Pardon the geek-out
So my first credit card after college was with Bank of America’s America West Airways frequent flyer miles card. At the time, I didn’t care about direct flights and I was just so happy to qualify for a card (I had crappy credit coming out of college — I didn’t get this card until like two full years out of college after I did a lot of “credit cleaning” via calling and check-writing) that I didn’t really pay attention to what program I was enrolling in.
I accrued 50K miles on that card over the last few years. I spent none of it, because it doesn’t go anywhere I want it to directly.
In the meantime, when my sister started having babies, I signed up for another credit card that accrued miles with Asiana Airlines, which flies to Korea directly from SFO, as I intended to visit her often. I have, to date, accrued 80K miles on it, 10K of which was used when we flew from the Korean peninsula to the Jejudo (imagine flying from Italy to Sicily) on a weekend trip while I was visiting her.
However, you may note that she’s now in the US, as are my nieces. Neither Asiana nor America West fly to ATL.
At some point in the last two years, AWA either merged with or was bought outright by US Airways. They had been working on merging the frequent flyer miles programs for a while now, but I hadn’t been giving it much thought, frankly.
Today, I discovered that all my heretofore useless points have been converted to US Airways points. Then to my further glee, I found that US Airways is a part of the Star Alliance! So is Asiana! That means that we have enough points (pooled in the right way, to boot) to book four econo tickets within the continental US, three econo tickets to Hawaii, or two econo tickets to Europe. Well, realistically, I know that the lowest level of award fares have so many blackout dates that this isn’t really possible, but it should be able to get us at least one ticket for free.
Wheee!!!!!!!! *gleefully waves fists around face*
Which means that as soon as Seppo and I both have enough PTO, hello vacation! 😀
What to write
I’m tossing around an idea for this year’s NaNoWriMo. I’m not married to the idea yet, but I’d really like to get the idea fleshed out and see how it feels.
Back to work
I always forget how useful to-do lists are for me. I’ve changed over my firefox homepage to point to the google personalized homepage (w/ The Google 15 prominently displayed on the top left) and to my list of daily to-dos on Joe’s Goals.
I’ve been formulating a blog post in my mind for about a week and a half, tentatively titled “Unified Theory”, covering my (very derivative) theory on social conflict. I’m not sure when I’ll get around to writing it up.
Coming back to work from a vacation is always hard, but I feel energized and ready to go. I have a list of items that I am excited to get done. This doesn’t mean that I don’t wish I had another several months of vacation, however. 😀
Rockstar: Supernova
I call one of Toby, Patrice, Dilana, or Lukas to win it all, with an edge on the latter two. Dilana was insane. Patrice is the weakest link of those four. These are the only ones that look & sound right for who they will be playing with. Most of the rest are great, but just not right.
Chris will go home.
ETA: Storm Large looks just like an older, taller Lindsay Lohan, but rocks out hard. I liked her. Love that that’s her real name.
Mid-minivacation Post
Man, it’s been a good break. I wish I could remember what I did on Friday night. Or even Saturday. I wish I could say it was because I was sloshed or something, but it’s just that age-old old-age memory failure kicking in. Uh… Actually, Friday is when Mobi and Maddie got into a scuffle and I had to take Mobi to the vet. Everyone is ok, but Mobi lost a chunk of skin on his face. 🙁 I was so wrecked on the way to and back from the vet. I held it together because I figured I had business to take care of, but once it was over and the vet reassured me that Mobi was ok (and he is), I sobbed in the car, just from the relief and release. Saturday is still a blur.
On Sunday, we met up with a couple of out-of-town friends in San Francisco and proceeded to shop the crap out of the Ferry Building (chocolates, oilive oil, bread, cheese) before eating at The Slanted Door and going on a whirlwind tour of SF. We drove by Pier 39 and Fisherman’s Wharf and Ghirardelli Square, then headed over to The Palace of Fine Arts, my personal favorite of the SF sights. Unfortunately, the grounds were getting fixed up (all the lawn had been dug up) so we couldn’t walk by the water.
After that, we drove by Crissy Fields on the way to the Golden Gate Bridge. Man, I love that area. It’s just so pretty. I also realized & commented to Seppo that it was precisely 8 years ago that I first saw the GG Bridge, on my visit out to the Bay Arey for the first time the very same weekend during the summer after college graduation. Aww.
After taking numerous pics there and walking about a third way over the bridge, we attempted to head over to the de Young museum in Golden Gate Park, but accidentally ended up winding around the Presidio, exactly like we did last time. It was… sad. I mean, it’s not like we hadn’t been there before. We did eventually make it to the museum, looked around a bit, then headed over to the Japanese Tea Garden. I like the tea garden a lot, except it’s always full of people. It’s less serene than I imagine it should be, whereas the San Jose Japanese Friendship Garden is just a serene as I think it should be. 😀 Plus, they have crazed koi, ready to eat your face off, should you get too close to the water.
I think we then drove in some convoluted path to try to maximize the experience of driving up and down the hills of SF, but actually managed only to drive on the semi-hilly streets, rather than the insane streets that actually make me clutch the dashboard in fear. We dropped off the tourists then headed down to Los Gatos to our dinner at Manresa, which, by the way, was TOTALLY worth the close to 1.5 hour drive. Full disclosure: I didn’t drive. 😀
We ate for something like 3 hours and went home and slept soundly due to our food-induced comas.
On my actual birthday, we laid low and went out to Korean BBQ for dinner, where I ate like a madwoman. Oh, during the day, we received delivery of some yard furniture that I had been waiting for. Yay! I fell asleep embarrassingly early this day. I don’t even know why.
Yesterday, we went to see the Oakland Municipal Band play at the bandstand by Lake Merritt, roamed around the gardens and bird sanctuary, then randomly decided to rent a pedal boat. It was a strange day where it felt like we were playing tourists on vacation in our own metaphorical backyard, but it was awesome.
Minivacation
I am taking next week off work! I just filed my PTO papers. As we have both the 3rd and the 4th off, I only had to file for 3 days of PTO in order to get 9 consecutive days off!
I can’t wait!
So You Think You Can Review
Before I review the couples, here is someone else’s recap of the Dance of Desperation (tm the crew at TWoP, also known as the “dance for your life” *eyeroll* solos)
This is the routine for both girls and guys. Roll, spin, spin, spin, roll, thrust your arms out forward, fall to the ground, get back up by rolling onto your toes, throw your butt back and your arms way out, pull them back into your chest like you’ve been denied, stumble dramatically across the stage, leap, spin, spin, spin, backflip, fall to the ground and reach out for help, etc, etc… YAWN!
