Petty Gripes
This post isn’t really about travel, for which I’m not really going to apologise. It’s about a word. A word I’m seeing too often. That word is ‘haters’. In dictionary definition terms, a hater is someone who hates something. I can see how you can be a hater of avocado, or a hater of the [...]
Virgin Vouchers and Flying Club miles Earlier today, I tried to book two flights to Orlando. I got married in April, and part of our wedding present stash was made up of Virgin vouchers. That’s vouchers created by the Virgin group that can be used on Virgin group products – such as Virgin Atlantic flights [...]
Continue reading about Terms and conditions of endearment: Virgin Atlantic’s self-harming stupidity
Cheap joke gone crazy Earlier today, I tweeted a cheap gag about the newly departed and not-particularly-missed News International CEO Rebekah Brooks. You may have seen it by now. It seems as though the rest of the world has. At the time of writing, the link contained within it had been clicked 16,800 times. Now [...]
Continue reading about Going viral and Twitter’s attribution issues
I have a complex love-hate relationship with airport security. I hate the queues, I hate the seemingly random changes of mind over whether you need to get your laptop out and take your shoes off, and most of all I hate every person in the big hall of scanners and conveyor belts that is not [...]
Continue reading about The people who shouldn’t be allowed through airports
Skiing holidays Summer is a wonderful time of year, if only because we’re spared the acres of newsprint spilled about skiing holidays. I may have got this all wrong, and skiing holidays may be so popular that 20% of the population goes on one at some point every year. But, to me, it seems like [...]
North Americans and tax North Americans, as a general rule, really don’t like tax. In fact, if you allowed a significant number of loonbags on the shouty fringe of the Republican party to have their way, there would be no taxation at all – let’s face it, we don’t need those vile evolution-preaching schools and [...]
Continue reading about ‘Plus tax’: A phrase that makes no sense whatsoever
Dear hotel receptionists, Imagine someone comes into your hotel. They say they’re a journalist, and would like to see a room as they’re writing a city guide and need to recommend places to say. What do you think they’re asking for? Is it (A) to see a room? Or (B) to pointlessly swap business cards [...]
Continue reading about An open letter to hotel receptionists
Over the last couple of months, I’ve spent a fair bit of time in the United States. On the whole, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed it. The US is a fantastically varied country with many stories to tell, and an overwhelming amount of things to see and do. But it isn’t perfect, and there are at least [...]
Continue reading about Ten things America could really do with getting over
Samoa skips a day The newspapers today are full of the news that the Pacific nation of Samoa has decided to skip a day by moving to the other side of the International Date Line. The idea is to be in roughly the same time zone as trading partners in Australia and New Zealand, but [...]
If you ask me, there are certain criteria that have to be applied if something is to be fairly deemed a ‘service’. Key amongst them is that it has to be genuinely useful and desired. The hotel industry, however, appears to think differently. A service, it seems, is when someone is put in the way [...]
Continue reading about Five hotel services that are not actually services