Tag Archives: Promotions

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Track IHG Nightly Award Rates & Rebook When Prices Drop (My Recent NYC Example)

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Good morning everyone, I hope your week is going well.  Last week (Thanksgiving Week), Laura and I spent 4 days in New York City.  We stayed at the conveniently located Crowne Plaza Times Square IHG Hotel which is close to Times Square, the Theater District, the Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood, and several subway stations (which you can take to JFK via Jamaica Station and the AirTrain).  We stayed at this hotel last March during Laura’s Spring Break, so we knew the area well.

I used 2 IHG Free Night Certificates from my Chase IHG Business Credit Card and the Chase IHG Select Credit Card (no longer available) along with IHG Points.  Nightly award prices vary dramatically (see the nightly prices for award stays in December 2024), but I closely tracked the nightly prices over a few months and rebooked my stays a few times whenever the award price dropped.  Whenever I book a hotel stay of more than 1 night, I always book my stays in 1 night increments since it is much easier to cancel and rebook 1 night at a time.  At check in, the front desk agent linked the stays together and kept us in the same room for the duration of the stay.  You could also call, email, or text the hotel ahead of time to let them know about the multiple back to back stays.

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ExpressVPN Cyber Monday Deal: Get 6 Extra Months Free with 24 Month Plan

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Good afternoon everyone, I hope you had a great Thanksgiving!  Cyber Monday is here and ExpressVPN wants to get the party started.  ExpressVPN normally offers a 1 month free trial when you become a member, but during this promotion, you can get 6 extra months free when you purchase a 24 month plan.  I have been using ExpressVPN since November 2016 and I love their desktop, laptop, and mobile app.  With data breaches occurring frequently, I think it is very important that we do our best to protect ourselves when we are online, whether that is at home or on the road.

I always use ExpressVPN when I am on free public wifi at hotels, airports, and lounges to protect my data.  ExpressVPN works very well when I travel internationally.  I connect to a VPN in the United States and then I can access streaming services that work in the US but are restricted / blocked internationally.  Lastly, since I am on the West Coast, I occasionally connect to a VPN in New York and watch TV shows that are airing on the East Coast.

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Around the World in 24 Days: Quick Update

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Greetings from Bangkok, Thailand!

It didn’t take long for me to fall way behind on blogging about my quest for a million SAS EuroBonus miles – with all this travel, it’s been harder than expected to find time to get work done, especially since flying in economy there’s rarely space to work on my laptop. But I wanted to give you all a quick status report.

Literal Data Points

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  • Number of flights taken since November 10th: 14
  • Number of qualifying SkyTeam airlines flown: 10 – AeroMexico, Virgin, KLM, Air Europa, SAS, Air France, TAROM, Saudia, Garuda, and Vietnam
  • Number of flights posted to my SAS account: 7 – AeroMexico, Virgin, Air Europa, SAS, Air France, TAROM and Saudia
    • I’m getting a “route not eligible” error when trying to claim my KLM segments. This seems to be a common issue, but nobody’s had any luck contacting SAS about it
    • Everyone else except Air Europa (UX) has posted automatically, and I was able to get instant retro credit for my UX flight through the SAS website
  • Shortest flight: Saudia JED-MED, 201 miles, 32 minutes air time
  • Longest flight: Garuda MED-CGK, 4,972 miles, 8h46m air time

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Buy Miles / Points Promos Ending Soon: Hilton (100%), Wyndham Hotels (60%) & Many More in December

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Good afternoon everyone, happy Friday!  I was working on my Buy Miles & Points Page and found 2 offers that end this month and many more end in December (see the list at the bottom of this post).  Always check the math to make sure that buying miles & points makes sense for you.  Do not buy miles & points speculatively unless you have a use in mind.  With that said, here are 2 offers that end soon.

Up first, Hilton Hotels is offering up to a 100% bonus, depending on the number of Hilton Honors Points you purchase. This offer expires on November 27.

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Too Many Cardboard Boxes? Get ZipSnip Handheld Cordless Electric Cardboard Box Cutter

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Good afternoon everyone.  Between my wife and I, we do a lot of online shopping and end up with a lot of cardboard boxes.  We have a small recycle trash can at home, so it was pretty easy to fill up the recycle trash can with cardboard boxes and other recyclable items.  I started using a sharp box cutter knife to break down the cardboard boxes into smaller pieces, so I could fit more cardboard in our recycle trash can. Bending over to cut the cardboard into small pieces would start to hurt my back after several minutes and I had to be careful with the sharp box cutter not to cut myself.

Last year, Laura saw an ad online for this ZipSnip cardboard box cutter and bought it on Amazon (affiliate link).  I was skeptical and reluctant to use it at first since I thought my old method was superior (minus the back pain and fear of cutting myself), but after using it for a few minutes, I could tell that this was a huge improvement.  The blade is sharp and cuts through cardboard very easily and I don’t need to bend down to cut the cardboard into small pieces.  Here are some photos of the ZipSnip and the smaller cardboard box pieces.

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