Airport Layovers, Do-it-Yourself Amazing Race, and Starwood Will Reward You for Your LinkedIn Connections (Bits ‘n Pieces for Feb 25, 2014)

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About Gary Leff

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 »

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Comments

  1. The bitcoin dude was just being an ass. He’d have been through security and on to his gate in 2 minutes if he hadn’t made a bit stink of it all.

  2. @Jay – I sure meant to, and make a snarky comment about it too, and I thought I had. I was finishing this up on a plane about to close the door and I think I got distracted. Sorry for the confusion, cleared up now.

  3. He was a bit of an ass, sure. Even so, if his recount of the experience is even remotely accurate, the Bitcoin thing makes me laugh out loud. I’m going to get a bunch of worthless Bitcoin medallions and put them in my carry-on. In fact I’ll wear one on a heavy chain around my neck like a 90’s rapper.

  4. As a transplant from the Midwest, thank you for pointing out what no one out here seems to understand: In & Out is the most over rated thing out here. I’m mean its fine, and certain a bargain. But it doesn’t even crack my top 5 of Fast Food/ Fast Casual Burgers.

  5. An interesting mix today! The bitcoin story is hilarious, both the agents not understanding what the are and the attitude of the guy himself – I don’t get the whole opt out and legal phrases surrounding a pat down, it just seems to be making everything into a much bigger deal than it needs to be!

    On the in and out front – I tried them a couple of months ago and must admit to being very underwhelmed, especially with the sauce they use in the burger. Can’t say I’ll be rushing back!

  6. HolidayCheck also offers the occasional bonus for 300 AirBerlin points per review, if you’d prefer a more OneWorld slant to their miles.

  7. Re: the Bitcoin story, I guess it is true that anyone can make up anything on the Internet and someone will believe it and repost it.

    That story cannot possibly be true.

  8. The bitcoin guy obviously has a bit of an agenda, and if you read the end of the article he completely misinterprets the point of the two suits who asked about them. Most well traveled people who read the custom forms know that if you travel internationally with over $10,000 worth of cash, gold or other currency you need to fill out a form. http://www.fincen.gov/forms/files/fin105_cmir.pdf

    As soon as his wife said they weren’t traveling internationally they went away. Simple as that. If he wasn’t being such a dude it would have gone much smoother.

  9. If the bitcoin dude had politely opted out and said nothing, he would have been fine. But he wanted to make a scene, and he did.

    His entire post is full of false innuendo about TSA’s intentions and attitude, and there is no doubt in my mind that he’s stretched the truth a few times in that post if not lied outright.

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