wild_turkey

I really enjoyed the Loire Valley. Spent 4 nights in Amboise and felt like it hat was plenty to visit the various chateaus but I’m sure you could make a full week of it.

Oh and for the Eiffel Tower, my personal opinion is that the best way to appreciate that is to get a baguette and a bottle of wine and find a nice spot on the Champ de Mars to have a picnic and just look at it. We did climb the stairs up to the second floor observation deck and waited about an hour in line for that, and I think it’s worth doing for sure, but much more enjoyable to just relax on the Champ de Mars and take it all in.

We went to the Louvre on a Monday in July, mid-day, and it was fine. Somewhat crowded, but aside from waiting ~10 minutes to see the Mona Lisa, no real issues seeing anything else. Much easier than I expected. Versailles kinda sucked for us. Went there on a Sunday and it was extremely crowded. I remember waiting at least an hour to get in, then once inside, it felt like we were in a herd of cattle just being pushed through the rooms. Once we got out of the palace, the garden was alright, but I wouldn’t do it again just for that. But, YMMV.

I would rank the Erik Larson books as follows: 1. The Splendid and the Vile 2. The Devil in the White City 3. Dead Wake 4. Isaac’s Storm 5. Thunderstruck Although I read The Devil in the White City about 15 years ago (damn that’s a long time) and I read The Splendid and the Vile last year, so maybe there’s a little bias involved. Regardless, they are all good except for In the Garden of Beast which sits on my shelf and for unknown reasons does not get read.

Coming down I-30 yesterday about 11:00 am there were about 8 motorcycle cops lined up on the shoulder near the University exit. Then between Montgomery and Hulen, I saw 6 different cops (motorcycle and cars) had pulled various people over. Was this just a massive speed trap or was something else going on? Never seen that many cops in such a small area just for the sake of writing speeding tickets.

Sounds like something an investment banker or financial manager would say.

We just booked a week in Corsica in mid-July. Anyone been there? Any recs? Will also spend a night in Paris on the way back. We’ve been there before so we’ll figure that part out pretty easily.

It looks like I never posted again after our trip last year. We ended up doing 3 nights in Split, 4 nights in Vis, and 2 nights in Dubrovnik. The entire trip was amazing, beautiful country, great food, great wine, nice weather and beaches. While in Split we did a day trip to Brela and a day trip to Brac. Both were cool in their own way. While in Vis, we rented a boat for a day and went to Hvar and a couple other islands I don’t know the name of. Vis itself stole the show for us. Amazing little island which we cruised around on scooters and visited different beaches. Stiniva beach is especially cool. I could probably make a repeat trip to Croatia and just go to Vis.

Yeah I do that pretty frequently with Chase. I’ve done it in the past with Amex and their portal was good, but I don’t accrue many Amex points lately since my main card is now CSR.

Problem with hotels is that I stay almost entirely in boutique hotels that are single location. There isn’t a card for that. I can sometimes use Hyatt or Marriott points but I don’t look forward to it. I have the gold Amex. Can I do the platinum and get a new signup bonus through that? Airlines are better for me. What’s the refresh rate on the AA cards? Or what about the British Airways card?

No advice on your questions but Croatia is badass. Have fun.

I’m still young and don’t mind index funds being on sale for a while.

I've been "learning" French for a few years now, mainly using podcasts like Coffee Break French. I've also tried Duolingo (which sucked IMO) and Rosetta Stone (slightly better but still surprisingly bad). In the end, the podcasts have worked better for me thus far. Anyone have experience with online video courses like Preply or Verbling? You can get 1:1 tutors for a reasonable hourly rate. Do they teach from a lesson plan? I feel like this would help me be more committed if I'm paying a real person to video chat ?weekly and monitor my progress.

I fly mostly AA out of DFW so I'm not sure the United Infinite card is worth it to me. The 120,000 mile signup bonus is tempting but the $525 AF not so much and the other perks I wouldn't use too much. I am in need of a new card though. I currently use CSR for everything, which is great and versatile, but I haven't had a new card with a decent signup bonus in a while. I already have an Amex, and I've done SWA in the past 24 months. It's been about 36 months since I've done the Barclay and CITI AAdvantage cards. Not sure what the reset time is on their bonuses? Any other recs?

Should I be buying more AMZN today?

Will be there first part of June. June 1-3 - Grand Hyatt Kauai June 3-7 - Airbnb villa north shore near Hanalaei Bay June 7-11 - Koa Kea Hotel We have a day on a boat booked and a helicopter booked. We have a rental car. We plan to check out Waimea Canyon and hike the first part of the Kalalau trail. Does anyone have recommendations for dinner spots? Anything from a fish taco truck to the fanciest blowout dinner spot? Price not a concern. Does anyone have recommendations on a luau? Prefer good food and a place to wear coconut bras and grass skirts.

My Global Entry expires in June so I submitted a renewal application, which is now pending. The GE application website said that due to increased application volume and a backlog, they have extended the grace period for expiring memberships to 24 months. That’s crazy but I won’t argue. Does anyone know if that includes Precheck as well, or will I lose my Precheck access while waiting on GE to be reapproved?

I wouldn't consider myself an Elon fanboy, although I like a lot of what he does. I think Tesla and SpaceX are extremely valuable companies for our future. For people that actively hate Elon and root against him, it seems like you are also rooting against Tesla and SpaceX. Does that concern you in any way? If not, is it because you think those companies aren't actually important, or that you don't agree with their purpose (EVs, cleaner energy, space flight)? Or do you think Elon could fail and the companies continue being successful without him? Or other companies would fill the gaps left behind? Just curious how people see this.

I just filled out my Global Entry renewal application and it looks like they have virtual interviews now. No idea how that will pan out because the application is pending and I can’t schedule the interview yet, but it did mention that possibility.

The annoying part is when you've paid more money at the time of booking for a flight with better departure/arrival times, then they jerk you around and change it to a shitty time anyways, and act like everything is fine because you are still flying on the same calendar day and they are kind enough to not charge you an additional change fee.

Just watched this. Incredible movie. Why are there so few posts in this thread?

No one here said they are happy that unvaccinated or immunocompromised people die. I said that I am tired of modifying my behavior (e.g. wearing a mask on a plane) to protect unvaccinated people. I will continue to wear a mask when in a situation that I am required to do so, but I’m also happy to see masking requirements regressing. Huge difference from that and being happy that unvaccinated people die.

Omicron and Delta were deadly waves for unvaccinated people. I don't know of a resource that looks at the U.S. as a whole, but the Texas DSHS website breaks down cases and deaths according to vaccination status within the state of Texas. It would be reasonable to extrapolate this data to the U.S. as a whole. https://www.dshs.texas.gov/immunize/covid19/data/vaccination-status.aspx During Omicron, the daily death rate for unvaccinated people peaked at 14.8 deaths per 100,000 people. During Delta, the daily death rate for unvaccinated people peaked at 19.9 deaths per 100,000 people. Those are not great numbers, but they are in unvaccinated people who have been given every opportunity to get a simple shot to save themselves and they refuse to do so. Compare those same waves of Covid with vaccinated people which saw a peak of about 1 death per day per 100,000 vaccinated people for each wave. That's pretty damn low for people who did the right thing, got their shot, and had some personal responsibility when it comes to their own health. Even though lots of vaccinated people still got Omicron and Delta, those waves of Covid can hardly be portrayed as "highly fatal" for vaccinated people. Omicron was basically a cold for most vaccinated people. Where there seems to be some disconnect between your opinion and the opinion of many others here (myself included), is whether or not we should give a shit what happens to unvaccinated people at this point in the pandemic. You seem to lump vaccinated and unvaccinated people together because deaths are deaths. I agree that any deaths are tragic, but I am far beyond the point of going out of my way to do anything to protect a person who was too selfish to get a shot for the greater good. They've made their decisions and my personal opinion (which I believe is shared by many other fully vaccinated people), is that we are tired of being asked to modify our lifestyle and behaviors because a section of our society wouldn't get a simple shot. What happens to unvaccinated people only matters to me from the standpoint of whether or not our healthcare system is being overrun by their presence in our hospitals, which currently is not the case. It sucks when they die, but it also sucks when people die from any other reason that was entirely preventable. People aren't arguing to ban fast food because heart disease and diabetes are major killers. Let people make their own foolish healthcare decisions if they want to. I'm not here to tell you that you should or should not care about unvaccinated people. That's up to you. I'm just explaining that for many of us, the only relevant statistics for the pandemic at this stage are how the virus is affecting vaccinated people, which has been fairly minimal for a LONG time now. Not just since February 2022, but since summer 2021. So yeah, we're over it. And no, I don't want to wear a mask on a plane if I don't have to. I did my part wearing a mask on planes - and every day all day at work (healthcare) - for the past 2+ years. It's time to move on.

Our current 7 day average deaths is 471/day and trending down. Even if it levels off and we assume 471/day for the rest of the year, that’s 172,000 deaths/year. A soft estimate is that 90% of deaths are unvaccinated. That’s about 155,000 unvaccinated deaths and 17,000 vaccinated deaths. Are you wanting to continue a mask mandate in airports and planes because you think it will reduce either of those numbers? Do you honestly believe that masks on planes will significantly reduce the number of unvaccinated people dying of Covid? Like somehow these people have skipped a life saving vaccine and every other precaution we’ve attempted, but if we just force everyone on a plane to continue masking, then it will magically save a large number of them from dying of Covid? Or are you more concerned about the 17,000 vaccinated people dying, most of whom are fairly old with multiple comorbidities and not even flying in the first place? Are you thinking airplane masks will save people who aren’t even boarding planes? I’m just confused at what your goal is and what the endpoint is? The mask mandate for planes does not seem like an effective ongoing precaution given what we know about the current Covid victims. It seems like a misplaced priority.

Our current 7 day average deaths is 471/day and trending down. Even if it levels off and we assume 471/day for the rest of the year, that’s 172,000 deaths/year. A soft estimate is that 90% of deaths are unvaccinated. That’s about 155,000 unvaccinated deaths and 17,000 vaccinated deaths. Are you wanting to continue a mask mandate in airports and planes because you think it will reduce either of those numbers? Do you honestly believe that masks on planes will significantly reduce the number of unvaccinated people dying of Covid? Like somehow these people have skipped a life saving vaccine and every other precaution we’ve attempted, but if we just force everyone on a plane to continue masking, then it will magically save a large number of them from dying of Covid? Or are you more concerned about the 17,000 vaccinated people dying, most of whom are fairly old with multiple comorbidities and not even flying in the first place? Are you thinking airplane masks will save people who aren’t even boarding planes? I’m just confused at what your goal is and what the endpoint is? The mask mandate for planes does not seem like an effective ongoing precaution given what we know about the current Covid victims. It seems like a misplaced priority.