"The Hell Of Flying And Europe's Best Kept Secret"
I hate flying. Absolutely hate it. Pushing, shoving, screaming, arguing; the proverbial wailing and gnashing of teeth. And that's just me and the dogs at the house before I leave to get on the plane.
The only thing that I hate worse than flying is booking flights. I used to have a method for doing this that yielded many a greenback saved, thusly putting me in line for getting away with the equivalent of aviation economical murder. After pulling off this secret for a few years, the airlines finally caught on (I'm sure I wasn't the only one that had figured it out) and if I try it now, its the WORST possible option 90% of the time. The band does a lot of flying. Enough so that my Bro's In Arms and I are able to keep a decent "status" level with our "normal" airline. Silver, Gold, Platinum and Diamond status can lead to deals, upgrades and perks, which can make the "less-exciting-than-a-trip-to-the-local-sewage-treatment-plant" proposition of flying barely bearable. The requirements for achieving any kind of status on our "normal" airline have changed this year, and not for the better. Add to that the fact that their International flights are becoming more and more full and more and more expensive with less and less perks. So, for this tour we decided to abandon the idea of staying with the "usual" airline and started looking for a deal.
After days of shopping online and becoming beyond blurry eyed and pissed off, I found one. Sort of. I found tickets for just over the price that I had previously bid on a well known website where one can "Name your own price". My bid was turned down, but I was given another "deal" option. Turns out the "deal" is on an airline that I once had "Gold Status" with years ago. I was ready to go back, hat in hand. I even remembered my frequent flyer number, even though I hadn't flown with them in almost ten years. I went ahead and booked two of the other guys first (Never book more than two people at once; believe it or not, you'll pay more. Sometimes, LOTS more. Buying in bulk does NOT help you here) and then tried to book myself with one of the other guys. The price jumped for these as of yet unbooked tickets at that very second, bringing it just above the price of our "usual"airline. Great. I then tried booking just one, and it was the same price as the previous two guys' tickets, so I took it. Just one more was all I needed to save a total of 800 plus USD off our "normal" airline's price! However, It was not to be. When I tried to book my own ticket, it was 300 plus more than the price of each ticket for the other three guys. I'd already dumped close to three grand total and they are upping the price on me? A quick refresh of the window on the site of our airline of yore, and the price had just DROPPED by well over two hundred, and was barely a touch higher than what I'd just paid for the other guys' tickets... So, as I write this, I'm traveling alone, on an airline whose crap I'm sick of. (I did horse 10,000 miles out of them for my account after they screwed a detail, so that helped)
But, so what, really? Finally after sitting on the runway in DTW for over two hours, I'm off to Helsinki, Finland via Amsterdam, Netherlands to meet the fellers and embark on an eleven-shows-in-just-over-two-weeks-tour that almost didn't happen. Rock And Roll can be a game of " horseshoes and hand grenades" at times, but with some hard work on the part of my bro/ agent Sami, it sprouted like sweet corn in late May. As I write this I'm sitting in a completely full plane in a row with some very nice people that happen to be from the Czech Republic. I whip out what little of the Czech language I know and they are delighted that I know any at all. I just finished a new song on my trusty iPhone, while putting back a few beers. The guys will get to Helsinki before I do, and I'm a little jealous, as I consider Finland to be "my" country. It was the first country outside the States that I really started playing my original music I'd written on decent size tours. I got a record deal for a CD I recorded in Finland; I started spending months on end in Finland; it was my base for touring all over Europe, recording, writing and producing in the five years before Skinny Molly was formed. I did lots of media there, have loads of friends and biz contacts there and have had for 15 years as of last month. I was even made an official Finn by two different groups of friends in both the East and West because they said I possess "Sissu" (hard to translate to English, but it's kind of like balls-out attitude) and for my ability to hold my liquor and take a dang hot sauna. Finland still holds all the excitement that it always has for me; fabulous people, beautiful sites, wonderful food, clean air, great wildlife and forests with Pine and Baltic Birch trees and great products made from them, water and fishing everywhere, and my beloved sauna culture. These folks know how to live, and this is the time of year that the country begins my favorite season. I hope it doesn't rain, and I hope I catch that big ol' pike that broke my pole twice years ago. I'm going after him on a day off. I know where he lives. Oh yeah, I'm also going to play some rock and roll while I'm there. :) Finland is definitely Europe's best kept secret. It's a place so awesome that I think God spent a little extra time putting it together. Whatever you do, please don't go to Finland. I want to keep it all to myself! :)
Mike
5/14/14 9:17 TN time
Somewhere over the Atlantic, probably near Ireland, I haven't checked the "flight map" yet.
OK, just checked the flight map, and yep, right over the west coast of Ireland. It just occurred
to me for the 300th time that I have done this a lot.
The only thing that I hate worse than flying is booking flights. I used to have a method for doing this that yielded many a greenback saved, thusly putting me in line for getting away with the equivalent of aviation economical murder. After pulling off this secret for a few years, the airlines finally caught on (I'm sure I wasn't the only one that had figured it out) and if I try it now, its the WORST possible option 90% of the time. The band does a lot of flying. Enough so that my Bro's In Arms and I are able to keep a decent "status" level with our "normal" airline. Silver, Gold, Platinum and Diamond status can lead to deals, upgrades and perks, which can make the "less-exciting-than-a-trip-to-the-local-sewage-treatment-plant" proposition of flying barely bearable. The requirements for achieving any kind of status on our "normal" airline have changed this year, and not for the better. Add to that the fact that their International flights are becoming more and more full and more and more expensive with less and less perks. So, for this tour we decided to abandon the idea of staying with the "usual" airline and started looking for a deal.
After days of shopping online and becoming beyond blurry eyed and pissed off, I found one. Sort of. I found tickets for just over the price that I had previously bid on a well known website where one can "Name your own price". My bid was turned down, but I was given another "deal" option. Turns out the "deal" is on an airline that I once had "Gold Status" with years ago. I was ready to go back, hat in hand. I even remembered my frequent flyer number, even though I hadn't flown with them in almost ten years. I went ahead and booked two of the other guys first (Never book more than two people at once; believe it or not, you'll pay more. Sometimes, LOTS more. Buying in bulk does NOT help you here) and then tried to book myself with one of the other guys. The price jumped for these as of yet unbooked tickets at that very second, bringing it just above the price of our "usual"airline. Great. I then tried booking just one, and it was the same price as the previous two guys' tickets, so I took it. Just one more was all I needed to save a total of 800 plus USD off our "normal" airline's price! However, It was not to be. When I tried to book my own ticket, it was 300 plus more than the price of each ticket for the other three guys. I'd already dumped close to three grand total and they are upping the price on me? A quick refresh of the window on the site of our airline of yore, and the price had just DROPPED by well over two hundred, and was barely a touch higher than what I'd just paid for the other guys' tickets... So, as I write this, I'm traveling alone, on an airline whose crap I'm sick of. (I did horse 10,000 miles out of them for my account after they screwed a detail, so that helped)
But, so what, really? Finally after sitting on the runway in DTW for over two hours, I'm off to Helsinki, Finland via Amsterdam, Netherlands to meet the fellers and embark on an eleven-shows-in-just-over-two-weeks-tour that almost didn't happen. Rock And Roll can be a game of " horseshoes and hand grenades" at times, but with some hard work on the part of my bro/ agent Sami, it sprouted like sweet corn in late May. As I write this I'm sitting in a completely full plane in a row with some very nice people that happen to be from the Czech Republic. I whip out what little of the Czech language I know and they are delighted that I know any at all. I just finished a new song on my trusty iPhone, while putting back a few beers. The guys will get to Helsinki before I do, and I'm a little jealous, as I consider Finland to be "my" country. It was the first country outside the States that I really started playing my original music I'd written on decent size tours. I got a record deal for a CD I recorded in Finland; I started spending months on end in Finland; it was my base for touring all over Europe, recording, writing and producing in the five years before Skinny Molly was formed. I did lots of media there, have loads of friends and biz contacts there and have had for 15 years as of last month. I was even made an official Finn by two different groups of friends in both the East and West because they said I possess "Sissu" (hard to translate to English, but it's kind of like balls-out attitude) and for my ability to hold my liquor and take a dang hot sauna. Finland still holds all the excitement that it always has for me; fabulous people, beautiful sites, wonderful food, clean air, great wildlife and forests with Pine and Baltic Birch trees and great products made from them, water and fishing everywhere, and my beloved sauna culture. These folks know how to live, and this is the time of year that the country begins my favorite season. I hope it doesn't rain, and I hope I catch that big ol' pike that broke my pole twice years ago. I'm going after him on a day off. I know where he lives. Oh yeah, I'm also going to play some rock and roll while I'm there. :) Finland is definitely Europe's best kept secret. It's a place so awesome that I think God spent a little extra time putting it together. Whatever you do, please don't go to Finland. I want to keep it all to myself! :)
Mike
5/14/14 9:17 TN time
Somewhere over the Atlantic, probably near Ireland, I haven't checked the "flight map" yet.
OK, just checked the flight map, and yep, right over the west coast of Ireland. It just occurred
to me for the 300th time that I have done this a lot.