So after the recent debacles with United and American, the government is getting heavy. 
Finally, we are seeing the government recognizing that consolidation is creating an arrogance in service and in amenities. After deregulation in 1978, industry charges like baggage fees and bumping passengers have been pretty much left to the airlines. And 80% of USA domestic business is now in the frightening hands of four airlines. Power to the few and less power to the consumer.
Airlines claim that overbooking helps keep fares low and provides less risk so more choice for consumers. Understood, but you have to be nice too! Honestly, whoever comes off a plane and says that they had a fab and fun experience? Now United are going to have to put their 
money where their mouth is. Dragging a guy down the aisle sounds like a bad wedding arrangement. It nearly cost them their business. CEO Munoz stated that he is committed to making things better and now overbooking as a policy is going to be phased out. Southwest, the darling of consumers, actually has the highest overbooking of any airline. They were just smarter and nicer about it.
We all get that overbooking creates more flexibility for airlines and lots take advantage of the compensation. It doesn’t take much but being nice and being smart makes the difference. Having a positive attitude and being customer friendly is key. That’s all we ask for. We are not cattle.
produce a travel magazine; essentially Airbnb Magazine. The rationale is that nobody knows better where people want to go than Airbnb does. They see it in demand and deals and have it resourced from billions of data points. As such, they can provide stories for people and places that are hot and can write about places that are trending. Savannah, for example, is one of Airbnb’s biggest sourced destinations, Porvoo in Finland is another. Go figure!
Now airports are moving into food and drink technology. Many airports have iPad ordering systems set up around bars and themed food restaurants. The deal is that you sit down, swipe your credit card, choose items from the iPad menu, and then food or drinks come flying out at you from places that you had no idea. Meanwhile, there are bartenders that you cannot order from and wait staff that appear randomly with your food in no apparent order. The basic problem with that system is that it’s not that good. Somebody has to keep coming in to manually assist and more often than not, the timing is all screwed up. Sometimes you get wine when you should’ve received coffee, or pizza when you were looking for dessert. It helps to pass the time and the idea is to simply centralize the operation center, but the problem is that it doesn’t work that well.
travel companion. However, it doesn’t get to go to Italy with me and I hate that. The cab company lobby there is just too powerful. So apart from not being able to see the sights of Ancient Rome and renaissance Florence, Uber does pretty well with me.
possibly canceled, one word of advice, pray to God that you are not stuck at LaGuardia Airport. It sucks. Watching delays unfold and getting bad updates and then inevitable cancellations are frustrating and bring out the worst in all of us. Airline staff is not helpful and nobody has a clue. Usually, they point to a gate complaint line that is a mile long and have you wait there. If you are really lucky, you get a snack voucher. As for a hotel, dream on! 
much better. It’s as if they have no training on what happens when stuff goes wrong. That’s the only time they have to worry and that’s when they can really overperform. We know the airline food is bad, the seats are cramped, and the service in general on the plane is very average, so how about excelling at this? Help passengers who are trying to figure out what to do, concentrate on the pre-
boarding service, calm people, assure people, and take a genuine interest in getting people into a good frame of mind. Maybe they should have yoga attendants at the gates helping passengers breath. It’s a shame. This is an area where you don’t have to do much. Just be service-oriented and kind. Is that too much to ask?
All I knew about the German city of Baden Baden was that it was a famous spa town. But I also recall the English football team had boot camped there with their WAGS one infamous tournament of which there have been so many. So I equated it with failure, inevitability, and the hopelessness of England to ever be successful at soccer again after one great and surreal moment in 1966. Off I went to visit Baden Baden and try to heal the memories and expunge the dreadfulness of overpaid footie players.
gardens and people were strolling along its banks as if they were in a French impressionist painting. It was so damn civilized.
50 years. I didn’t get to go to a spa. It seemed complicated and difficult to figure out how to gain entrance. You knew the spas were somewhere but it just didn’t seem that if you wanted to go for a spa holiday, you would
credit from a canceled reservation a year ago over to a new reservation this year. So my son and I hit Telluride. I had never been before although I had heard lots about it. We both love to ski so this seemed like a perfect storm.
territories. Not more than 20 minutes from Montrose is Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park. The canyon is as deep as the Grand Canyon but not as wide. It was spectacular in the early morning mist to see this giant chasm in a national park right next door to a very bland, modern town like Montrose.
to Strasbourg, the capital of the territory, to see this beautiful city that sits on the Rhine and its tributaries. It has fabulous wines and is the center of power for the European Parliament. Who knows, this would potentially be for me a last look at what it was like to see a Union Jack outside the Parliament building after Brexit.
to visit two other spectacular nearby places – Baden Baden and Colmar. For a French teacher, Colmar is a must and Baden Baden is a fabulous add-on across the border. We even got to see a baseball game outside the EU parliament. How strange, especially since baseball, so they say, is on the decline and soccer is on the rise. It seems here in the heart of Europe a flicker of faith was keeping the old ball game alive. Meanwhile, the Union Jack was flying high; a last flutter of the flag to denote that the great European experiment, alive and well everywhere, and created after the disaster of the second world war, was getting red carded in the U.K. Go on Scotland, declare independence and leave Auntie Britain and go live with your less superior relatives, The Euros. Ireland seems much happier living with its European neighbors since its divorce in 1922!
