Another TBB post featuring the most eclectic links around the web such as a Utah road trip itinerary, US military spending and how it compares to other countries, an expose on the poppers industry, a great Chase cards ultimate guide, amazing travel photography, an amazing short film about life in Burma, pondering the maze of the US retirement planning landscape, how unemployment insurance fraud was spectacularly huge, interview with a prominent doctor about the pandemic and where we stand, learn more about expertise, how vaccine incentives failed us, learn about an old super sport, amazing art above bridges, how a company dear to our hearts is getting back into, cough, financial planning, lots of Olympic news and jokes and enjoy the week!
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TRAVEL
If you missed my trip report from Tehran in Iran, check it out!
Doing a part of this next month (to Moab, UT for Arches and Canyonlands) so I saved it for reference: Utah Road Trip: The Ultimate Utah National Parks Itinerary.
I LOVED this short film: Guardians of Paradise – An Intimate Short Film Peers Into Life in Burma.
These are amazing: This Photographer Is Traveling The World With His Camera, Here Are 30 Of His Most Beautiful Pictures.
PERSONAL FINANCE
There are so many different types of retirement plans out there and so many different rules that it is maddening. This short post will try to clarify some of this madness: Pondering the Maze.
Everyone who ever dealt with the office that handles Michigan Unemployment related affairs is not surprised with this. At all. How Unemployment Insurance Fraud Exploded During the Pandemic. Bots filing bogus applications in bulk, teams of fraudsters in foreign countries making phony claims, online forums peddling how-to advice on identity theft: Inside the infrastructure of perhaps the largest fraud wave in history. Reading this will shock you!
This will get conservative trolls to attack me once again, I am used to it by now. All I can say is “I am a lover, not a fighter”…woohoo! U.S. Military Spending vs Other Top Countries.
COVID-19
I always advocated we needed to do whatever it takes to get the vaccination momentum to keep going. Instead, we got comfortable, started celebrating too soon and that anti-vaxxer wall proved too thick I guess to push through. I mean, how many stories have you seen with people in hospitals fighting to breathe regretting not getting vaccinated. For many of them that light bulb appeared too late. How Covid vaccine incentives failed America. America has a long history of requiring vaccinations. Why so much resistance when it comes to Covid? My daughter is moving out to an apartment nearby here in Ann Arbor to continue her studies at the University of Michigan in a few weeks hoping for a normal year. The university is mandating vaccines and more and more business and institutions are doing the same and I am all like…PUULEASE, let’s do this! Because…yeah!
Why should the Americans who have done the right thing for themselves, their families and their communities be forced to sacrifice on behalf of those who act as though their “personal choices” have no consequences?
If people want to make the choice not to vaccinate themselves and put themselves and others at risk, well, you do you. But the rest of us need not bear the consequences of that decision.
I must admit we have all been surprised about, well, everything that has come our way with this pandemic. We have all become amateur epidemiologists and arm chair quarterbacks virus experts. And we have all been wrong along the way. The ones who do not admit they are ever wrong are the knuckle heads who, sadly, make a lot of money catering to other knuckle heads out there. Anyway, I loved this article! If They Say They Know, They Don’t Know. A principle for understanding which experts to trust, including the CDC. You are welcome for learning about the Kiesenhofer principle in my blog!
Now I’m old, I’m 30, and I started to realise that all those people who say they know, they actually don’t know. Many of them don’t know, and especially those who say that they know, don’t know, because those who do know say that they don’t know. by Anna Kiesenhofer, the Austrian PhD mathematician and Gold medal Olympian in cycling (whose win was completely shocking!).
I don’t want to make it sound like we live in an utterly opaque fog. We know some things reasonably well. We know vaccines prevent most symptomatic COVID and we know almost certainly that the death tolls from future COVID waves in heavily vaccinated populations are going to be much lower than what we’ve seen before. But we definitely don’t know whether 10,000 or 100,000 Americans a day are going to be getting COVID next month.
Excellent interview of doctor Ashish Jha on Covid-19, the Delta variant and vaccines by conservative Bill Kristol. I found this very educational.
ODDZ & ENDZ
You would never learn about stuff like this in any other blog. Anyway, I had no idea that this sport, pedestrianism, existed! The strange 19th-Century sport that was cooler than football. Pedestrianism was a sport of epic rivalries, eyewatering salaries, feverish nationalism, eccentric personalities and six-day, 450-mile walks.
This article will teach you about poppers. Actually, I had heard of the term but I had no idea what they were exactly. But I learned in this article Where Do Poppers Come From? I found the business man coming out (pun intended) to shine a light in his business kind of strange, why do it now as it has obviously been working for him for so long, what a business! I found the paragraph below about his adult daughter hilarious!
Very few people outside his immediate circle know about this part of what he does. “My daughter didn’t know when she was in high school, but when she started researching on the internet, she figured it out,” Farr said. “And I’m like, ‘Well, honey, it put you through college!’” With a proud smile, Farr said she now delights in visiting gay friends’ apartments and pointing out the products her dad has made.
This looks amazingly cool! Monumental Cardboard Bridges Float in the Sky in Temporary Installations by Olivier Grossetête.
MILES & POINTS
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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: BEST TRAVEL REWARDS CREDIT CARD, TO KEEP! 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.
My kids are going for the 100k Chase Sapphire Preferred any day now…If Chase pulls it without warning we will be very upset!
Are you a newbie or kind of a beginner who already tasted the dopamine seeing one or two or three huge travel rewards credit card signup bonuses hit your account and want to really capitalize on this hobby in this era of inflated bonuses before they go away? And you don’t want to see conflicted advice from bloggers miles and points experts online marketing experts? Well, this blog post is for you from Andy the Lazy Traveler: In 2021 Go Chase or Go Home – The Ultimate Guide to the 5/24 State of Mind. Well done!
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 am going to break out some news here that self-proclaimed travel thought leaders will blog about after attributing they found out about it from mysterious blog readers with names such as Alan H. or something and then a bunch of ass kissing bloggers will link to them and not me…and that’s the way it goes in this miles and points blog world, oh well: American Express slides back into the financial planning game 16 years after it sold off Ameriprise; expect success, experts say. American Express used to own Ameriprise but spun it off 16 years ago and I would like to thank them for that since I have several clients who abandoned them after being sold one too many crappy annuities lol. Anyway, as Mastercard and Visa made some purchases of fintech companies it is not surprising Amex bought a robo advisor outfit. It will be interesting to see if they expand on this move…I doubt it but I have been wrong before.
Greece got two more medals in the Olympics: Men’s gold in long jump and a bronze in men’s gymnastics. Three total so far. One more than San Marino and Kosovo! 🙂
Love watching USA men’s soccer team play Mexico in soccer, what an amazing win by the US late in overtime! Here is the goal. Too bad I fell asleep to see it live!
Italy is at it again now winning the 100 meters race!
Let’s have some laughs next, every time I watch this I lol big time!
How To Funk In Two Minutes. Lol!
Let me leave you with this…
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TBB
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Utah really looks nice! I’m looking forward to your trip report, which I assume will be posted promptly after your trip.
You are killing me man, I am still recovering from the Tehran trip report post!
Will see what happens. Definitely before the new decade rolls in 🙂
Colorado incurred $6 million of unemployment fraud losses. But the agency that runs the program said it was a success since they blocked $91 million of fraudulent claims. Isn’t there a word for creating victory out of lowered expectations?
Great photos today, Buzz. Again.
Bill Kristol is one of the few conservatives who hasn’t folded for the Trumpian onslaught. Smart guy with principles-no place for him over there now.
Yeah, there are not many of those decent conservatives left, sad!
The size of the fraud is surreal!
Thanks
Good morning!
Thanks for the links. The caution about expertise is very well taken.
I just blog about stuff I find. I am no expert by any stretch of imagination 🙂
For your Utah trip, I wouldn’t lean too heavily on that blog post. It seems to me that the author didn’t actually do the trip that is outlined. You’d basically kill yourself trying all of that, especially in the summer! Looks like a cut-and-paste job.
For example, be aware that Arches usually closes their gates in the morning after X number of cars are let in. And the best (points) hotel in Moab? We really liked the Mainstay Suites. (Free bike rentals…Woohoo!)
I’ve been to (almost) all those places. Consider adding Natural Bridges Monument and the little city of Kanab (and some cool slot canyons near there). Be aware that there is a lot of repetition in those places—even though they are very beautiful, you can get burned out a little and you might seek out some more variety. (But not like you are going to find a lot of crazy bar action or anything…this is Utah, after all!)
Feel free to reach out for specific ideas.
Thanks for the feedback!
We have a friend who is executive assistant to a bigly exec (Delta 360 elite caliber) who also does all the travel planning for her and she has us covered for Arches/Canyonlands. And I built in a little cushion for us. Happening in late September. No way I am doing all that driving per the post!
We are staying at the Hyatt Place in Moab, UT. All on points. I wake up early, we will make sure we are not shut out!
I may have questions as we get closer and have more time to look over the travel plan she made for us, thank you!
Sounds good. Enjoy! Utah–especially away from the cities–is my favorite place to visit in the US!
more than Hazel Dell?
I just blog about stuff I find. I am no expert by any stretch of imagination
Poppers article is fabulous
I respect such business men and I still have no idea why he decided to come out now…Something is behind it, may be retirement, imminent closure or hopefully not a medical diagnosis.
Two interesting charts about stocks with high price/sales ratios:
https://twitter.com/BvddyCorleone/status/1422583025037189127
You asked about what to worry about, inflation and stuff like that, good read:
https://www.oaktreecapital.com/docs/default-source/memos/thinkingaboutmacro.pdf
Thanks, I actually just finished “Mastering the Market Cycle” by Marks. I like him. In the pdf above he makes a point that’s been perplexing me: there’s more chatter about, and signs of, inflation yet rates are going down and gold is going nowhere.
Howard’s memos are required reading imho.
Yeah, some things don’t make any sense…focus on what you can control 🙂
Greetings from Lake Myvatn, Iceland. Lots of traveling ‘not’ for free going on around these parts – shhh, don’t tell any of the other bloggers.
It’s weird to be on a proper trip after a year and a half. Kind of feels like my last hurrah coming back to the U.S. in March 2020 since it seems like we’re all heading for Pandemic 2: Electric Boogaloo shortly. Thankfully, at least the farther you get away from Reykjavik the fewer chinned-masked Americans there are.
Enjoy….If I had to take a trip abroad it would be Iceland and not next door Mexico.
For the record, still not allowed to drive half an hour away to Canada, sad!
My family and I just got back from Iceland as well. Though we had to miss Myvatn because we did a whale-watching boat ride in Húsavik (Ja Ja Ding Dong!). What a spectacular country! I got to burn some points on the trip: BofA points for 2 r/t airfares, and some stupidly-hard-to-use-after-the-split Radisson points for a couple of room nights near the airport.
Oh oh…I think you had to move them for the “Americas” bunch to the “world” branch? I dread having to do that one day…Crap, I dread using these damn points. Maybe I give them away as a prize to a reader lol.
Great you enjoyed the trip!
Play it!!
We had to make a stop at the bar/cafe now calling itself the Ja Ja Ding Dong. ‘Husavik’ was literally playing when I walked in. I asked the guy working if he was sick or the song yet and his answer was…diplomatic. They had a mini gallery/exhibit for the movie in the cafe – he added that Netflix has sent them all of the costumes from the movie and they were preparing to display them.
For the trip I did use 2 certs for the Hilton Curio Konsulat in Reykjavik. I feel like this hotel gets raves about. And the hotel itself is very nice, but I found my room to be unbearably hot to even be in. I understand why Iceland hotels wouldn’t have A/C but to be that uncomfortable while it was only high 50s/low 60s outside seems like a huge problem for that level of hotel. I’m not a complainer, and also, I’m not in Iceland to be in a hotel room, but I honestly would be furious IF I paid the cash rate there. Maybe requesting a north-facing room would help, but just keep this mind if you make it there.