Who we all are
Dec 2, 1999, 2:09 pm
#376
Original Member
Join Date: May 1998
Location: PDX
Programs: TSA Refusenik charter member
Posts: 15,978
TravelWeary: Lucky you. My folks wouldn't let me go near Evergreen. Said I'd turn into a Communist. Oddly, they kept pushing for Reed College, whose slogan is "Atheism, Communism and Free Love." Yikes! What the hell where they thinking? 
Dec 7, 1999, 11:41 pm
#379
Join Date: Sep 1999
Location: Gila, NM, USA
Posts: 1,044
OK, OK since you brought it up again, Shadow, I'll give it a shot. I'm 32, I have one step son (7) from my previous marriage who's very dear (and loves to travel with me!) and another boy who used to be my neighbor and adopted me as his replacement dad. He's 12 and wants to be a pilot. His mom works for an airline so he flys all over the place after school and on holidays just for kicks. Not my idea of a good time!
I live on a small organic farm out in the middle of nowhere in NM. I'm not disclosing the exact location because in a prior post I admitted to having thousands of pounds of food buried in the root cellar, and while I'd love to meet some fellow flyer talkers, if things get ugly at the end of the year we don't want TOO much company!
I am a non-profit development consultant, which means I help charities raise money and expand their programs, and I work on both coasts. I'm constantly tempted by attractive job offers on the coasts, and once took one for a little while, but I got homesick. I love it here, looking up at the high peaks, being surrounded by gardens and then the hills rising up to the mesas and then the peaks. The air is clean. Cows are the main traffic on the road. We still have lions, bears, elk, and lots of other friends running around the neighborhood. People here are mostly clueless about what I do and I can wear scraggly farm clothes around town and not have any chance of running into a client. Lately, people have been offering me jobs here, which I used to think I wanted, but I've been turning them down because I value the anonymity and irresponsibility of my position here.
I usually spend about 6 months a year on the road. Lots of nights in hotels, though I stay with friends and family quite a bit too. My brother lives right by one of my clients' offices, so I stay with him a lot. I confess I haven't been elite on an airline in like 8 years. I almost never buy any airline tickets, having found ways to get enough miles to fly free without earning many. I hate United Shuttle and like having my own car so I often drive to San Francisco (20 hours) rather than fly if I'm going to spend more than a week out there. I used to travel with the Grateful Dead and drive over 75k miles a year so the road miles are easy and I like seeing this beautiful country from the road. I live almost 4 hours from the nearest airport, so by the time I drive that far I might as well just keep going a little more...
I seldom travel for vacation, though I always make plans to. When it gets down to it, I usually find I'd rather be home, and if I'm traveling I'd rather work than play, or at least work most of the trip and then take a little time to see the sights. I like going to places that are vastly beautiful, unspoiled, and have few humans!
I've really enjoyed prticipating in Flyertalk, and I hope I'll have a chance to meet some of you one of these days. You've helped me get lots of extra miles. And, you've helped convice me that my obsession is normal so I actually feel better about myself even as I've become more hopelessly addicted! I'm using some of the extra points I've picked up from tips on FT to treat the couple who manage my farm to a sweet vacation. Thanks y'all!
I live on a small organic farm out in the middle of nowhere in NM. I'm not disclosing the exact location because in a prior post I admitted to having thousands of pounds of food buried in the root cellar, and while I'd love to meet some fellow flyer talkers, if things get ugly at the end of the year we don't want TOO much company!
I am a non-profit development consultant, which means I help charities raise money and expand their programs, and I work on both coasts. I'm constantly tempted by attractive job offers on the coasts, and once took one for a little while, but I got homesick. I love it here, looking up at the high peaks, being surrounded by gardens and then the hills rising up to the mesas and then the peaks. The air is clean. Cows are the main traffic on the road. We still have lions, bears, elk, and lots of other friends running around the neighborhood. People here are mostly clueless about what I do and I can wear scraggly farm clothes around town and not have any chance of running into a client. Lately, people have been offering me jobs here, which I used to think I wanted, but I've been turning them down because I value the anonymity and irresponsibility of my position here.
I usually spend about 6 months a year on the road. Lots of nights in hotels, though I stay with friends and family quite a bit too. My brother lives right by one of my clients' offices, so I stay with him a lot. I confess I haven't been elite on an airline in like 8 years. I almost never buy any airline tickets, having found ways to get enough miles to fly free without earning many. I hate United Shuttle and like having my own car so I often drive to San Francisco (20 hours) rather than fly if I'm going to spend more than a week out there. I used to travel with the Grateful Dead and drive over 75k miles a year so the road miles are easy and I like seeing this beautiful country from the road. I live almost 4 hours from the nearest airport, so by the time I drive that far I might as well just keep going a little more...
I seldom travel for vacation, though I always make plans to. When it gets down to it, I usually find I'd rather be home, and if I'm traveling I'd rather work than play, or at least work most of the trip and then take a little time to see the sights. I like going to places that are vastly beautiful, unspoiled, and have few humans!
I've really enjoyed prticipating in Flyertalk, and I hope I'll have a chance to meet some of you one of these days. You've helped me get lots of extra miles. And, you've helped convice me that my obsession is normal so I actually feel better about myself even as I've become more hopelessly addicted! I'm using some of the extra points I've picked up from tips on FT to treat the couple who manage my farm to a sweet vacation. Thanks y'all!
Dec 8, 1999, 8:40 pm
#382
Original Member
Join Date: May 1998
Location: Chicago, IL (2 miles from ORD)
Posts: 660
http://aubie34.tripod.com/index.html, this is my homepage that I just updated in my profile. I will write something about me and add it to this post.
Dec 9, 1999, 12:25 pm
#383
Commander Catcop
Join Date: May 1998
Posts: 10,259
Aubie! Welcome back to Flyertalk and I hope all is well. And it's great to have ANOTHER CAT LOVER on the boards.
Philforest... I love all animals but cats saved my life once. That's why they are special (If ANYONE wants an explaination I will tell you in person or by e-mail!)
Philforest... I love all animals but cats saved my life once. That's why they are special (If ANYONE wants an explaination I will tell you in person or by e-mail!)
Dec 9, 1999, 2:12 pm
#385
Join Date: Jul 1999
Location: Albuquerque,NM US
Posts: 156
Steffo:
I probably buy some of your organic produce at the Coop. Thanks.
An aside relating to the ATT wireless string.
They are now in the process of negotiating spaces for towers in ABQ so you may be able to get a slightly more local number.
I probably buy some of your organic produce at the Coop. Thanks.
An aside relating to the ATT wireless string.
They are now in the process of negotiating spaces for towers in ABQ so you may be able to get a slightly more local number.
Dec 10, 1999, 1:07 am
#387
Original Member
Join Date: May 1998
Location: CH-3823 Wengen Switzerland
Programs: miles&more, MileagePlus
Posts: 27,041
so Aubie - you (or at least your girlfriend) become very multilingual: english (or at least some US-kind of english 
), french (or at least what the Belgians think is french ), flamish (?), and THE REAL italian!
), french (or at least what the Belgians think is french ), flamish (?), and THE REAL italian!
Dec 15, 1999, 2:07 am
#388
Join Date: Sep 1999
Location: too far from the airport
Posts: 3,298
Speaking of real Italians, I've been posting (not so often) for a couple of months, so it seems only appropriate that I should introduce myself.
I grew up in Italy, with a *very* travel-phobic mother (to this day, she hasn't set foot on a plane). I must have got my genes from dad, however, because at 19 I caught the travel bug, and it hasn't left me yet. Problem is, many of the places I visit during my travels end up becoming my home for a time. So in the past 20 years, I've lived in Germany (briefly), Holland (not for long), India (a bit longer), and finally landed in the US (for the last 16 some years).
Here I seem to be gravitating towards the West Coast and beyond. After a good start in the People's Republic of Santa Cruz, I moved for three wet years to the Pacific NW (mainly PDX and SEA), then returned to sunny Santa Cruz in plenty of time for the earthquake and stayed there for more than a decade.
At 32 I decided to go "back" to college (never really had a chance to start sooner with all that moving around), and after getting a BA at UCSC, I found it necessary to continue to an MA at the university of Hawai'i.
And here I am now, living with my husband of two years (and partner of twelve) on the beautiful Windward side of O'ahu. If we keep up this West-moving trend, we'll end up in Japan or Australia sooner or later (not in our current plans, though).
None of my previous jobs ever required me to travel, so I travel almost exclusively for leisure (except for a few conferences as a grad student), and I've never been anything more than Gold on AA. Now that I live in Hawai'i, that's pretty easy to reach...
My husband, however, is a computer consultant/trainer, and especially lately, has had to travel quite a bit (UA Prem-Ex and AA Plat.). Amazingly, he doesn't have the interest (the obsession?) in miles that I have, so I actively oversee all of our accounts. You could say I'm "Premex by proxy".
Besides travelling, I love snorkeling and birdwatching (and nature-watching in general), and I miss mushroom hunting, my main reason for not wanting to travel in the winter when I lived in California (Hawai'i is great for snorkelling, but unfortunaltely has no wild edible mushroom to speak of...)
We have no kids, no dogs, and, I have to admit, cats make me sneeze really bad. Am I still allowed to post on this board after this confession?
I am *extremely* grateful to all the knowledgeable people who post on this board. With all the extra miles we have earned because of your wise advice, we will be flying to Europe at least twice next year, and still have miles to spare if my Italian friends ever want to come visit.
Other travel plans in the distant future include most of the South Pacific, Australia, and Seychelles or Mauritius (anyone been there?)
Muchos mahalos to all of you
:-) honu
p.s.: how do you make those emoticons?
[This message has been edited by honu (edited 12-15-1999).]
I grew up in Italy, with a *very* travel-phobic mother (to this day, she hasn't set foot on a plane). I must have got my genes from dad, however, because at 19 I caught the travel bug, and it hasn't left me yet. Problem is, many of the places I visit during my travels end up becoming my home for a time. So in the past 20 years, I've lived in Germany (briefly), Holland (not for long), India (a bit longer), and finally landed in the US (for the last 16 some years).
Here I seem to be gravitating towards the West Coast and beyond. After a good start in the People's Republic of Santa Cruz, I moved for three wet years to the Pacific NW (mainly PDX and SEA), then returned to sunny Santa Cruz in plenty of time for the earthquake and stayed there for more than a decade.
At 32 I decided to go "back" to college (never really had a chance to start sooner with all that moving around), and after getting a BA at UCSC, I found it necessary to continue to an MA at the university of Hawai'i.
And here I am now, living with my husband of two years (and partner of twelve) on the beautiful Windward side of O'ahu. If we keep up this West-moving trend, we'll end up in Japan or Australia sooner or later (not in our current plans, though).
None of my previous jobs ever required me to travel, so I travel almost exclusively for leisure (except for a few conferences as a grad student), and I've never been anything more than Gold on AA. Now that I live in Hawai'i, that's pretty easy to reach...
My husband, however, is a computer consultant/trainer, and especially lately, has had to travel quite a bit (UA Prem-Ex and AA Plat.). Amazingly, he doesn't have the interest (the obsession?) in miles that I have, so I actively oversee all of our accounts. You could say I'm "Premex by proxy".
Besides travelling, I love snorkeling and birdwatching (and nature-watching in general), and I miss mushroom hunting, my main reason for not wanting to travel in the winter when I lived in California (Hawai'i is great for snorkelling, but unfortunaltely has no wild edible mushroom to speak of...)
We have no kids, no dogs, and, I have to admit, cats make me sneeze really bad. Am I still allowed to post on this board after this confession?
I am *extremely* grateful to all the knowledgeable people who post on this board. With all the extra miles we have earned because of your wise advice, we will be flying to Europe at least twice next year, and still have miles to spare if my Italian friends ever want to come visit.
Other travel plans in the distant future include most of the South Pacific, Australia, and Seychelles or Mauritius (anyone been there?)
Muchos mahalos to all of you
:-) honu
p.s.: how do you make those emoticons?
[This message has been edited by honu (edited 12-15-1999).]
Dec 15, 1999, 2:12 am
#389
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: May 1998
Location: Texas, U.S.A.
Posts: 19,523
Smiley Faces:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/faq.html#smilies
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/faq.html#smilies