links from the web: tied up for wanting a smoke, cibc matching td's travel benefits, amtrak's "go free" promotion

1) a passenger is tied up for repeatedly trying to smoke a cigarette on an emirates long haul flight. oh, i guess he was also tied up for physically assaulting the crew. it was on a singapore-brisbane flight. i can't imagine what would happen if it were on a singapore flight, with their fairly dainty singapore girls. nails would be broken! (flyertalk thread)

2) CIBC is matching some of TD's travel benefits on their aerogold infinite visa. starting january 15, cardholders get priority boarding, priority check in, and first bag free when flying on a reward flight operated by air canada. they will also give you a one-time use lounge pass for use, again only on reward flights operated by air canada.

3) view from the wing points out that amtrak is rolling out their "go free" promotion. essentially, if you take a certain number of round trips on their specific lines, they'll throw in one free (for use during a certain qualifying period). the one that is most valuable to me is the cascade line running between oregon, washington state, and vancouver. if you travel 2 qualifying round trips between january 6 and march 1, 2014, you will get one free round trip to use between march 2, 2014 and april 30, 2014.

• in doing a quick investigation of prices, amtrak is about twice as expensive as the bolt bus. however, amtrak's border clearance process is much better than the bolt bus as you clear and pre-clear at the actual rail station in vancouver.