Things have completely changed since miles don't expire in three years anymore. I am definitely in the "earning" miles phase of my life. Since learning that you can become lifetime gold with AA for collecting 1 million miles, I wouldn't think of using an award ticket unless i really had to. I see my mileage account as my 401K for travel. While I can find cheap fares and reap lots of miles, I'll spend the money cause I have it. Once I get lifetime gold, I will be able to use my award travel and be sure of having elite status. I am only 75K away, thanks to these boards. I will lose my platinum status and am really upset that I couldn't fit in two more trips to Europe to achieve it - and get all those miles. Oh, well. But I will have gold, and will achieve my lifetime gold real soon - sort of triple gold! I've used award travel to Mexico and Hawaii and the Caribbean because they are "good value" of miles spent compared to airfares, and miles would have expired. I did one discounted (20,000) domestic. 25,000 for a domestic trip seems "expensive" unless the fares are really high. However, that was all before I knew about lifetime gold, or ways of achieving status such as the challenges. I would have made some different decisions way back when if only I had known (such as signing up for frequent flyer programs sooner - I always though that I didn't fly "enough." I think that the change to miles not expiring has made the difference for a lot of us. I would never be collecting so many miles if they expired in three years.

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DtG