Football Season Is Here

I'm interested in baseball still, but a few people might be interested in the football season kicking off. To appeal to a wider audience, here's an NFL related picture.

Carolina Panthers A319

Pity this year the Cubs would be the best team in the NL East or West, but are third in the Central division.

Booking United Flights With Global Premier Upgrades

Global Premier Upgrades, formerly System Wide Upgrades, permit upgrades without any miles or copay. The pre-merger United.com website had a search option for using a System Wide. The post-merger website has no comparable feature. This means users have to use the Advanced Search and search for fare classes W and V, the two cheapest fares that work with System Wides. Then there is no way to know if the upgrade will clear at booking. The best method for confirming upgrades at booking is making a reservation and then trying to apply the upgrade. The website will say if seats can be confirmed. If the flight is waitlist space only, cancel the reservation and try a different date. There’s no fee because you are cancelling 15 minutes into the 24 hour free cancelation window. United will put an authorization hold on the credit card used, so your available credit will be used up quickly.

Difficult to Move Up Front

MileagePlus and Mercedes-Benz Offer

Wow, United actually has a great offer available.  Most emails I've read recently are bad ways to acquire miles and worse ways to spend them, but the Mileage Plus Mercedes Benz offer is a great deal.  The deal is run through TrueCar.com and starts with the best TrueCar prices then adds an additional discount ($500-$7,000) and bonus miles (up to 50,000).  This is probably the best price on a new Mercedes publicly available.  Now if only I had a spare $100,000 for a 577 hp station wagon.

Like 757's, Good Deals Are Harder to Find

Could Be Worse

It's not de-icing season yet.

Coming Soon to an Airport Near You

IHG Rewards Credit Card Extra Bonus Points

The IHG Rewards card I picked up earlier this year is still paying out bonus points.  The sign up offer I received was for 80,000 points after $2,000 spent (any offer less than 70,000 isn't worth taking).  IHG ran a promotion when I signed up that gave me an extra 2,000 bonus points for acquiring the card. All these points counted to status and I earned Spire Elite status which comes with 25,000 bonus points (or gift Platinum status).  I thought 80,000 points was a good credit card bonus, but I actually earned 107,000 points.  I wish other credit cards had extra bonuses like this.

I Have a Few Free Nights to Enjoy

Visit Britain Shop Review

I'm excited for my trip to the UK and Ireland in October and I've started my planning.  The British tourist board has a great website for exploring activities and a shop to buy travel cards, tourist cards, and maps.  It's a top notch production and I ordered London transits cards and a map for my trip.

On Board Soon-ish

Post #600

To celebrate 600 posts, here's an uplifting picture from CLT.  Thank's for joining me on the trip.

About to Depart CLT on Runway 18 Center