointed out, no money changed hands so Pfizer can do its thing knowing there is a big buyer AFTER. Big difference, they funded the whole thing themselves, they sure earned it!
Agreed on the Obamacare rollout, they could have done much better at rollout. It was a disaster. But it has gotten better and after taking a beating for four years it is only going to get better from now…
Interesting small business stats. I think your number range for the conversion $ to OMAAT are right…I would say veer towards the high end…especially after hitting volume target goal. If I was paid that much per conversion I would do the same thing…because…incentives matter!
Instead, I am here whining trying desperately to reach that higher end of the range, SAD!
Great post tomorrow. I do it for the love and my belief my blog is changing the world…ok, lol.
I liked the length of today’s post, but I’d prefer it just a bit thicker.
That’s just me, though.
More content please and those silly pictures you always come up with.
I am leaning towards the posts being around this size. I can do 2 posts a week easily this way. Maybe a third…but not all the time. We shall see.
I am still laughing abt that Texan dude dancing in the snow link..to a Bee Gees song.
We have an upset OMAAT Brex customer:
>>>>>>>>>>>>Great job prostituting brex to the high-end travel community when the company can’t execute a foreign transaction.
https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/external-miles-points-resources/1483373-one-mile-time-omaat-discussions-merged-277.html#post33042634
Maaaybe Ted Cruz can actually serve Texans better in between margs, sure is an interesting take:
https://xYZliveandletsfly.com/ted-cruz-flees-texas/?utm_source=BoardingArea&utm_medium=BoardingAreaxXYY
I edited the link so my blog is not used to increase that blog’s pageviews and ad revenue.
I think this guy sleeps with the portrait of Gary Leff by his bed. He is ALWAYS trying to get his attention, the ass kissing is approaching pillowguy levels!
Well, whoever voted for Cruz it is on them. Can’t the Dems find a decent person to run and beat this asshole?
In other news, my daughter called the Chase reconsideration line and got approved for the 80k Southwest card! After my coaching of course. It took 35 minutes, wow! Credit line is $2,000 so we will deal with that…
Never give up!
So a reader unsubscribed and another one canceled the small monthly donation.
Dave is still the only plastic conversion this month.
And that DCFLyer dude still bitched that I have become like the other salesmen bloggers…
I wonder what he would say if I did “xxx card review” posts all the time? It obviously must be working for them, otherwise they would stop.
To any one who considers blogging to make a lot of money, DON’T! Unless you become a pumping machine targeting newbies and join the rich asshole blogger pumper club.
I feel so much better now.
It looks like I have enough to do a new post tomorrow…
But I must admit this is just too painful sometimes..
Second conversion!
I don’t feel as big as a loser now 🙂
Thanks.
Got the injection, feels ok for now, should be better tomorrow, snowing again.
Post is in the oven right now…
How can I sign up with your Brex link