I love credit cards so much! v2.0 (see first page for add'l details)

[GZanta77]

That's good to know. I booked an 'economy web special' only 5000 pts from PIT to MCO in Feb. Has a longish layover in Charlotte but being winter I'm OK with that. It does say no changes, can cancel and get pts back but there may be a fee. This may be different since it was even less than the AA Saver rate. I have such a hard time using my AA points for flights that I jumped on it, fairly certain I won't need to change.

Mine was a regular SAAver award - maybe there are tighter restrictions on the 'special' awards like you mentioned.

 

[Lain]

Apparently gcs.com coded as 3x on the Biz Gold. Ugh, wish I knew these things.

...giftcards.com?

 

[georgina]

I bought some silicone straws at Aldi last week. Haven't tried them yet because we rarely use straws but they should work better than paper ones!

I don't like when dining at a restaurant and they bring water with straws already in the glass, as we prefer not to use straws. Happened to me yesterday and I am thinking of contacting the restaurant to let them know some of us prefer no straw. I guess I need to tell them when I order water. Sadly my suburb is not very environmentally conscious.

 

[amalone1013]

I do too! I keep them in my park bag in a toothbrush holder.

Genius!

 

[Psychodisney]

Anyone ever stay at the Marco Island (fl) Hilton beach resort? Thinking about it for a beach trip with dd in Jan/Feb sometime. Would fly SW to Ft Myers and rent a car.

I considered transferring all of P2’s MRs out of his plat account to Hilton, but I don’t think we’ll need that many more Hilton points for this winter and we’re not done with Amex MR cards yet (hopefully). We’re only possibly going to lose 15k MR in the clawback (hasn’t happened yet!) so I guess we’ll just sit tight and see what happens.

I looked into it last year but it was closed for renovations after Hurrican Irma. Not sure when it reopened.
Marco Island is a beautiful beach though! We did a short stay at the JW Marriott at the end on March.

 

[amalone1013]

Somehow this morning I ended up discovering I could fly rt to Calgary for under $200pp on Frontier, including buying cheap seats together... no bags for 3-4 days. Its only about a 2hr flight. I'm very tempted now.

*Googles to see what Calgary has to offer*

 

[speedyfishy]

...giftcards.com?

Yeah

 

[Haley R]

Got a fp for fop!

 

[Lain]

Yeah

How hard are you gonna hit it? Gotta MS back those clawed back MRs.

ETA: Or is this one of those dead things you only just found out about?

 

[Alexle2007]

We usually take the first or second flight of the morning on SW (there are 80 bazillion nonstops from BWI to MCO). My night owl kids are the ones insisting on the 6:30a flights That means we have to get up at 3a to drive the 65-75 minutes to the airport Last trip I suggested that we stay overnight at a park-sleep-fly hotel so that we wouldn't have to get up quite as early. It was, let's just say, not the nicest place we have ever stayed. We had a complete flight crew on our little shuttle bus to the airport in the morning so it must be decent enough. The weather was horrible in the evening when we drove down, monsoon-like, and was still pretty awful until right before our flight took off.

We are dvc and usually in the borrowing position, so we don't want to use points to stay after a very late flight. One trip we did stay at the Hyatt in MCO because younger dd's friend was joining us and her flight didn't come in until the morning. We couldn't get our flights from home and younger dd's flights from where she was finishing a summer program to sync up with Friend's flights, so we just came in the afternoon/evening before.

This next trip in March some people will be flying from PHL, dh and I may be flying from BWI, and younger dd will be flying from IND. It will be interesting to book everything...once SW finally opens up the schedule

Since we are about an hour away for BWI, DH always on staying the night in the area if we have an early or late flight. We typically stay at the Courtyard or Fairfield Inn across for the FastPark since that’s where we always park our vehicle.

I am not sure how I am going to manage a 6:30 am flight out of DCA which is at least 2 hour drive. Luckily, it’s a laid back girls trip.

 

[Alexle2007]

Somehow this morning I ended up discovering I could fly rt to Calgary for under $200pp on Frontier, including buying cheap seats together... no bags for 3-4 days. Its only about a 2hr flight. I'm very tempted now.

*Googles to see what Calgary has to offer*

Isn’t Banff and Lake Louise around there?

 

[speedyfishy]

How hard are you gonna hit it? Gotta MS back those clawed back MRs.

ETA: Or is this one of those dead things you only just found out about?

It looks like it is dead

 

[Albort]

It looks like it is dead

Seems like Amex is putting a stop on vgc purchase. gcm also stop earning 3x/4x on the biz gold under advertisement too. U still earn 1x though, unlike Simon's Mall, u earn 0.
edit: oops, wasnt gcm, it was GC.com as well.

 

[amalone1013]

Isn’t Banff and Lake Louise around there?

I think so. We are not necessarily hikers tho, so... must do research

I also feel like @Ngwira had a semi recent trip there

 

[Lain]

Seems like Amex is putting a stop on vgc purchase. gcm also stop earning 3x/4x on the biz gold under advertisement too. U still earn 1x though, unlike Simon's Mall, u earn 0.

RATs on a rampage.

 

[amalone1013]

RATs on a rampage.

 

[gottalovepluto]

they're still canceling???

Southwest has bought a lot of goodwill amongst their flyers- but this is gonna dent it, we see that right here in our little section of the Internet Heck I don’t fly them & I’m ticked at how y’all keep having your plans derailed. There is no excuse for this, it’s happening too frequently to be unrelated to MAX cancellations imho. SW is assuring themselves of the revenue by waiting until last minute on some of the cancels because a ticket on another carrier will be prohibitively expensive- it’s a very slimy move worthy of a legacy carrier.

 

[gottalovepluto]

Yesterday’s cancellations were due to weather

Well- that’s different. I take back a little bit of my anger. Even Southwest can’t control hurricanes!

 

[LuckyMamaInDE]

Since we are about an hour away for BWI, DH always on staying the night in the area if we have an early or late flight. We typically stay at the Courtyard or Fairfield Inn across for the FastPark since that’s where we always park our vehicle.

I am not sure how I am going to manage a 6:30 am flight out of DCA which is at least 2 hour drive. Luckily, it’s a laid back girls trip.

Thanks for the recs! We had no points last year to use on the hotel so we had to go with $$.

And ouch, I feel for you with that drive + early flight

 

[Lain]

Were you even alive when this movie came out?