Sitting here in the Sakura lounge at NRT having just gotten off the last segment of a DONE4 that morphed to a DONE5 (and awaiting my JL award flight across the Pacific to home) my reflection on the alliance and its members is that it's variable, and it's all about the people. Good service from IB and clapped out 743s from QF; polite but obstinate CX ground people and bang-bang efficient AA ticketing people.

Some random observations...

Amadeus and Sabre are not married, not even dating. Ridiculous last-century technology that infects the partnership with ticketing sclerosis.

Hub-itis near the point of collapse. All roads lead to Dallas or Heathrow. Yuck.

Slouching toward the mediocre middle. Had some lousy meals in CX J and some great ones in IB J. Huh?

OW REALLY needs to improve its Africa coverage. Its lunch is being eaten by LH and especially SAA.

Every lounge should have cool beer machines like this one and the AC down the hall here. AA should farm out the domestic AC operations to somebody that knows something about the catering business.

Time for another. TTFN.