My Musings (Sundays)

Category Archives for My Musings (Sundays).

My 757th is coming quickly..my very next flight in fact

Just travelled on my 756th plane flight and I can reveal that the 757th flight of my life will be on a United Airlines Boeing 757 from Washington Dulles to Los Angeles Thursday 16th June, 2011. United has 135 of these planes- almost a third of its main line fleet. This follows my 737th on a Southwest 737 and my 747th on a Qantas 747. Who will my 767th be with?

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Understanding Accents and Identity

There were two of us waiting for the lift (elevator) at a hotel in the USA. When the car arrived, the other man got in first, pressed “9” and said to me (with an English accent), what floor do you want?I said “12 please”.He said: “oh you are an Aussie“.From two words, he worked out where I came from. Yet after travelling to the USA for twenty years, I cannot tell you how many times people have assumed I am English or asked me if I am from “over the pond”. How come an Englishman…

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How I got hooked on Flightmemory.com

My friend Tony became very ill and was confined to home. Frustrated out of his mind, because he was unable to work, Tony rested and surfed the internet to satisfy his passion for all things “Boeing”. In fact his slogan was “if its not Boeing I ain’t going“. It was Tony who got me to Seattle when Boeing first unveiled the 787. It was Tony who got me onto Flight memory.com Four years ago, Tony rang me up: “got your frequent flyer statements?” “yes”. I said. “Good. Bring them round to my place” “> “Why”. “>”Don’t…

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United’s Oil Consumption will be expensive

According to Airways Magazine for June 2011, one out of every 350 barrels of oil produced in the world is used by the combined United-Continental airlines to fuel their 1262 planes! Every increase in oil has gotta hurt. Whats their long term plan for oil one wonders? If peak oil theory is correct then they face a very expensive future as oil becomes even pricier.

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Dear Nut – Please Go away

I sent this through to Qantas this week. (OK I know I am geek but let me geeky about something) Dear QantasThis is a very, very unusual request.I am a Qantas Platinum customer (QF 1657665). I am also a plane geek.This week I flew my 737th flight in my life. I flew my 737th flight on a Boeing 737. (see my blog post about it: http://mjtravlife.blogspot.com/2011/05/737-737-flight-report.html). The flight was in the USA with Southwest airlines.My flight memory where I record all my fights is here: http://my.flightmemory.com/mjc3000 Now to my request:I am booked to fly MEL-AKL-WLG-AKL-LAX in…

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2300 hours

A recent flight  tipped me over into 2300 hours of flying since I was born. This is equivalent to over 95 days inside a metal tube.  Over 3 months of my life! More Trivia (some of which can be found at my flightmemory page) 75 airlines (my favourites of course Emirates, Air New Zealand and Qantas) 48 types of plane (the 3 most common being B737, B747 and B767 and the most exotic a Zepplin airship) 180 airports (the 3 most common Melbourne, Sydney and Los Angeles) 36 countries on 5 continents flown to (out of the…

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I have just flown ONE MILLION MILES

Dawn in the air In the film: Up in the Air, George Clooney plays Ryan Bingham, a guy with the goal of earning one million miles with the one airline. Today, I reached the milestone of one million miles in the air (1.6 million kilometres).  My life does not completely rsemble Clooney’s movie character, however. Unlike him, I actually love being home and I like people.    I now have elite statuses with the following carriers:  United Airlines Gold Virgin Blue Gold Qantas Platinum I measure my air life at a great flight tracking tool called FlightMemory.  My…

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Annoyed at steep fare rise

I had to book air travel to a client’s city for a presentation I am making. I found an airfare five weeks ago of around $250 but was told not to book it because the client’s corporate travel department would book it at a corporate rate thus “saving money”. Fair enough”, I thought. Anyway, corporate travel department finally got back to me today to book it myself. Only the fare is now $700-$800. So much for them saving money. I hate seeing money wasted!

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