Kinglobjaw's Blog

Archive for February, 2009

One my Mom’s friends turned to the King for help with booking a trip for her Mom. Her Mom is supposed to fly from WRO-ORD in June, stay for the summer and return back in September. Right off the bat, my options were limited, because my Mom’s friend said to only take LOT under consideration with a single connection in WAW. I guess it’s understandeable given that her Mom doesn’t really speak english and she has connected in WAW for many years. For an elderly lady travelling alone, it’s best to keep it as simple and as familiar as possible. Sure, LOT isn’t the cheapest and if I were the one flying, I would doing something more creative, and cheaper at the same time like an LH/SK combo, or LH via FRA to DUB, then US to ORD via PHL and CLT. Let’s back on topic however as I am not flying this time!

Here’s the part I’ve been meaning to talk about. My Mom’s friend is about 50 years old, so she’s not that old, but has this silly infantile notion that schedules never change. Let’s take flight LO3852 from WRO-WAW departing at 9AM. In the past, the flight would leave at 9:10AM, or so she claims. She can’t seem to understand that some flights get pulled or have schedule changes. She goes “No, No, there is no flight at 9:00AM, it leaves at 9:10AM!”. I am a perfectionist, so yes 10 minutes does make a difference, but in this case there is no flight at 9:10AM anymore. It now leaves at 9:00AM. Period.

Same, odd situation on the return. We were talking about LO4 which leaves ORD at 9:55PM and flies nonstop to WAW. ImmediatelyI heard her say, “9:50PM”. I let it slide, and later on when she was reading back the flights, she said “leaving Chicago at 9:50PM”. Back and forth we go. In the end I forced it in her hed. LO4 now leaves at 9:55PM. Good, the King is done here- put the flight on hold and will ticket tommorow over the phone or maybe on Orbitz.

I understand this post is more like a rant, but I’m curious to see if other people’s parents or older family/friends do that sort of thing? Maybe it’s a generational thing!

Have a nice clicK life,

-Mark

If you are not a RewardTV member, now is the time to join. Free of charge, of course! You get tons of valuable points for just watching your favorite TV shows, even if you don’t really watch them at all. You end up earning lots of points since you earn them in bunches of thousands. What can you do with your points? You spend them on shopping sprees. There are two each week and they announce the guaranteed prizes ahead of time. This is no silly sweepstakes.

An upcoming shopping spree on Wednesday, March 4, 2009 at 2:30PM Eastern Time is offering 1,000 AADVANTAGE miles for 300,000 RewardTV points (if you sign up for today, you can still earn in time- yes, you really earn them that fast). RewardTV very rarely offers miles as a reward, as it’s usually a gift card to places like BestBuy, Staples or Amazon.com (my favorites).

Besides American Airlines they partner with other airlines, but those miles are offered even more scarcely than the AA miles. Here are the airlines:

• Delta
• Northwest

They also partner with Marriott, but since I’ve never seen them offer it, I have no clue whether it’s a $10 Marriott gift card or Marriott Rewards points.

Have a nice clicK life,

-Mark

People will never forget how Live Search Cashback offered as much as 35% cashback on Buy-It-Now purchases made on eBay. Well, it’s BACK!!! Right now it’s a 8% cashback which is still really high, compared to Ebates which only offers 3%(even though they offer it daily and year-roud), but I’m going to take a wild guess that the cashback may go up again. Sure makes selling Best Buy gift cards much more rewarding!

For those who are new to the game, I’ll make it very simple.

0. Bookmark this blog so you keep coming back, hehe =]

1. Go to Live.com and search for the keyword “wii” or other product related keywords like “40d” or “psp”

2. Look for the banner that says “You may be eligible for X% off with PayPal if eligible

3. Link takes you to the eBay homepage where you can buy almost anything you want, but make sure you dont’ bid- use Buy It Now

4. Pay with PayPal, and you will get a message about claiming the cashback. After a while, they send the cash directly to your PayPal account. Beautiful!

Have a nice shopping experience clicK life,

-Mark

Just received my quarterly paper statement from Marriott Rewards. Yes, some companies still send those!

Page 2 hightlights Ritz Carlton savings if you are wanting to stay using Marriott Rewards points. More info can be found here: http://www.marriott.com/rewards/ritzCarltonPointSavers.mi (or if that link doesn’t work try http://www.marriottrewards.com/pointsavers)

Tier 2 Savings

• 1 night award- 50,000 pts (normally 70,000)
• 2 night award- 80,000 pts (normally 110,000)
• 3 night award- 110,000 pts (normally 150,000)
• 5 night award- 150,000 pts (normally 200,000)
• 7 night award- 190,000 pts (normally 250,000)

Tier 1 Savings

• 1 night award- 35,000 pts (normally 45,000)
• 2 night award- 60,000 pts (normally 75,000)
• 3 night award- 80,000 pts (normally 100,000)
• 5 night award- 120,000 pts (normally 150,000)
• 7 night award- 140,000 pts (normally 175,000)

I hear the Ritz-Carlton Grand Cayman (Tier 2) is really nice, and for a 7 nights stay it’s a savings of 60,000 Marriott Rewards points. Excellent deal for an excellent property.

Now, if only Ritz-Carlton Molasses Reef would open up already!

Have a nice clicK life,

-Mark

Because I fly only with US Airways, does it mean I only carry a Dividend Miles account? Of course not, and folks should learn to do the same.

You have to be on the lookout for various partner promos from the other airlines. Sometimes they’ll let you earn miles so easily and quickly and you’d be crazy not to. And I’m not talking about flying here! Take a look at a section of an email from Northwest that I got this morning.

Dear Mark,

Never shopped WorldPerks Mall before? Now’s a perfect time to try!
Savvy WorldPerks members know they can earn miles every day by shopping WorldPerks Mall. Now, you’re in the know! Plus, through March 31, 2009, make a purchase on WorldPerks Mall from Ann Taylor®, Lands’End®, homedepot.com, or more than 200 other favorite online stores, and you’ll earn 1,000 Bonus Miles in addition to the miles you always earn. Shopping the Mall is easy, fun and habit-forming. You’ll see.

Register today for this one-time offer.
 

1,000 miles for one (any) purchase. That’s great! The cheapest way to nail this is to buy an iTune for 0.99 cents. That will earn you 2 miles + 1,000 bonus miles. Full details on the promotion can be found here.

Some may ask if keeping a 1,000 miles is good for anything if you’re not going to fly with that airline?

Well, for starters, that 1,000  miles would normally cost you $50 + tax if bought directly from that airline. Also, you can be sure there will be other promos in the future to get you to try new products or the airline credit card will carry a no free promotion where you can score a huge 20,000+ mile welcome bonus. If you earn E-Rewards you can usually transfer to your frequent flyer account to get more miles. Last but not least, you can try redeeming those miles for a magazine delivered to your home free of charge. Subscriptions for certain magazines start from only 600 miles in cost.

I’ve been doing this with a couple of frequent flyer programs just to score enough miles that I will keep as emergency miles. I already have 50,000 miles with United and will have about 35,000 miles with the merged Delta frequent flyer program. I”m also going for American Airlines since I already have about 8,000 miles in my AAdvantage account. I’m also thinking of signing up for the BMI program since they have low redemptions levels for UK and Channel flights. All these are not from flying, but from partner promotions and no annual fee credit card offers from the airlines.

Have a nice clicK life,

-Mark

Just a few hours ago, I completed my voting in the Freddie Awards. I have to say, it was a little different this year.

US still got the all the highest marks for all the airline related categories, but I voted differently when it came to the hotels.
Each year I would recognize Marriott with all my votes, but I found 2008 to be poor for Marriott. I’ve had some upsetting stays, dismal customer service and ridiculous reductions in the Marriott Rewards program. I’m also upset with the progress of new properties I was really looking forward to staying at.

This year, I’ve found more value with the Hilton HHonors program, and more than anything else, I’ve found Priority Club very rewarding with their stackable bonus promotions and excellent credit card. In the last 6 months I’ve earned more than 80,000 Priority Club points without spending a single penny for hotel rooms. I will say it again, the Priority Club Visa card is amazing and has a very low annual fee ($25). And while Priority Club outsources all of their customer service (even for the Platinum line), I still find the agents genuinely helpful and friendly.

One other neat thing. Go on USAirways.com and on the top left of the page use their Google based search engine and search for the keyword “freddie”. You’ll find an old page which strangely enough still bears the America West logo. Interesting read.

Don’t forget to vote in the Freddie Awards. Voting closes February 28, 2009.

Have a nice clicK life,

-Mark

A few weeks ago, I posted about US Airways pulling the plug on the PIT-EWR route.

Turns out, that same day (March 7, 2009) US is starting a single PHL-EWR flight. It will be operated by US Airways Express- Piedmont Airlines. After that, starting on March 8, 2009 there will be 4 flights in each direction.

Schedule is as follows:

US4534 PHL (9:30AM) - EWR (10:29AM)
US4536 PHL (1:30PM) - EWR (2:29PM)
US4552 PHL (4:10PM) - EWR (5:15PM)
US4556 PHL (8:50PM) - EWR (10:00PM)

US4505 EWR (6:45AM) - PHL (8:00AM)
US4525 EWR (11:20AM)- PHL (12:35PM)
US4527 EWR (2:59PM) - PHL (4:19PM)
US4539 EWR (5:45PM) - PHL (7:05PM

Have a nice clicK life,

-Mark

Alrighty. This is sort of a big deal for me. It’s also I reason why I’ve been quiet for the last few days. I just applied for The Best Job In The World which makes me excited yet nervous at the same time. My application just got processed and published. Step 1 done, few more steps to go.

The Best Job In The World is a very clever marketing gimmick Hamilton Island is using to promote tourism into the region. They are offering a 6 month job for one talented person. Could it possibly be Kinglobjaw?

Anyway, sifting through all the videos you’ll see a lot of people get undressed, everyone talking about doing anything to get this job, and the lamest of all was the “it is currently x temp here so bring me to Hamilton Island”. There were also a lot of good ones, oddly enough most from Canada.

Given my love for travel, I decided to apply, but with an aviation twist. I stand to be original. Music isn’t too bad either, eh?

Anyway, here is my app: http://www.islandreefjob.com/#/applicants/watch/7nBRJ9zVgMs

Here’s my application video,

Be sure to tell your friends about this- spread the word about Kinglobjaw’s quest. Rate my video, drop me a line, or comment this post. Thanks.

Have a nice clicK life,

-Mark

P.S. If I end up being selected, this blog will surely turn in a different direction for 6 months. Question is, will I survive without setting foot on a plane for such a long time? =)

An account of the events and his life post the accident. Every single day I read more about this guy, I find him more and more amazing. I would be honored to fly with any member of this crew. Who knows, maybe one day I will.

Here’s the article.

Have a nice clicK life,

-Mark

I decided it’s time to sign up for Twitter and broadcast website and blog content via Twitter updates.

I think anyone can sign up for the updates, so here’s the direct link: http://twitter.com/kinglobjaw

At this point, it’s better if you use a PC instead of a mobile to access my site, gallery or the blog. My website is not yet mobile capable. One day!

Have a nice clicK life,

-Mark