In this article, I’m going to outline briefly how I managed to purchase my around the world trip ticket 100% on miles (+ a fee for airport taxes) with Continental Airlines.  It took just over a year and a half, at least two long flights for vacation and multiple cross country flights, but I pulled it off.   Here’s how:

1. Pick an airline alliance and always fly with that alliance. I chose Continental Airlines in the Winter of 2007.  At that time Continental was part of the Sky Team Alliance, but as of October 2009 it is part of the Star Alliance.  It included Delta, Northwest, Air France, Korean Air, and Copa, to name a few. (As a backup to #1, make sure you have an account with each alliance. Continental is now with the Star Alliance.  I opened up a Delta SkyMiles account just in case I continued to fly with Sky Team partners. )
2. With #1, remember to give the airline your account # for every flight. That’s how you collect the miles in the first place!  You only need one account number per alliance.  With the SkyTeam, if I fly Air France, I give them my Delta SkyMiles account, with Star Alliance, if I fly US Airways, I give them my Continental One Pass number.
3. If you forget to give your account # for the flight, keep the boarding pass to redeem the points/miles later. As long as you have your boarding pass, the process to redeem your points/miles is quite simple.  Just send in your boarding pass (make a copy for your records) to your airline (in my case Continental) with a note explaining the situation and including your account information.
4. Apply for  a credit card with the primary airline with whom you are collecting miles. Again, my primary airline was (and still is) Continental Airlines.  I took out my first credit card with them and Chase in December 2007.  You earn bonus miles for opening a credit card, and in some cases, for making your first purchase.  Most airline cards have a yearly fee (ex: $85) and a fairly high APR (ex: 13.89%), so only charge each month what you can pay off by your payment due date.  The point here is to charge as much of your normal expenses as possible, paying off the balance in full each month to avoid fees.  This way you maximize the amount of miles you earn each month.
5. Use your airline credit card to purchase flights for double miles. Very simple rule.
6. Take advantage of opportunities to earn miles from partner programs. My previous employer and client had me stay at Sheraton’s whenever I was on -site and conveniently, Continental had a partnership with Starwood Resorts, whereby my Starwood Points converted to Continental Miles.  I lost out on points with the hotel system, but gained big in airline miles, which was what I wanted.

Most people ask how many miles the flight cost – 140,000 – and how much the flight would have cost in dollars – roughly $3500.  The general rule of thumb is to hack off the last two zeros of miles quote to get an idea of how much the ticket would cost in dollars.  There’s a $1 for every 100 miles.  Not a great ratio, but with that conversion, I was able to travel around the world for $1400 while my traveling partner traveled for ~$3500.

Note:  This is not a sponsored article.

Interested in seeing more of my trip?  Visit www.myfirstretirement.com

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There, we picked up Adaptive Path‘s “Subject to Change: Creating Great Products and Services for an Uncertain World.” This was the first time I had a chance to hold the book in my hands and check out the bibliography in the back.  Lo and behold, there was my name (along with the primary author, Professor Bob Glushko from Berkeley’s School of Information) for a paper I helped author called “Bridging the Front Stage and Back Stage of Service Design”.  To be honest, it was pretty amazing to see the citation, and my name in print.  It’s also great to know that someone else read what I had to say on a topic, and found it thought-provoking enough to share it with others in their own publications.

Here are a couple of pictures Nate took to capture my “moment”!

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…with my friend Lauren:

Here’s our itinerary…

If you feel like meeting us along the way let me know! And, if my flights look a little cooky to you, it’s because I got the entire ticket with airline miles from Continental’s One Pass Program; the miles were much easier to earn than I expected. The only leg I didn’t get on miles, that is not included in this itinerary snapshot, is the 3 week trip to South Africa for FIFA World Cup.

I’m going back to Philadelphia for the winter, to hibernate on my parent’s couch and to work on other projects that I’ve always wanted to devote more time and attention to, until I leave for this big and amazing trip of 2010.  In the meantime, you can peruse my collection of travel pictures from previous treks.

As always, stay tuned…

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A portion of the dialogue that is pervasive in these types of groups is dedicated to asking the question to ad nauseum “Why are there not enough women in technology?”  The women that are in tech are quick to point out that most conferences are dominated by men, mostly white, and that few of these conferences feature any women speakers at all.  Day in, and day out, the conversation and complaints flood my twitter stream and my RSS feed to so much annoyance that I’m almost tempted to start spending my free time speaking at conferences (which I’ve done), or organizing a survey to better understand why women in tech do not attend conferences or try to speak at them on their own volition.   Just to make the noise go away.  It’s not that I don’t believe there are valid concerns, it’s that I find the conversation is tired, and somewhat generational.

In the pop culture of the online world, it seems that women in technology fall into three roles which I can relate to Save by the Bell characters.  The Kelly Kapowskis use their sex appeal to attract the tech geek guy to pay attention to them without knowing a lick of what they’re talking about.  The Lisa Turtles are the peppy chicks that “overcompensate by pushing their ‘geekery’ on everyone” (quote), displaying a mastery of social media but not of the separation of the application and presentation layers (you dig?).  And, the Jesse Spanos are quite qualified women of tech, who also sound like feminists ranting everyday that women are somehow being purposefully left out of the tech equation.

I don’t buy into it.  And neither does my friend Amy Ziari.

Last August Amy approached me at a Girls in Tech event (we thank you for that GIT!), tired as well of the same old conversation, with an idea to create a video series featuring women in technology who talk about what they are interested in.  Not to prove to anyone that we’re competent, or that we’re “geeky just like you!”, but to let our audience draw their own conclusions.  We didn’t want to be Kelly, Lisa or Jesse, we wanted to be ourselves, comfortable with our role in the industry, with our peers (male, female, black, white, hispanic or asian), and what we find interesting.

In mid September we teamed up with Camille Ricketts of Venture Beat to put together the pilot episode of the WildWest show.  We hoped to put together more episodes, but time passed, and now I’m leaving soon to take off on an excellent adventure (I’ve alluded to this trip, but have yet to post details).  So enjoy this first episode, where we interview Joey Mucha from Sprout and talk about some of our biggest tech snafus!  Also, visit the website – www.wildwestshow.tv - to learn more.

Credits to Amy for doing all the video editing!

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Andrea and Christina at SF1900 2008

I imagine that most of the people that come across my blog are more likely to be part of the San Francisco tech scene than they are part of the, well, non-tech scene.  If you’re following the current debate over whether you should love San Francisco or leave San Francisco, than you may have come across Mat Honan’s blog post “Are You Going to San Francisco”.  In his article, he makes a point to tell everyone to Make Real Friends:

“This only applies to people working in the Internet and technology sectors, but you may be amazed to discover that most people in the city work in fields that have nothing to do with the Internet. It’s fantastic to have friends in the industry. You’ll have shared interests and they’ll always get your meme-of-the-day jokes. But if most of your friends work in the same field you do, that’s a little boring, right? Try to branch out. This is a city of people from all over the world, doing all sorts of interesting things. Get to know them. ”

So here’s your chance: City of Dream’s 5th Annual – SF1900 – A Night at the Barbary Coast.  I can expound the virtues of City of Dreams, but I have already done that previously.  It’s a great organization, and I admire everyone of the members and friends I’ve met through my roommate and the organization.  But for those of you not familiar with City of Dreams, this event is the best way to get an introduction!  Not only can you fraternize with people outside of the (tech) industry, you’re going to find better male-to-female ratios than your average tech event (quit complaining!), and you can gamble the night away for a good cause.  If you don’t believe me just yet, take a look at last year’s photo site. Now go buy your ticket!

My Roommate and I Looking Snappy

Details

WHEN: Thursday, November 12th, 2009 7pm – 12:30am.
WHERE: The Bently Reserve (The old Federal building, 301 Battery St.)
WHAT: Annual Fundraising Gala for City of Dreams
THEME: Think San Francisco’s Barbary Coast, circa 1900.

Preview the event’s AH-mazing silent auction here!

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Signs of San Francisco from Lindsay Tabas on Vimeo.

Katie came to visit me in August 2009. She helped herself to my city of 4 years so I helped myself to her images. Through her lens, the city refreshes in my eyes.

Like any person in your life, a city cannot be all things to you through thick and thin. As much as I love this city, after 4 years, I’m looking to shake things up. I set sail very soon, stay tuned.

Produced by: Lindsay Tabas
Photos by: Katie Delaney
Song: Signs by Bloc Party (buy on iTunes)

PS: Happy Birthday Katie!

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More than 35 million people in our country are on food stamps – up 3 million just since January.

At Whole Foods you can get cherries for $7.99/lb, and in Chinatown you can get cherries for $0.99/lb. Even at Safeway, conventional apples are $1.99/lb, and in Chinatown they are $0.59/lb! Scallions? $0.39/each! Cilantro? $0.49/each! Eggplant? I bought some for $0.39/lb today. For the exchange in price, you get a cultural adventure.  Some may argue that the quality is not as good, and I would agree.  But not all fruits and vegetables need to be organic.  And to be honest, I would rather eat some fruits and vegetables for cheap, rather than none at all because they are too expensive.

I have learned the laws of shopping in Chinatown over the past 3 years, and I will share some of them with you here:

• Put your food on the scale as soon as the person in front of you is finished, else someone behind you will get there first.
• Do not substitute an unidentified green leaf vegetable for spinach just because it looks like spinach; it won’t taste the same
• Be prepared to see carcasses and single fishies lying dead in the freezer.  If you don’t like it, don’t buy seafood and meat (I don’t).
• Find the less busy stores – prices are $0.10/lb higher, but the food hasn’t been picked over.
• Feel out the prices for the day. 1 store may have red peppers for $1.99/lb, another may have them for $1.29/lb.

Here are the foods I purchased today.  I had a few recipes in mind while I was food shopping, and knew that I had some bulk foods to use at home which are not pictured here.  I’m hoping my assumption that multiple recipes using similar ingredients will make my life easier will prove true.

Tonight I’m going to finish cooking for tomorrow. I’ll post the recipes and what I eat in tomorrow’s post.

What do you think?

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Today was Park(ing) Day around the world. SF Weekly explains that the day “was dreamed up by Rebar, a San Francisco-based art and design collective, and invites participants to convert a parking space into a green space that becomes a spontaneous public park for a day.”   I went to North Beach on my lunch break to go to the bank, and to my pleasant surprise, I found a great spot outside of Lola’s on Grant Street.  After lunch, I walked the full stretch and found about 5 park(ing) spots.  I read a book, I hoola hooped, and I got some free lemonade!  Having to decline the “adult” lemonade in exchange for the regular lemonade because I had to return to work was the only sad moment.

Here are some of my “better” pictures (give my blackberry a break). You can see the entire set here.

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Since I struggle with my own volunteer efforts, I wanted to get the word out about my friend Sarah’s quest to raise $2500 for the The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society by selling pillows for $25/each. My roommate and I were able to snag 3 for our couch, and absolutely love the new addition to our apartment.  The pillows are well made, and the fabric patterns are to die for.  If you don’t want them for yourself, they make great presents and come with some awesome karma.

To purchase a pillow from Sarah, you just have to pick your pillow pattern, pay online, and then pick them up.  She’s located in Russian Hill (San Francisco), but is willing to mail you the pillow if you would like.

You can also visit her Team in Training page to donate money without redeeming a pillow.

Come on now, go help a girl out, and in turn, help save many lives!

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It’s storytime again, and this time, like so many others before, I was prodded to share this online.   It was Friday, June 19th, and I had just flown to Washington DC from San Francisco for my friend Jess’s wedding the next day.  Jess said she could pick me up at the airport, and I, in turn, said that I would pick up our friend Kenzie from the airport 4 hours later.  Kenzie’s family lives outside the city, and her parents left the house unlocked and her car keys on the table.  I spent the morning at their house, working remotely, and a little before Kenzie’s flight was to arrive, I grabbed her keys and got in the car.  Being that I was so excited to drive her Mini, I jumped in the car and turned it on.  Or tried to.

When I realized that her car was manual, I panicked…just a little bit.  “Crap, crap, crap, how am I suppose to pick her up?”  The brilliant person I am decided that everything is online, so instructions on how to drive a stick must be online (aside: this is where everyone says – tabas! you thought you could drive stick by reading about it online?).  I ran back in the house and searched “How to Drive a Manual”.  I read a few lines on About.com and felt sufficiently able to go on my way.  Or at least start the car, try to reverse, and stall.

I go back in the house, read some more and then call my friend Katie who is at work.  She tells me enough to get the car to the front of the development where I can get cell phone service and call her back.  Katie gives me a couple pointers, I make it out of the development and on my way.  Or so I thought.

Driving the two lane roads and coasting through my first right turn worked out alright until I had to get on Leesburg Pike – at least 4 if not 5 lanes on each side. The first light I get to, I stall. It turns green, I have to put the blinkers on, people behind me are visibly annoyed. I break a sweat. Second light; the same thing.

I turn into an abandoned parking lot and call Katie again. She tells me she has to work and can’t talk. I call my Dad. He picks up. I put him on speaker phone and he gives me our first father/daughter lesson as I drive around an abandoned bank parking lot. Park, reverse, forward, drive around the decrepit teller window. Repeat. He tells me he regrets not teaching me how to drive stick (there’s a first for everything!), and tells me some funny stories about my older sister’s steep learning curve. Being the supportive father that he is, he tells me if I’ve gotten 3.5 miles so far, I might as well go all the way to the airport. I think differently!

Finally Kenzie calls me to tell me she landed and I tell her the story – “Kenzie! I don’t know how to drive stick, my dad’s teaching me right now!” She thinks I said that my dad taught me once before, not just this moment and tells me to come pick her up. I repeat myself and when it finally clicks she says “Tabas! Why are you driving my car?? You knew it was a mini.”

“I really wanted to pick you up, I’m excited to see you ” I exclaimed! “But I didn’t know all mini’s were stick”. She proceeds to make me feel clueless; apparently all mini’s are manual, or were when she bought hers. We try to figure out if I should come get her, or if she should take a cab to where I am, or if I should attempt driving home. We pick option #3, and I get back on Leesburg Pike. Surprisingly, I made it all the way home without stalling once; I must have learned something.

Of course this became the story of the weekend at the wedding. That, and we were running so late to rehearsal dinner on Friday that we got dressed in a gas station bathroom.

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