The Flag's a Plus

In about a month, we need to fly one-way from Pittsburgh to Zürich. This means booking tickets. There are two complicating factors: While we're about 95% sure that we'll be leaving in a month, there are still a few things that could go wrong. Refundable tickets are necessary. I'm fat. I don't fit well into the newer "cattle class" economy seats. We were looking at booking 3 seats for the 2 of us or considering business/first class to get the wider seats there. Both of these things raise the price of a ticket, and more importantly, they make it nearly impossible to compare prices using Google Flights, Hipmunk, Orbitz, Kayak, etc. However, those services are still a good starting point to figure out what's out there. I started with the ticketing services to get a list of airlines that flew that route. Then, I went to each airline's website and looked for the same route on the same days. To my dismay, one-way flights are barely less expensive t...

This has nothing to do with Switzerland. It's a leftover from when this was a personal blog. I'm leaving it here anyway for my own reference. I'm a fan of Podcasts. For those who don't know, these are something like radio shows that you download to your phone or computer. They often focus on a small area where they have passionate interest. They're perfect for long walks, drives, or bus rides. These are the podcasts that I've been listening to lately: NPR Hourly News Summary  because radios are hard. I own a dozen computers and cell phones, but there's not an FM receiver to be found in the place. The ISC Daily Stormcast is a daily brief overview of current events in computer security. Planet Money tries to figure out why financial markets work the way that they work.  Hidden Brain looks at some of our less-than-rational decision making processes. 99% Invisible  covers the reasons and impact of design decisions. Futility Closet discusses unusu...