Sounds like me, a couple of years ago.

I fly NW all the time. I pay el cheapo fares, and get upgraded to First most of the time. Would you refuse that?

If you want to do some long haul flying (i.e., Europe, Asia, etc.), you must be aware that the the time spent in your seat can be considerable -- if you can upgrade yourself by spending some miles, would you deny yourself that just because, I don't know, maybe you feel you don't "deserve" it?

Re: hotels. Yes, we've done the B&B/pensione route, too. It can be a lot of fun. But since I spend a lot of time in hotels anyhow, why not take the points I'm getting for free and splurge a little? Maybe you'd never pay $500/night in Rome -- well, I wouldn't either. But if I wanted to visit Rome on the cheap, I can prpbably find a decent hotel for ~$100/night. 6 nights is $600. A GLONP2 from Hilton costs some points, and I get a very nice hotel for $0, plus free breakfast, excellent service, etc. And, I get to stuff that $600 in my pocket.

Different strokes for different folks and all that, but the reason most of us are here is to find out how to maximize our return on things we would have to do anyhow. I know I've learned a lot -- the cash value I've received from tips learned here far outweighs anything I would have likely done myself, and I've enjoyed some pretty comfortable travel in the bargain.

yellow77 -- Most of us here do know the tradeoffs of cash vs. points/miles. We wind up earning the points/miles in the course of our business. Money is fungible -- miles are not. There's very little we can spend them on except airlines and hotels. I often make the mental calculations of "should I use cash or points". We all do.

If you have no interest in international premium travel or upscale hotels, well, OK - that's fine for you. But an awful lot of people would very much like to experience that, and that's what this board is all about.

Don't forget, while many of us here are relatively young, quite a lot of us are older -- we've done the backpacking thing. We don't necessarily have decades of travel ahead of us. We're cashing out in style, and FT is helping us along.

[/sermon]