Two SPECIAL NOTES:  Faith from Frugal Travel Momma blog, please contact me ASAP at ingy@gmail.comOur Grand Slam Contest Winner is: All of Us. With only 89 entries, everybody had a decent shot of picking up the $200 first prize for suggesting a Grand Slam “hit” tip. The lucky winner was chosen by Random.org and is…………..…..Kim R.  Congrats, Kim! I know you’ve won something before. Thanks for playing along. Send your full name and mailing address to rick@frugaltravelguy.comThis is so much fun. I have never done the Grand Slam before and I’m just hunting and scratching for “hits.” I have no idea how many I’ll end up getting, but I’m trying to find the low hanging fruit first. Katy and I each started with the buy miles the last day of the 100% bonus on September 15th then quickly added two credit cards uses for me (business and personal) and one for Katy (personal). Next came the toolbar for three searches and another “hit.” I’m at four and she’s at three.

On Sunday night I went on a completely disorganized Grand Slam Run. I did: Super Shuttle, Thanks Again, 1-800 Flowers, FTD.com, US Airways Dividend Dining, a bad Choice Privileges hotel point transfer, SPG transfer, Bischoff Cookies, Share Miles for $40 (ugh), Magazines for Miles, and I bought a copy of my own Frugal Travel Guy Handbook from Amazon.com through the mileage mall. I know I have some more cheapies coming, including a needed hotel stay and car rental. I looked at some of the other hotel points transfers and passed on them, other than Choice and SPG. Unless, of course you guys can direct me to another good one.

My Points.com account info is so old that I have to call customer service to change my email address from five years ago-plus. Seems to me, in all the chaos, I need to do that for some reason. Can I really get a hit for transferring four American Airlines miles to one US Airways mile?

I’m so new at this game that I’m taking the “if they don’t post attitude, I’ll try something else.” I’m really glad they post the successes every two weeks.

I’m not even predicting how far I’ll get in this promo. Nor am I going to count them up at this point. I’ll look when I get the hits posting to make sure I don’t end up one short of another level. My US Airways account is looking rather healthy after the 100K miles that purchase Katy and I each did. Adding a few more from this promo will push it up close to our 300K plus American accounts.


Well, that didn’t work. I had to look and it was 16 hits as of Sunday night. Now we are into the meat of the game and bigger rewards for the next batch of “hits.”

Thursday Morning Update

Nothing new for me other than booking a hotel room that I’ll credit to US Airways. I also think I screwed up the Audience Rewards hit by not activating my account before buying my show tickets. I did enter my DM number so we’ll see how that one goes. I feel like I’m lagging behind the gang and will need to spend a few more hours getting back up to speed.

Another blog is helping me keep my focus on the game. Over at MommyPoints on the BoardingArea.com website. Mommy is keeping a Grand Slam hits list of all her successes. I suggest you take a look at the tab on the upper right of her blog. Mom was always more organized than me. Same holds true today. 

I’m  trying to keep up three times per day, seven days a week, with the emails, and at times forget to have fun playing the “game.” I hope our contest last week and the chance to add a few more miles to my US Airways account will give me some much needed zip. A Reader Success Story always brightens my day as well.