California to Texas

I had to leave early this morning, so checked out and left the hotel at 8 to get the BART to the airport for my flight to Dallas Fort Worth. I requested an upgrade for $75 and 20K miles for today's flight, but for some reason I was not able to check-in online. My name was third in line for an upgrade, with two 1st class seats available, so they got the seats - which is just typical, so I had to sit in my original seat ... until a couple of minutes before we pushed back, when the attendant came and asked me to move up to seat 1F. Obviously, the lady in front of me had decided not to go after all.

My new seat entitled me to free lunch and drinks on tap. I had the beefburger, with fresh lettuce, red onion and pickles with a bread roll (which they had instead of chips) and a bowl of spicy stuff that I didn't fancy. The warm cookie for pudding was also very nice. There was plenty of space to stretch out and the seat was comfortable.

Dallas is much warmer than San Francisco was. I was able to get a Supershuttle to my hotel, which is actually just self-catering suites. I have a kitchen area and a sitting room, a separate bedroom and a separate bathroom. there's a free hot breakfast in the mornings and every evening there's a brief happy hour (2 hours) with a few buffet items provided, which will be different each night - this is also free, including any drinks.

I'm now sitting in the kitchen having just watched Andy Murray claim his first grand slam win by defeating Novak Djokovic in the US Open final in a match that was tense at times, particularly during the 3rd and 4th sets, but was so pleased that he was up by plenty in the decider and was able to close it out at the first attempt.

I've now caught up with all the entries that cover San Francisco - some new entries have been slotted in in chronological order, so if you've been reading all of them, you might need to go back to September 3rd and look for new ones.