Originally Posted by maverick17

The blog one mile at a time had a post recently with someone in SEA looking to switch away from Delta (written April 15th). I advise reading it. With the current turf war they are having with Alaska, the blog made the point it's a really good time to be flying Delta in Seattle. They are offering double miles on all Seattle routes, which is pretty amazing. Not great redemption rates, but they have also been improving their flight experience and have a good business class longhaul.

Given that you're going to be flying lots of int'l routes, I'd sign up if you haven't already for AA and Alaska. And although you don't like United, they do have very good award rules and comparable rates, and have the biggest footprint in many parts of the globe. I'd want one program in every alliance, plus Alaska since you're in Seattle.

You should consider too Aegean. They offer an easy route to Star Gold (with a very long expiry period) and after a few flights crediting to them, you would have lounge access domestically and internationally, priority checkin, and economy + seats on some airlines, if you do end up flying Star partners. After you meet their low threshold, you can go back to crediting any Star flights to United or whomever you choose. See the Aegean forum here on Flyertalk for details.