About two weeks ago Santa asked me to post a litte about myself. That alone should tell you a little something about my procrastinating lifestyle.

Let's see....I have always lived in Mississippi, graduated from the University of Southern Mississippi with a degree in Music Education and am now teaching percussion(drums) in the Jackson area.

My mileage life began when I was 18. I was performing with a drum and bugle corps music group from New Jersey and had to fly to rehearsals about every 3 weeks. By the time my first complete year had rolled around, I was Platinum with Delta.....or was it Royal Medallion? Anyway....I was sitting in First-class most of the time and I liked it and I liked the miles so I started going on short weekend trips etc.....then some friends asked me to come to England to teach and I did and now after about 7 years I have over 800,000 base miles to my name. All on Delta. But now with this alliance game going strong and Delta lagging behind, I may have to begin using someone else. But since DL has the best connections to everywhere I have ever needed to go, that may be hard to do.

Anyway.....my only real interests are teaching music and flying/travelling. I am one of those people who really doesn't mind if he flies some place spends a few hours and comes straight back. The fun part was being on the plane. And now that I know about RTW fares things are about to get much more exotic and interesting.

I hope this is enough and I appologize for not getting this posted earlier and for this not being very interesting but hey, now you know that I am not an interesting person.

Oh, one other hobby. Hanging out at a pub or bar. I like to drink and chill. Either beer or clear. No Bourbon or Whiskey for me. Double Vodka on the rocks. No problem. Guiness. No problem. (Did I spell that correctly?) Bourbon and Coke. Send it back.

Chris Moss

Thanks Chris...

Sorry the MSY meet never happened last month, we do have two things in common, beer or clear, and a preference for DL. I can't handle any 'brown' spirits, though I've certainly tried over the years. I have been known to drink a LI Tea from time to time, but that doesn't really count.

Don't know if I'll ever get to PM, but have been GM for the last 3 years, and starting my 4th.

Thanks Chris, might have to get some tips from you for my daughter who is pursuing a music degree and is interested in teaching music. That a music teacher could afford to travel first class is not in most music student's thoughts.

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Shadow.. I can sense that you are concerned..

1) I travel with one case only. 5 shirts, 2 suits and an assortment of other clothes. That is it. Everything either gets worn until damaged (by hotel laundry) or discarded and replaced by something else. I avoid really cold places, so that makes packing easier. I am also incredibly unfashionable.

2) I used to have a 3 bed house of my own in the UK. It is all in storage. I will be re-united with it one day. All the stuff I buy en-route I send back to my parents in the UK. They use this as a means tracking me down. Either that or thry have opened an ethnic handicraft shop.

3) No homebase at all. I will most likely move within my company at some stage in 2000, but whereever to is not predetermined by a home.

Hope that answers your questions ! Great to have this forum to communicate with while on the road sometimes.

Derek,

Nice to see another free marketer on the boards. It's probably too late apply, but for the ultimate in pro free-market education there is U of Chicago. Personally, I would have died and gone to heave to have studied with Austrian school profs had I know about it when I was studying econ.

Read much Rand?

Cheers,

Samantha

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Shadow - LI Ice Teas don't count as dark to me either. I will scarf those down in a heart beat. Don't forget about the MSY meeting early next year. I have a performance that week but am going to try and catch a late flight to get in Saturday night for that schindig.

BlondeBomber - Somewhere along the line I was blessed with a knowledge of meeting people and playing with groups a long way away from home. That is where my flying started and has continued since. I still look back and say....."annual salary=this much travelling.....how does that work?" The truth is that I am as poor as the next musician but at least I am a well travelled one.

Good to meet all of you.

Hi everyone. Here's a liitle about me.
I'm 48, and live with my wife and 3 boys (16,14,12) just south of Bristol, UK. I was born and brought up in the north of England (Yorkshire).
I work for one of the 'big 5' accounting firms, and much of my work is with multi-national companies. I spend quite a lot of time helping with corporate acquisitions.
Most of my travel is to the US (5 business trips there so far this year). Funny how, even with 'europeanisation', so many UK companies look west when it comes to business development.
My main hobby is playing guitar, which I've done for many years. I lead the contemporary music group in my church, and also play in a Christian rock band. My eldest son sings, and my yongest plays percussion, so when we want to we can make music (well we think it's music!) Otherwise I'll be found walking our 'Heinz 57' dog, Max, who's been part of the family for 2 years since he came from the local dog's home.
Nearly all my travel is with BA. I'm Silver status, and also a member of Virgin's Flying Club.
My next trip to the US is in January. Such a good time of year to visit Southern California from the UK!

Martin

Welcome martin!!

shadow, ChrisMoss7...LI teas are made with clear... 1/2 shot gin, 1/2 shot vodka, 1/2 shot light rum, and 1/2 shot triple sec (although some people substitute tequila and rose's lime for the triple sec)and the coloring is a splash of pepsi!

Derek: you have very correctly described the difference between UofC and NU econ-bus, incl

MM and MBA programs. It was not always so; 20 years ago (and earlier) UofC was much more practical and NU just becoming one of the best, now the best (Kellogg) by some rankings. You sure have a blue ribbon group listed and this old fellow wishes you all the best in your pursuit of the best.



Samantha: if you come to UofCLaw, you will find profs still teaching, or, if retired, taking a few pupils, who studied with Hayek,

von Mieses, Friedman, and others from the Austrian School. That's in econ; bus school is what I referred to above.

Essxjay:

"Died and gone to heave"?

Sounds like a WHOLE lot of college parties I went to.


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"I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered. My life is my own."

TravelWeary::: We don't have a too much of a dress code now. We can pretty much wear what we want. They don't really like you to wear shorts or anything too revealing, but jeans or whatever. Sorry it has taken me so long to respond.
Not very many people dress up, that's for sure, it is very casual.


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"Some people dream of worthy accomplishments, while others stay awake and achieve them.

TravelWeary::: We don't have too much of a dress code now. We can pretty much wear what we want. They don't really like you to wear shorts or anything too revealing, but jeans or whatever.
Not very many people dress up, that's for sure, it is very casual.

Sorry it has taken me so long to respond. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

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"Some people dream of worthy accomplishments, while others stay awake and achieve them.

If you are wondering why I have 2 posts that are basically the same, I tried to stop the first one before it posted because there was a typo, but oh well, I was too slow.

Anyway.........
GK:
I travel basically the same way that you do, or at least I used to....now I get to go home every 2 weeks. I still live out of a suitcase though. Like I said earlier, all of my things are in boxes at my parents house. When I do get to go home, it is usually only for a day or so, so I never unpack my suitcase. Most of my friends think it is a glamorous job, but it is definitely not. It used to be fun and exciting but now it is starting to get tiresome and is wearing me out. Since I am only 25, I can't let it get the best of me. I hope to be moving on to something different before it starts to ruin my love for travel. Anyway, I am glad to know that there is someone else out there that experiences the same lifestyle that I do. You get to go to more international places than I do and I am a little jealous. Best of luck in your many travels.

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"Some people dream of worthy accomplishments, while others stay awake and achieve them.

Jon Toner, LOL http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

Hi. I am Barry Rubin. My first official FT interaction was the Hawaiin Party In Paradise, and I'm wondering, aren't we supposed to have a party once a month in a different exotic local? I mean, where do all my membership dues go to anyway?

I'm a 41 year-old criminologist. I have a small company (30-odd employees) that contracts with the California Dept. of Corrections and Fed. Bureau of Prisons to run community correctional centers (hence jailer, so anointed by cousin craig6z). I was also involved in a start-up electronic house arrest firm, since sold. I teach criminology now and again and have a side-practice of writing private probation reports. I always have a nice cell available for FT members with substance abuse issues.

Lived in England for a couple of years, and did my graduate work at Cambridge. Don't travel extensively for business, more for pleasure. Most of my frequent flyer awards have been on my cousin's mileage dime: Kenya, Turkey, Thailand, India, Nepal. Craig6z's wife refuses to fly. We've parlayed her phobia into some great trips.

I met my Chinese-American, travel-loving wife in Europe in the late 70's. We took quasi-separate honeymoons. After Ireland I went back home to work, and she headed to England. She going solo to France this summer. We have a nine year old daughter named Emily, Twoey the cat (named after the plant in Little Shop of Horrors), a rabbit, and a dog all in an old (by Long Beach, California standards) house. Emily loves to travel, and is very adaptable to foreign places.

I collect art a little, mostly Anoro and Oleg Zhivetin, and am moving into Chinese folk art. Because of the battered Australian $, I was able to pick up a Charles Blackman last year while in Sydney. And, while I consider myself somewhat of an athlete, my athletic feats are a little thin: an unassisted triple play on a team of Brits who didn't understand the significance ("Oh Bloody Hell, side out"), and I beat the reigning US Handball champion last time we played--he was 13 at the time. I enjoy cross-country skiing and scuba diving is a new passion, even though I swim like a stone.

I tend to be wordy. Bye.

Does the shamless hording of frequent flyer miles count? There'd better be a lot of room at the inn, that's all I can say. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

Criminology is fascinating to me. I've always wanted to take a course in forensic photography but where do you find such a beast? Certainly not at Podunk Community College.

The outsourcing of corrections is also very interesting to me. I'll email you privately.

Hi,
This is my first post. I travel over 40 weeks per year as a professional speaker. I have been in 47 states and 21 countries. At age 57 I am growing weary of travel, but not speaking. I live in southern New Jersey, just across the river from Philadelphia, therefore, US Airways, gets most of my biz but I flew on 13 different airlines this year. I spend over 220 nights per year in hotels. I never have a choice. I go where my clients have there meeting. We had a cat, but he liked the heat under my Vette! My wife and I enjoyed three weeks in England, Scotland and Ireland in Sept 99. The only cost was food. Rewards did the rest. Yeah!
Peace and NightNite.

I have been a lurker on Flyertalk for awhile, and have found it helpful. I retired recently from disaster response work for the Lutheran Church... so travel is all personal now. My wife and I are just back from the second trip to Germany this year... the concerts and Christmas markets in Leipzig and Dresden.

I have been flying mostly Northwest since before the Republic merger, when they had the "segment" system. I have 1,350,000 air miles with them... more than 3,200,000 program miles... and with retirement am about to go from platinum (about 120,000 a year) to silver ( Just 26,000 miles this year). I am also a Marriott platinum- for one more year, anyway.

Of course, I have flown more than one airline. Over the years each of the ones I have flown has had both "up" years and "down" years. I personally have found Northwest better than most of the Flyertalkers seem to consider it... and on this most recent trip noticed significant improvements in service.

I appreciate the tips, reports and insights of Flyertalk, and the availability of this way of communicating with each other.

Hey Stimpy, we have to be careful, Jailer lives in Long Beach also. I think he even lives in our neighborhood. But, a couple trips to Joe Jost's might loosen him up!

Hey Newself, I know the way to Joe Jost's quite well, thank you. Just because I talk the talk, it doesn't mean I walk the walk. Merry Christmas to all.

Jailer,

The traditional Christmas Eve cocktail (ice cold schooner of beer) at Joe Jost's starts at 10:00am. Be there by 11:00am or stand in a long line to get in. I will be by the Marmion peanut roaster in the snooker table room wearing my traditional Christmas Eve outfit of Sushi Hawaiian Shirt and black shorts. CYA there!

here goes......35 M....frequent reader, occasional poster.....live in ny, originally from texas........work in television (as i always say: "beats working for a living"). early on travelled primarily for work, now equally for pleasure. platinum for life in continental, gold in aa. enjoy sports, travel (duh), outdoors. collect old wooden hand crank movie cameras and very old maps. best travel experience was laying on the back seat of a open air jeep in the middle of the botswana bush on a nightime "photo" safari.......more stars than you could imagine and not a sound from the modern world.....no planes over head, no tv or radio babble. helped put my life into perspective, would recommend to anyone beaten down by deadlines, dilberts and road rage.

Heres a little something about me...
I'm 26 years old, from Des Moines, Iowa but currently I am living in Malmo, Sweden. I have been living in Sweden since 1997 and I just graduated with a masters degree in European Politics... (go ahead, admit it, it probably sounds boring) :-)
I have also lived in Austin, TX and W. Palm Beach Florida, but I grew up in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia! My parents (whom are both originally from Cleveland, Ohio *gasp*) went to work in Saudi and ended up working there 25 years... hence I grew up there and spent half my life there. I think thats kinda interesting :-)
And yes, I love to travel.. I've spent my whole life traveling the globe and traveling is my favorite hobby. While I belong to many FF programs, I am most loyal to NW/KLM (KLM is one of the few Int'l airlines that flies into Malmo) and I have been an elite member of NW's progam a while. My second choice is,not surprisingly, SAS. :-)
Cheers

I too have been lurking around here for a few weeks, and have started to make a few posts.

I am an American, but I live and work in London, where my company's headquarters are. My girlfriend and social life are in Washington DC, where I used to live. I've been living in London for a year and a half, and will probably be here for a little more than another year until I go back to DC.

Since my girlfriend is in DC, I usually fly over there two weekends a month. I'll take off Friday and fly to DC, then take the red eye back to London on Sunday night.

I travel extensively, and almost all of my travel is on BA. I fly about ten times a year to CVG, and since BA doesn't cover that route, I fly Delta, giving me PM status on them.

When I'm not on the road or at my REAL home in DC with my girlfriend, I'll be at my little, lonely townhouse off of Berkley Square (conveniently close to the US Embassy, should I need it).



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An American Lost in London...

I'm 34, married and live in the White Mountains of eastern Arizona... 50 miles from the New Mexico border. It's a great place to live, 7000' with mild temperatures, and just enough snow to enjoy. The population here is about 3000, so Christmas shopping is a breeze, even today. (Although, I did drive by Wal-Mart, and the lot was packed!)


Started travelling with my job three years ago. Don't get out as much as most of you... generally only about 50K/year. Unfortunately, it all comes within a short period of time, so my wife gets to spend large periods of time alone.

My office is actually in the Bay Area of California, but I don't seem to go there very often. As a project manager, I telecommute from a home office 365 days a year. It's not as great as you think... you tend to get lonely. And it's only going to get worse... I've told I can only travel four times in 2000!

Personally, we have one dog, and three birds. We enjoy to go hiking (the natural forest is 100 yards from the front door,) and spend time outside.

Someday soon, we hope to open our home as a Homestay (small Bed and Breakfast.) They're popular in our town as people from Tucson, Phoenix, and New Mexico like to come here to relax and ski or just escape the heat. I'll try to post when we open.

Now for the fun part. Since I live in this little community, we have a small airline that flies from here to Pheonix. The plane is a King Air, fitted to seat 8 passengers. Costs as much to fly to Phoenix as it does to fly from Phoenix to the Bay Area. No actual FF program, and they don't codeshare, so all of those miles are lost.

Out of Phoenix, I fly America West and Alaska when going west; Continental when flying east. Unfortunately, due to new policies, I have to fly with the lowest airfare carrier, or pay the difference out of pocket... and my company can get some good deals from UA, DL, etc. So, looks like I may have to switch.



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The only difference between ordinary service and extraordinary service is a little EXTRA.

-- Bob

So many new folks - jailer, Phil, Billedr, Oxford, Lance, and AZ_MISMAN - welcome, all.

Newself, please rain check me, I'll be doing my Xmas drinking in the Bay area this year.

Jailer,

You are rainchecked! We do need to get the Long Beach Bums together for a get together at Joes maybe in January.

Rudi,

I only know English, my girlfriend knows English, French, Italian, and Dutch. I figure as long as we are together, she can always translate for me, so I can be lazy http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif. She wants me to learn French, but I dislike French because of the protectionistic attitude. I want to learn German! for some reason my girlfriend doesn't like it that I want to learn German? If not German, I think I would like to learn Spanish.

But I do know the langauges of BASIC, Pascal, JCL, COBOL, Fortran, RPGII, Assembly, FDL, Dyl280, CLIST, and HTML http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif how's that for a lot of langauges?

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I was asked to post a bio of some sort, so here it is, ready or not!

38 years old, bald, fat, bearded, bespeckled, and benighted. Computer software consultant, 100% travel. Based in Denver, hit both coasts with regularity, not as much in flyover country. Fly UA, just made 100K Premier on Dec 30th (just made it, too). I usually fly every Sunday and every Friday.

I'm divorced (over ten years ago) no children, one hairy old fat cat.

I like Spaghetti-O's and Little Juan's frozen burritos. And Mountain Dew. My teeth are rotting, thanks to the Dew.

I usually am only home on weekends, this has been a rare 'down' week for me at home. Back on the road tomorrow (DEN-SNA-SFO-DEN).

My hobbies are horology (collecting vintage men's wrist watches), guns (mostly the scary assault rifle type), writing, reading EVERYTHING, and computer geek type stuff of all sorts. I've been on the Internet since 1985 (yes, 85) and I used to run a pirate BBS in the bad old days. Statute of limitations is up, I believe, so there.

I subscribe to Smithsonian, National Geographic, Conde Nast's Traveler (don't care for that one, though), Shotgun News, Guns-n-Ammo, and PC Magazine. I buy right-wing magazines over the counter (and pay cash), because I'm paranoid.

I am a member of the National Association of Watch and Clock Collectors (http://www.nawcc.org) and the NRA (http://www.nra.org). I'm obviously a creature of extreme contradictions. Or perhaps just extreme.

I read philosophy, historical biographies, and Ayn Rand for fun. Anias Nin and Henry Miller for even more fun. Then I go to the gun range and blow accurate holes in little pieces of paper.

Recent events: just traded in 350,000 Marriott reward points for a 53 inch projection TV, will be delivered soon I hope. Recently converted ALL of my bill payments to the online type, via WingSpanBank.com. Neat deal, got tired of carrying around bills and checkbooks all the time.

I make a lot of money, but I am always broke and have nothing in the bank, really. My retirement plans involve not having one, due to my smoking. I believe I'm on schedule.

What else to tell? I'm a former US Marine, have been told I'm scary-looking. Judge for yourself:
http://home.earthlink.net/~bmattock http://www.dimensional.com/~bmattock

Don't say you weren't warned!

I haven't taken a vacation in over two years, and it shows. Argh. I'm pretty much worn out, all the time. What a drag it is getting old.

I smoke a lot, drink Guinness, and carouse, although most of my carousing is in my imagination. I like to explore new cities, especially the seedier sides of them.

I'm mean as a snake, ugly, and hard to get along with. I don't know why.

I have gathered many tricks and tips to FF traveling over these last couple of years, and hope to learn more. I swear I'm going to write a book about it. Road Warrior's Revenge, or some such. Think PJ O'Roarke on crack, or Hunter S. Thompson sober. Not pretty.

I am seriously thinking of moving away from Denver (it has gotten too big and ugly) and moving to northern Kentucky, near Cincinnati. Don't laugh, houses there are still $50K or less.

I adore the absurdities in life. I need to laugh, lest I begin to weep. Do anything you like to me, but be entertaining, that's my motto. I have a lot of mottoes. Want some?

That's it, I think!

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

thank you Bill (and I am so proud that I was right with the term 'horologe/y' in the other thread).

Doc, you are an active member of Flyertalk. How about tell us a little about yourself?

Bill: Welcome. You write that book someday. I would most definitely read it.

Hi folks
I'm 54 years old and live in Reno Nevada and have worked for the Legislature for the last 27 years. I've been a travel junkie all my life, spent my early years traveling the US-seen all 50 at least twice. Now my goal is to see every county, been to 63 so far. My job lets me earn a lot of comp time when the Legislature meets, I'm of the few who wants time off rather than be paid. Have been lucky enougth to take 2 or 3 months off a year for travel, realy like the out of the way places, that have not been discovered by the masses. Have reached the 1k level the last four years flying mainly UAL. Buy nothing but the cheap tickets, but end up flying business class 90% of the time because of the upgrades and other goodies one gets by flying with one airline.
Take a lot off weekend trips to South America, Europe, and Asia using United's
E fares. Have fallen in love with South East Asia, and plan on retiring their once I finish my 30 year job sentence. Will still be able to travel cheaply because of the great bucket shops in SEA. My motto is memories are what count, never want to be in the position to wonder what if, just do it. Life is good, travel is great. Happy flying

Derek Webster: Your program will run (and run and run and run and run and run.....)

[This message has been edited by dgolds (edited 01-07-2000).]

With so many Flyertalkers, we should start a 365 day calendar of us for 2001. (each day for a Flyertalker's birthday or special day.)

I MUST GET DECEMBER 31!!!!

Or: a calender of the cats and I guess other animals of the FLyertalkers.

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