Happy 7th Birthday to Travel Blogger Buzz Blog!

Happy 7th Birthday to Travel Blogger Buzz Blog! We take a moment to celebrate this special anniversary and share with you some of the posts in the past seven years that are dear to my heart. I do not know how long I can keep this going. One day it will stop. Until then, enjoy the journey with me and thanks for coming along, I appreciate you!

TBB Blog Mission: To Educate. Entertain. Inspire. In That Order!

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Happy birthday to this blog, 7 years keeping you educated, entertained and sometimes even inspired! I am more shocked than you that I have kept up this baby for seven years running, wow! Thank you for reading and keeping me company here. And keeping me out of trouble. And most importantly, for your wisdom, kind words to keep me going and your fun attitude. I got to meet some of you personally and I really cherish that. I hope I can meet in person more of you in the days/months/years ahead!

As many bloggers have quit, or merged, or sold out, or just packed up and went to work for The Points Guy, I have remained true to my roots. Fiercely independent and speaking my mind. I don’t do things to conform and certainly not for maximizing my money haul from this blog. It helps I don’t need the money. What would happen if I truly needed the money or I was just greedy? Well, my blog would probably be like all the others. In other words, most likely too boring for me to have fun!

I don’t know where I am going with all this. Thing is I had announced I will go to posting twice a week on Mondays and Fridays. Well, I missed only one Wednesday lol. It will happen in the future, maybe I implement this in the new decade around the corner! As with everything around here, I started this blog as a joke and gave me three months to get bored by it. And here we are…

I just want to say I am proud of staying alive in the blog space for so long. I mean, in blog speak, 7 years of blogging regularly is a lifelong career! Not many can accomplish this for sure. It takes, well, special talent, hard work, lots of discipline and being stubborn as hell!

Thank you for your support. The money the blog brings to me is tiny but it does justify in a way to keep it going. I truly enjoy most aspects of blogging, the learning, the interactions with readers, dealing with the hypocrite trolls, giving back some of the wisdom from my experience on planet earth and in a way doing my little part in making this world a better place.

This blog has evolved. As we all humans evolve. And it will continue to evolve of course. I do not see myself selling out and becoming like The Points Guy and so many who want to be like him. To me, this quirky hobby has remained a hobby. To them, it is BUSINESS first. One of the posts I am most proud of is this one:

The “Travel” Miles/Points Blogosphere Has Turned Into a Giant Credit Card Pumpization Scheme!

My travel hacking masterpiece trips were the two below where I managed to put together an amazing trip for all four of us on Amtrak cabins crossing the US and then flying Business Class to Santiago, Chile and then Buenos Aires paying almost nothing out of pocket for all flights and hotels. The trip to Banff was another masterful hacking job taking advantage of the then lifetime Fairmont Executive Platinum status seeing the most beautiful place I have ever visited. If you missed them, here they are again:

Cross Country Amtrak-Seattle-Santiago & Buenos Aires

Banff & Jasper, Canada

There have been a few other posts that are really special to me:

The White Man in That Photo

My Best Redemption

There is another post I made recently that I am very proud of. Thank you for reading my endless commentary about how I started running and how I was going to go for a full marathon. While running it, I did not want to fail because I would have to confess to you so in a way you were my inspiration to keep going! I hope my Marathon story inspires you. I am thinking to run the Athens, Greece marathon next year, God willing.

My Running Journey to Becoming a Marathoner In Detroit October 2019

I will see you again Friday with the regular Buzzy post as usual.

Please allow me to cut and paste below the FIRST post of TBB. I just read it and shook my head. So many things remain the same and so many have changed, enjoy! I wrote “Actually I have no freaking clue what I am doing” which remains so true to this day lol!

Introductory Post November 9, 2012

Hi,

I am George, known on twitter as @FlyertalkerinA2 and on Flyertalk and Milepoint as gpapadop. I have a severe addiction to all things related to miles/points/traveling. I have tried to cure myself but have determined that there is no cure. It is like the crack epidemic that somehow keeps going and going. There is no 12 step program either. I have earned millions and millions of frequent flyer miles and points and have an extensive knowledge of this space. I have been on Flyertalk for over 12 years. I have done mileage runs, got fantastic hotel upgrades, got in some error fares & other deals. If it was not for my extensive family and job responsibilities, I would probably be just roaming the world constantly. I LOVE exploring a new place I have never been to before!

I am also known on twitter as the guy who rants about other bloggers. I would like to state once again that I have ABSOLUTELY nothing personal against any blogger! I know lots of them personally and I consider all of them my friends. I do like to say what is on my mind and cherish my independence though. My twitter persona is just an avenue to let out my artistic side because I always thought I had one (even though I never learned how to play an instrument and not many, understandably, get my quirky sense of humor).

So, why join the other bloggers? Well, I have been thinking about doing this for many years. Heck, it was before Rick FrugalTravelGuy started (what could have been…oh well)! I have gained a respectable number of followers on twitter who have enjoyed my contributions (and rants!). They encouraged me to take my rants to a blog. My biggest fear is that the blog activities consume a big part of my life and I add another stress factor to my already full life. This remains a huge concern and will be monitored very closely. The following will always come first: Wife & kids, my own career, health (I work out daily!) and my Monday night over 40 old indoor soccer league game (been playing for years, my team’s name is Gasping for Air and the name fits us perfectly).  We just see where this journey goes…Hey, I am a sucker for journeys!

Over the past week on twitter I have done a somewhat unofficial travel blog review series of tweets. Since I spend some time on this hobby every day I started tweeting about whatever comes to my mind as I go through several travel blogs. Again, I do not mince words. I will make some travel bloggers upset. I will bless others with my fantastic seal of approval. I will try to make things fun. I believe laughter is the best medicine in life! I love Saturday Night Live so maybe this blog becomes the SNL version of this space. Sometimes I dream I could be as funny as PointsEnvy. Actually, I have no freaking clue what I am doing:-)

I will start posting my thoughts here. I have no time to find out how to get this blog to its own domain (which I registered by the way at godaddy) or to learn new software. We see how it goes and go from there. I definitely do NOT want this to be a burden in my life, I want to keep it fun!

I do have a family blog on Blogger so I start here. I update that blog once a month and would like to thank my faithful 9 family readers!

Feel free to talk to me at the Frequent Flyer University in Los Angeles about my adventure.

Now please excuse me while I go and update my Award Wallet balances.

George
TravelBloggerBuzz

And I leave you with this…A special gif from the past that never fails to make me lol!