I was thinking about this as I laid out my schedule for the next couple of weeks.

Almost everybody's heard of frequent flyer miles. Plenty of people sign up for a card, and then diligently funnel as much of their spend as they can through that card and hope someday, usually in a couple of years, they will have enough for "free" flight to visit grandma in Tuscon. Hah!

Those are the "social drinkers" -- when do you admit you're a full-blown "alcoholic"?

1. The first warning indication is when you sign up for more than one credit card, just to get the bonus. When people ask me, I tell them I have a stack of cc's about an inch thick. They tend to look at me goggle-eyed. "Why do you need more than one credit card? Isn't that dangerous?" Sigh. They just don't get it.

2. The really definite sign, IMO, is the first time you hotel-hop. There is no reason on God's green earth to do that -- it's more than a bit inconvenient and it makes no sense -- unless you're a hard-core, well, FlyerTalker.

This summer -- about 45 nights, all in the same chain, no two consecutive nights in the same place. PITA? Sure. 250,000 points? Priceless!

To paraphrase Snoopy again, "Until it is demonstrated, it is not always clear, the difference between the true professional and the merely competent amateur."

Yes, you're in full-blown "disease" mode if you hotel-hop. It's even worse if you have to turn in hotel receipts for a business trip.

Fortunately, my experience with hotel-hopping took me down a category from our usual business hotels. (Usually folks book standard 3-star Hiltons and Marriotts; my hotel-hopping to hit Conquest bonuses took me to every Hampton Inn, HGI, and Embassy in the Tampa area. ) So no one ever asked any questions...

Yeah, this year I qualified for top-tier status with Hyatt (25 stays, 21 nights, taking advantage of some double-credit promotions), Hilton (28 stays, 33 nights over the last year), Starwood (25 stays, 25 nights, also with some double-credit bonuses), as well as Marriott and InterContinental Group on nights (thankfully). Plus about 20 nights, often one at a time, at luxury chains or non-chains. I think that I've moved from one abode to another something like 180 times in the 300 days of the year so far. Painful at times -- and a sign of illness, or at least irrationality -- especially given that much of this was indeed business travel that required expense submission.

Of course, the plus-side is that I am now an expert -- having stayed at virtually every major hotel -- in a handful of cities (e.g., Albuquerque, Abu Dhabi, Amman, Istanbul) and have made quite a dent in some other places where one could not realistically hope to stay at every major hotel (e.g., Washington DC, Dubai, Atlanta).

Wow...that's a lot of hopping. Were you ever tempted to just call off the dogs and enjoy whichever one of those is your favorite top tier?

That's the dilemma I have right now. I could embark on some Starwood runs - decent promos are out there, and I do enough short stays that hitting Plat on 35-40 nights would be do-able. But I'm generally happy with the Marriotts in the cities I visit most, so why not just hang back and enjoy being Plat there for a while? So far, I'm sticking with the Marriotts... My 2008 mix of business travel will change somewhat to some different cities: if I start seeing a lot of great Starwoods and "average" Marriotts, that might be enough to make me switch.

Marriott is my "safe harbor". Their promos tend to be night-based rather than stay-based, so I'm finishing up a complete week at a Marriott this week (ahhhh ).

Next week, though, it's back to the grind - 4 nights, 4 stays.

Oh, the horror! The horror!

And here I think I've gone overboard because I'm considering doing a mileage run in December.

Hotel Hopping is the sign of a problem. I did a jump between a Hyatt and a Starwood hotel for a week to take advantage of the FFN promo and Starwood promo.

See, you could look at it that way, or as just another example of your fantastic efficiency as a traveler. What is one of the big hassles for a flyer? Baggage. FFers know to only take a carry-on bag. What is one of the big hassles for hotel hopping? Baggage again! But with your small carry-on, you've already eliminated that problem...

Of course, self justification is probably one of the classic signs of having a problem

Yes, hopping is a bit of a p.i.t.a. My project over the last 7 months has a Marriott, CY, Westin, Sheraton, and Hilton all within about 2 miles. Marriott stuck mostly to stay awards (double nights, double points - nice), but SPG and Hilton insisted on stay promos, so I did a lot of hopping.

I'm lucky that my Amex corporate card downloads directly to my T&E system, or it would be an even bigger pain.

The other sign you are in full blown addict mode is when you consider vacation destinations by EQMs.

My wife and I got $300 certs from a trip this past May. Before I considered where to go, I checked both our EQMs for the year. Her's were more important, because she won't MR. We were both a little under 9K away from the next level. That left only one choice for last week, Hawaii. If the status had been locked in, we probably would have gone to SFO or AZ, or maybe to Caribbean.

Then, just to make it a no brainer, Hyatt comes out with FFN and I'm booking a hotel for both her and me for the same night, to save a trip to pay with the MC. Gave the second room away to friends.

I just look at this as a way of preserving domestic bliss. Married for 37 years this year and for the life of me I can't figure out why she is staying. Must be the front cabin flights and free hotel nights. Flying and hotel hopping has been in my blood for a long time but I won't do it on trips with my wife-take the most direct route and stay in one place for an extended period or risk marriage breakdown!

You likely have crossed the line when your force the spouse into this form of abuse

firstly, this thread is genius and makes me crack up. I guess I should say, ^to the OP?...

Anyway, because MM likes to be different, I have a slightly varried version of addiction and since it's 4am, some of that need not even be explained (btw, that's 4am at my home, and not even on the road where it'd be ok to be up pacing around some hotel room or airport lounge)

==> I have jeaprodized jobs by feeling that CONSTANT urge to be on FT...

==> I have had to "do just one more thing on the computer, honey" to type my thoughts on FT...

==> I have missed great plays on the game to type about the last great play of the game on FT (the Yankees Red Sox thread, for example)

==> I have signed up for things I do not need, gotten too much spam from signing up for things I do not need, spend money on things I do not need and gotten credit cards that do give mile bonuses but do taint your credit and I have spent time calling companies and canceling things too.

==> I have spent valuable time chasing missing miles... and oh, I don't just mean the 4,500 from that flight credit you're missing from last month... I mean the 50 mile bonus or the 500 mile promo thing I printed out from something I did when I should have been outside enjoying the sunshine instead, but I now have a 10 page stapled 'packet' on and I need to call multiple levels of customer service all afternoon into some third party partner company that says it will take up to 10 weeks to give me the miles only to do it again when they don't. Chasing missing miles from scammy promos I always seem to run into even if they seem to work for everyone else on here is my thang. It consumes me. I do work it out and get my miles, but it's an uphill battle every day with every thing. Oh yes, people... I blame myself for picking ALL those battles, but FT is the culprit --hahaha.

==> I have dealt with Citibank for credit deals and missing mile offers (that one alone says it all, don't you think?)

I admit this and more!

My name is Jeff and I am a FT-olic

MM

Hi Jeff!

did the whole room say that in unison?

Finally a confirmation that I am not alone using precious hours and energies chasing the old mighty mile. For many sleepless nights I have been wondering if I should see a shrink to talk about my addiction to Miles!!!

My worst sin to get Miles? Mrs 2muchfun travels a fair amount for business and is required to book all plane tickets via the company's travel agent who uses a central corporate credit card, hence not giving Mrs 2muchfun Credit Card miles for these spendings. However, they also have the personal CC number of Mrs 2muchfun on file for her personal travelling needs and the always ask which card they have to charge for the trip being booked. Many many times I have gently offered Mrs 2muchfun to call the travel agent to book her (and her clients) expensive J fares as she is always too busy to do so.

And guess what? Many many times I have had to pretend to her that the travel agency used by mistake her personal Visa Gold CC instead of the company central travel corporate credit card! . No mistake it was...just the old devil in me!!!

We have raked in hundreds of thousands of CC miles that way before the VP finance cornered my wife... and issued a company memo for that practice to stop.

I had to confess to Mrs 2muchfun of my little scheme... but fortunately my wife loves the free travel benefits and told me to ensure the travel agency makes less frequent mistakes for a little while until the dust settles...

I have also gotten her to do hotel hoping after telling her the hotels were booked solid (just a little white lie) and only available certain nights.

I have recommended her to some unknown restaurants for business luncheons just because these restaurants were paying miles via the Rewards Network. Fortunately, they have always been good restaurants.

I have sent many christmas basket to her clients instead of having her secretary do it. Again for miles given by the web portal and for the miles obtained via the spending on her credit card.

And the last one (I have fallen to a new low I confess): I gave out Quaker granola bars to the kids at Halloween instead of candies: the local food store had a huge sale on those bars with huge Air Miles bonus, Aeroplan Miles on the packaging and finally a BOGOF coupon on each box, making them virtually free before getting all the Miles. I got the Miles, they got the bars!
I am not sure if these kids will be back to ring our door bell next years!

Writing this, I feel I have spent an hour on the couch at the shrink talking about my addiction. I now feel better but I am sure I haven't solve my addiction problem...and maybe that's the way I like it!

2muchfun