What I’ve realized is that the restaurants that have most impressed me are headed by chefs who are constantly driving for improvement. They aren’t churning out the same meal to guests, month after month and year after year. They’re constantly experimenting, learning, and pushing themselves to higher levels.
A woman and her mother are suing Delta Air Lines after they say that a man seated in their row on an international flight from New York JFK to Athens was served ten vodka drinks and a glass of wine – before harassing and sexually touching them. Flight attendants blew off their pleas, according to the women, and didn’t even report the incident to authorities. The daughter was sixteen. Eventually they were each awarded 5,000 SkyMiles.
I checked into the hotel and found it overrun with teenage sports teams. There were adults out front tailgating, and downing alcohol from full sized bottles.
There was one person working the desk and a line of people. When it was my turn I learned that they’d screwed up.
Wednesday’s United Airlines flight 1813 from Houston to Los Angeles diverted to Phoenix when a woman went berserk over being unable to drink wine. It appears that she wanted to drink her own wine she’d brought on board with her.
She argues with a flight attendant. She argues with other passengers. And all she wanted was to drink wine. But instead of wine she whines, gets told to sit down – or get arrested. Never a good idea, she challenges: “Let’s do it.” But the United crew wasn’t playing.
The general manager of a premium Los Angeles-area chain hotel writes to me, explaining why his hotel will not offer top tier elites to suites even though the chain requires them to do so.
The new Chase Sapphire Lounge Boston Logan airport is better than expected. I visited just before noon on a Friday and it was busy but not overcrowded. The food and drink options were good. There was too long of a wait for a shower and a ‘wellness room’ but otherwise the first U.S. Chase Sapphire Lounge by The Club is an absolutely great addition to the pantheon.
A roundup of the most important stories of the day. I keep you up to date on the most interesting writings I find on other sites – the latest news and tips.
The Senate passed its version of the National Defense Authorization Act without the Credit Card Competition Act from Senators Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Roger Marshall (R-KS) included, pushing off risk of new rules driving down interchange rates in the near-term. To placate the Senators, Senate leadership promised a future vote on their long-running quest to deliver a gift to retailers at the expense of card issuers.
While it can be useful for the average consumer to search flights with Expedia or the like, it’s not usually a good idea to buy travel from them unless they are able to construct complicated itineraries at a lower price than booking directly. Instead, find the flights you want and then go straight to the airline to buy your ticket.
Aviation watchdog, whose sources inside airlines are generally impeccable, says that there are murmurs of a closer relationship between oneworld carriers American Airlines and Hong Kong-based Cathay Pacific. This would be surprising to me.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
