The de-I Guide to Air Travel Planning - Part Four - The Points Game and Some Conclusions

If you have been following these posts on travel planning, and specifically air travel planning, you have seen that it can be complicated...which is why a lot of people dislike doing it. I'm going to conclude with (I hope) is some guidance to try to make the whole process easier. But first I want to touch upon the subject of trying to score free or discounted flights using miles. 

This is a massive subject. There are tons of pundits and services that discuss this subject and I am far from an expert. I will say, however, that the game boils down to two considerations:

• How are you going to get the points?
• How can you use the points?

The first is done either by flying on airlines and being part of the loyalty programs or using credit cards that allow you to earn points. Optimizing either are a huge can of worms which I am not an expert. The second usually requires a degree of flexibility and quick decision making (deals come and go fast) that also does not fall into my area of expertise. 

However, as I mentioned in my recent post on booking a flight to SE Asia, I do have one little hack that works pretty well for me. That is the use of United Airlines Cash & Miles feature. I made the decision to focus my travel with United Airlines decades and decades ago so I have lifetime status. While scoring fully free flights with miles is a real challenge, using the Cash & Miles feature, I can reduce prices substantially. And I can transfer points off my Chase Sapphire or Capital One Venture cards to United in a matter of hours to. I've managed to save a lot of money on both domestic and international flights this way. 

CONCLUSIONS

In the end, it really is about knowing your own personal preferences and pain points. Given the amount of international travel I do, buying the lie flat business class seat is critical to wear and tear on my old body and allowing me to manage the jet lag problem. I doubt I could travel as much as I do internationally if I didn't fly business class. So for me, it is well worth the price. Your needs are probably completely different. That's going to affect your choices.

The more you travel, the more experiences you have which will influence your decisions. You remember me vehemently stating I would not fly British Airways or go through Heathrow. That comes from experience. There is no substitute for experience. However, if you use the process I've outlined for you, you will be able to cut down on the amount of time it takes you to determine your options.

 

The de-I Guide to Air Travel Planning - Part Three - Conducting a Sample Search - Self-Connecting

We are continuing our samples of how I actually do my flight searches and selections. I had made a claim that one can frequently find better options in terms of price and other factors when one looks to book from a hub, especially going to another hub. I then was proven COMPLETELY WRONG when I, at random, selected some routes. This teaches us a valuable lesson. Don't do in real time research when you write your blog post. 

Today, I have done my research ahead of time to demonstrate the point of using a self-transfer going through a hub. For today's search I have chosen to research going from Albuquerque to Dubai, leaving on October 27 Monday and returning on November 19 Wednesday.

Here's what came up

Not particularly great. $5k is barely acceptable on my budget. And it is on American connecting to British through London Heathrow which is a no go for me. I hate British Airways and hate Heathrow. But the other options are $6.5k and 6.7k. Not attractive either. 

So I did the same multi hub search I showed you last post. And I came up with this.

OH! Now this is interesting. Two options, one Turkish Airlines, the other Royal Jordanian for around $3.7k. WOW, that's a $3k savings. If two of us are flying, that's a $6k savings. That's nothing to sneeze at. 

But wait, there are additional costs. You will have to book a round trip from Albuquerque to Chicago. Fortunately on the way out, the flights leave late so you won't have to do a hotel. Based on experience I know I can get to and from Chicago for about $500. 

So which one might I choose. Well, I checked the detail of the two flights. I like Turkish but it is flying an old Boeing 777 that has a 2-3-2 configuration in Business. It means there is a high likelihood you will have someone having to climb over you to get to the toilet or you will have to do the climbing. And there isn't much privacy. I am not crazy about the arrival time either. 

So I checked out the Royal Jordanian flight details

 They are flying a 787, a much nicer plane in my opinion. I like the arrival time a lot more. What about the seat configuration. I checked it on SeatGuru. It is a 2-2-2. So if you are in the center, both seats have aisle access. Looking at pictures, there isn't much privacy. But  saving as much money as this looks like, I would make that tradeoff. One thing I need to do is check what the return flight would look like.

The return is not bad. It gets into Chicago at 3:05pm. With going through passport control and switching terminals for a self-connect, I would stay overnight and make the last leg the next day. That would add maybe $200 in hotel cost. 

So in conclusion, if I choose the self-connect through Chicago I would save $3 thousand in airfare, give back $750 in connection to Chicago and hotel for a savings of $2,250. And it would take me another day of travel. Especially if there were two of us and I was doubling that savings, I would totally go this route.

 

The de-I Guide to Air Travel Planning - Part Three - Conducting a Sample Search (Part One)

Enough of preparation and background, let's look at how this plays out when one actually wants to find a flight.

Let's put together a hypothetical example. For this example, I am going to do a search I've never done before. Let's assume I want to go from Cleveland Ohio to Ljubljana, Slovenia and back in April of 2026 for two weeks starting the second week of April and that I want to travel business class on the over Atlantic portion of my trip in both directions.

Before I even start to search, I will take the following things in account:

• Trying to book flights from a spoke city to a spoke city will almost always end up with something more expensive and convoluted. 
• The better option is usually to book your over ocean flight from hub to hub and do a self-connect to get to your final destination.
• Or do a hub in the U.S. to your international spoke city
• Except for those situations where the spoke to spoke route comes out better.

Totally confused? Let's actually do this and see if we can shed light on how it works. 

I start by doing a search using a site that aggregates flight information from many airlines. I used to be a big fan of Kayak. But recently I've moved to Google Flights  because of a feature that allows you to put in up to 7 departure cities and arrival cities in one search. It also shows just airline deals and not agency deals. I don't do agencies. That is another post altogether.

 Okay let's do the search

WTF!!!!

Okay, one clearly has a helluva a lot better options from Cleveland than from Albuquerque lol. These are seriously good options. A business class round trip fare from spoke to spoke for under $4 thousand with two stops, and 13 to 18 hours total travel time is a killer deal. $5 thousand for transatlantic would be a more normal low end price. Just for grins, let's see what this would look like from my home town of Albuquerque.

Now we're seeing what I normally run into. Take into account that Wife and I fly and that $4,200 to $4,600 fare translates into $8,400 to $9,200. That is about what I would expect to find.

 Let's change the locale we are going to. Let's say we are going from Cleveland to either Kuala Lumpur or Singapore.

Those are in the almost $9 thousand and up for two people. Looking at going from Albuquerque.

Similar pricing

But one needs to look beyond the price to see the total travel experience. Notice on each listing you will see it has the total hours of travel time and the number of stops. If one clicks on the arrow to the far right, you will get the details of the flight including what kind of aircraft is being used. This can be significant as there is a wide variety of comfort available depending on the aircraft per airline. 

So let me give you a bit of homework. Go to Google Flights and enter the exact parameters I have for this Albuquerque to Kuala Lumpur or Singapore route in April. Then go click on the flight details and study what you see. In the next post, we will start to analyze this information because it can be key to the kind of total flight experience you might have. 

And we will look at the options to us if we look at a hub to hub routing with our doing a self-connection to get to the hub.

 

The de-I Guide to Air Travel Planning - Part Two - Understanding the Airline System

We are in the second of the four part series discussing how de-I and Wife plan their travel. Please note:

• I am focusing primarily on international travel though many of the issues we cover would apply to domestic or short-haul travel.
• I have a bias toward what I will call standard, full-service airlines as opposed to discount airlines. This ties into my first post where I talk about the variables important to you. With my preferences, the advantages of a discount airline often disappear as I have to pay extra for all the things I prefer.

So with that in mind let's talk about how the majority of main stream airlines operate, and why that is important to your planning. 

The vast majority of major airlines that serve the international trade operate with what is called a hub and spoke system. The hub and spoke system makes use of a small number of major airports that act as 'hubs'. Traffic is funneled into the 'hubs' from a wide number of outlying locations. These routes are the 'spokes'. There are also only a limited number of major airlines flying these international routes. When you combine these two sets of data, you find that your options on how to get from Point A to Point B reduce substantially. Here is a non-complete, unofficial list of major international carriers and their hubs. (I am leaving out airlines and locations in Latin America as I've had no experience with them)

United States

• American Airlines - Charlotte, Chicago, Dallas/Ft. Worth, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Los Angeles
  
• Delta Airlines - Atlanta, Boston, New York, Los Angeles, Salt Lake City, Seattle, Minneapolis, Detroit
  
• United Airlines - New York, Washington D.C., Chicago, Houston, Denver, Los Angeles, San Francisco
  

Europe

• British Airways - London
  
• Air France - Paris
  
• KLM - Amsterdam
  
• Lufthansa - Frankfort, Munich
  
• Lot - Warsaw
  
• Iberia - Madrid
  
• ITA - Rome
  

Middle East

• Eithad - Abu Dhabi
  
• Emirates - Dubai
  
• Qatar - Doha
  
• Turkish - Istanbul
  

East Asia

• Asiana - Seoul
  
• Ana - Tokyo
  
• Japan Airlines - Tokyo
  
• Korean Airlines - Seoul
  
• EVA - Taipei
  
• Malaysian - Kuala Lumpur
  
• China Airlines - Taipei
  
• Starlux - Taipei
  
• Singapore - Singapore
  

You will note that the vast majority of the 'hubs' are located in major cities around the world. And the majority of long haul international travel is between hub and hub. Unless you live in one of them, you are going to have to take a 'spoke' route into the hub to get where you are going. 

One should also note that these airlines have combined in three major alliances - One World, Sky Team, and Star Alliance. These alliances allow airlines to show flight options booked on one ticket as if they were one airline. I will discuss why this is important in a later post.

When planning international travel one should understand that each of these airlines has flights going from their hub to other major hubs. If you know this you can in your own mind map out the possibilities of getting from one place to another. 

For example, I recently planned a trip in 2026 to South East Asia. But I didn't know exactly where in SE Asia I was going to go. So I chose a couple of hubs in SE Asia where I know many other short haul flights go in and out of. These were Kuala Lumpur and Singapore, With this information, I could now limit the number of options on how to get to these hubs. And I could, in my own mind, start thinking about how I would get from where I am, Albuquerque, a minor spoke city, to where I wanted to go. 

This still leaves you with a heck of a lot of options. So how do we refine things so we can find what we want and not go crazy? In my next post, I am going to walk you through an actual search and purchase I recently conducted to show you how I use this information.

The de-I Guide to Air Travel Planning - Part One - Understanding the Variables Important to You

I have been asked by so many people...

1. You actually like planning travel? (The answer is yes I do)
2. How do you plan your trips?

 The answer to #2 is much more complicated. But I have decided to give it a try. (Please note this is the de-I Guide to Travel Planning not the de-I Sandia Outfitters Guide. The later can only be found on the dark web with the proper authorizations and access money provided). 

This Guide will focus on international travel because that is where the bulk of my heavy duty planning is spent, where things can get much more complicated, and the trade-offs between cost and other variables become the greatest.

Here are the things we will be discussing:

• Understanding the Variables Important to You
• Understanding the Airline System
• Conducting a Sample Search
• Working to Get the Optimum Value

Let's get on with our first topic, Understanding the Variables Important to You.

Every time we make an air flight reservation there are a host of variables that you are going to be dealing with...whether you understand them or not. A bit of intentional thought on what is important to you and what's not can save you a lot of time when conducting your search as you can eliminate certain options quickly if they don't fit your preferences. 

Here is a list of some of the things that I consider whenever I start researching a flight.

• Total flight time
• Cost
• How early or late the flight leaves (Wife HATES making early flights)
  
• How early or late the flight arrives
• Total travel time
  
• Checked luggage allowances (what I am considering will vary depending on the nature of the trip)
• What kind of seat location I can get (I like aisles toward the front so I can get to the toilet easy and get off the plane faster)
• Leg room and seat width
• Connection time
• Food options
• The particular airport I might be flying from, arriving, or changing planes (Example the flight I booked to SE Asia recently, I did from San Francisco instead of Los Angeles because  the former is easier to change terminals when doing a self-connect)
• Particular airlines one might prefer or want to stay away from

I often make trade offs to get the best experience for Wife and I. I might be willing to pay more to have a flight that is shorter and/or departs and arrives at a more reasonable time of day. I will avoid specific airlines if at all possible because of past experience. I am very aware of seat size and leg room. I will even consider where my seat is in terms of my ability to find overhead baggage space.

The point being if you know what you like and don't like, you can screen the information you are getting when doing your search so as to optimize your final experience.

In my next post, I will explain some of the basics of how the air transportation system works. Knowing this allows you to be realistic about your scheduling expectations, and reduce the number of options you research for any given trip.

 

Remember To Account For Mass & I Score Big With Airfare

As mentioned on Sunday, I finished off my pulled pork on Monday faithfully following the methodology I'd developed in June. However, I failed to account for one variable. The piece of pork shoulder I was processing was twice as heavy as the one I used in June. As a result it took much longer to get up to heat, causing me to have to improvise to get it done in time as we were going out for a drink with friends. 

I have been following a number of people who tout hacks using credit card and frequent flyer points to get free or discounted business class airfare. Most of these require a degree of flexibility in timing to grab the opportunity when it arises. That typically is not harmonious with the way Wife and I travel. However, I was able to find a hack of my own that saved me major USD.

My travel planning is focusing at the moment on our SE Asia trip planned for the end of February. Kuala Lumpur is our arrival hub. I will write a separate post to go into detail on the methodology I used overall, but the specific hack for the fare I got makes use of a feature on United Airlines where you can pay with a combination of Points and Dollars. I was able to book flights on ANA, a Japanese carrier that code shares with United so I avoid United's horrible food service. Then I brought over a bunch of points from a credit card to my United account and secured round trip business class fare for two for 40% less than the listed price. 

My inner cat was very pleased.

A Delightfully Relaxing Day

Sunday, for the first time in a long time, I had a day where I did nothing related to my consulting, Theodora, or Rotary. This was in large part due to the events of my most recent trip to Ghana combined with Wife getting the green light to ditch the boot. The former has led to a lot less work required from me, the later has allowed me to reengage in the joy (at least for me) of travel planning. 

I spent the whole day talking to the daughters, cooking, and researching travel (accommodations and airfare) for a trip to SE Asia we are planning for early 2026. 

I made cole slaw for the first time. For a dish with just two ingredients as a base, I was surprised at how it did not come out as I hoped. Like a lot of dishes with few ingredients, the technique and proportions of things become quite critical. I will try it again for sure. 

I also smoked a ton of meat for our freezer. I did a rack of ribs which we tried on Sunday. I also did a pork shoulder for pulled pork which I will finish today (Labor Day) using the two step process I pioneered in June.  

 Today, I will need to do some work.

Travel -Game On!

Wife and I spent an anxious hour at the foot doctor this afternoon. Neither of us was feeling very confident. The doctor has a great bedside manner. He brought in the new X-Rays. He pointed out that healing was continuing...continuing, not complete. He showed where a very important section on the outside of the toe has completed healing. That was important. We were on the edge of our chairs so to speak. It was not completely healed. That was clear. What did that mean for Wife staying in her boot.

It was then that he said that she could go shoes only. He indicated that she should keep her boot in case things felt like they were going backward. But he said if we were careful and used good judgement (like stay off of Medieval cobblestone streets), there was no reason for us to not take our trip. 

We came home feeling a weight had been taken off our shoulders...and threw ourselves into our preparation to go to Spain next month.

Reflections On The Magical Unicorn Pony God Of Travel

It is quite amazing the mind's ability to forget about pain. My flights to and from Ghana were reasonably smooth. Going out, there was a delay with the last flight from Washington to Ghana. That led to a long delay in getting my luggage when I arrived. But in the whole scheme of things, it wasn't a big deal. On the return, my flight back to Albuquerque from Washington was delayed as well. But again, that wasn't a big deal actually. 

So my mind was thinking, "Oh does each traveler have their own personal incarnation of the Magical Unicorn Pony God of Travel?" Does it age as you do so its abilities are lessened? I was going to write a whole post on this phenomenon. 

Then I decided I should go back and check the archives of posts related to MUPGT.

Oops. 

Am I getting dementia? Since 2022, there has been a non-stop series of battles with MUPGT. All the chaos in Ghana. Wife's security ordeal going to Amsterdam. Getting from Alicante to Copenhagen. Epic trying to get to Malaysia. 54 hours trying to get from Ghana to New Mexico.

Now instead of feeling mellow and complacent, I'm wondering what battle awaits us the next time we travel. 

All's Well That Ends Well

Despite all the intensity, illness, fatigue, angst, and questioning of this trip, it has all ended up on a very high note. 

I personally was incredibly productive cranking out fundraising campaigns, business development campaigns, and content for both. I've worked with my local board and had multiple meetings with them and my new local manager. I sat in the office today and listened as she effortlessly handled a new business prospect and closed same. I saw a level of quiet intense work in the office each day. I enjoyed the tranquility of our new office that is so quiet compared to our prior one. I'm feeling good about the transition that is taking place. As I stated in the last post, I'm not sure where I will be in all this but I'm sure it will be 'the right place.

On A Different Note

 I saw this image on one of my people's computers

This is my inner cat

And a special Ghanaian 

SIGNS OF THE WORLD

I love a sign that leaves little doubt as to the message.

 

Transition 8.5.4. 2025 (Ghana)

Back in July of 2024, I wrote a post related to transition. In that post, I expressed a realization that while I constantly looked for definitive 'transition points' in my life development, what was really happening was a never ending of transitions. (Having been watching things related to physics lately, I think of this like the electron which is in multiple points of time/space at the same time.)

Thus we have come to yet another of these points, this one dealing with the Theodora Project in Ghana. I gave my update in July where I went through our crisis of the first half of 2025 and how via local engagement, we overcame it. This was my first time back to actually see and feel what that meant. 

It has been both deeply encouraging and stressful at the same time.

If you have raised children to their becoming adult, you are aware of this experience. You want them to become independent. But as they start doing that, they start pushing you away. You are happy and encouraged that they are finding their independent way. Yet you are hurt that you are no longer that central part of their life. It opens a hole in your heart. And that hurts. A lot of what has been going on during this trip fits into this category. That's the stressful part.

Encouraging, however, is the incredibly increased engagement by the Ghana Board of Directors. For years, they have been mostly window dressing. As mentioned in the crisis post, they came to the rescue in the time of need. Now they are providing the level of engagement that the participant manager is going to need to go forward. 

And I am left with wondering how this will all play out for me. As I mentioned in my earlier posts, I've made huge progress building out our fundraising program and part of our business development program as well. There are still things I need to do to train a business development person. And I still have the strategic vision that is needed. But for the first time in six-years, I am leaving Ghana without a clear idea of if I will be returning. It will be interesting to see how things play out. 

Exhaustion

I spent about 4 hours yesterday just lying on a couch. Literally. Just lying there. Not sleeping. Just lying and not wanting to move. 

There has been and is a lot to get done this trip. It is crucial to Theodora that I extricate myself from management in order that it become self-sufficient. But to do that, especially with very limited people resources available on site, actually means more work in the sort term. 

Day-to-day management has been completely taken over. That's a big plus. Passing on the more strategic tasks are going to be harder. The two big things on the list are mapping out our first ever significant fundraising campaign (I will do a detailed post on that shortly), and putting into place a replicable business development system not requiring me. The first has the most time urgency as the end of the year is the big fundraising period. The later is inhibited by a chicken and egg situation...namely we need a local person to train and all local people are needed to do billable work. 

In order to accomplish these, I have been working extensively to create the systems, processes, and content to hand over to the team. This has meant going into our office and basically working 7 to 8 hours straight at a desk. That doesn't sound like that much does it. But, in reality, I haven't worked that way in, I don't know, ever! My work days when I do work are more about having all kinds of meetings, being able to get out, move around, etc. I tend to work in smaller spurts. 

Last night and yesterday I was hit with some kind of mild lower intestinal disorder, no doubt something I ate. I didn't get a good night's sleep. That combined with the amount of working, seemed to push me over the edge to where my body said, "de-I YOU are going to rest." Of course I said, "Body, I have a lot to do. I don't have time for this." It said, "You don't understand. YOU ARE GOING TO REST." and with that it was on the couch.

I got a good night's sleep. My innards seem to have settled down. It is Saturday and I am not going to do any kind of work.

AI Working With AI (Ancient Intelligence Working With Artificial Intelligence)

I had a lot of work, A LOT of work to get done coming to Ghana. Big projects related to fundraising and business development requiring detailed process development and content creation. It is hard to do these kinds of work when I'm home because my days often have meetings (physical and virtual) and I (at least) need uninterrupted blocks of time to do massive process and content work. I have been looking forward having numerous days relatively free from interruptions to do this work here in Ghana.

What I did not expect was a massive leap into the use of AI to assist me. 

Over the last month, I have been dabbling. I had used it mostly to edit and reformat written content and for some research. I had not used it to map out an entire campaign. But on the flight out, I had layovers and I tried for the first time to put into AI (I am just using ChatGPT at this point) a request for developing an entire campaign. That led into developing ideal target definitions. This led into the creation of separate documents to be used in the campaign.

There were things I wanted done by my team that were going to stretch their capabilities. I was able to generate instructions and scripts that took into account the strengths and frailties of my people. 

I am learning how to iterate. By that I mean, give the AI a set of instructions, edit the response, and ask the tool for what additional instructions would assist making the work output more in line with my desire.

I know I am just taking baby steps. I have not succeeded in creating any fully formed, formatted end products. I am giving things to my team to for them to do final formatting. I find when I ask Chat to create an original document, my prompts (instructions) don't seem to be clear enough and it comes out not very close to what I desire. On the other hand, when I give it content I've written and ask it to make it more impactful, or more emotional, or more concise, I get much better results. 

On the whole however, I have gotten WAY MORE done over the couple of days I've been here than I would have thought. So I'm looking forward to see what else I can learn about using this tool.

Transit, Arrival, Settling In, Difficulties Of Inter-Cultural Networking

Truly by Magical Unicorn Pony God of Travel standards it wasn't all that bad. Going to Ghana I flew from Albuquerque to Denver to Washington, D.C. and then on to Accra, Ghana. I knew the last flight was going to be late because I got a notification. Unfortunately, even with the late notification, the flight was even later so we all stood there waiting to board for an hour beyond the announced time. 

For those affectionados of business class flying, there is quite a wide range of quality between airlines food offerings. United made a big Hoo Ha when it unveiled its special Polaris cabin, seats, and lounges. Initially the food quality took a big jump up. But lately it has become decidedly 'Meh'. In particular, there seems to be a ban on salt. Everything is very bland. And the salt shakers on the individual trays don't seem actually put out any salt. Then there is breakfast. Breakfasts on flights, even business class, tend to be very 'meh' as well. This flight took that to a new level of insipidness with the introduction of the Egg White Bite, little like blobs of tasteless egg whites. Why the airline has decided that we need to be conscious of our egg yolk intake is beyond me.

As we took off late, we of course arrived late. This meant that instead of us being the only flight arriving, that there were four other large international flight arrivals so the small Accra airport was packed. However, as the experienced traveler I am, I got off the plane right away, bounded to the health and passport check-in, got the shortest line and was through in about 15 minutes. Amazing...

....only to wait over an hour for my bags to finally show up. 

I was picked up by my people. It was so late we went out to get something to eat. I had some stir-fried noodles that were mercifully full of flavor. 

The weekend was mostly about shopping for food and doing food prep for the week. On my agenda this trip is making rounds to various Rotary Clubs to increase the visibility of Theodora and Rotary Club to End Human Trafficking. It has been awhile since I did this and I had forgotten some of the cultural differences. 

In the U.S., people like to talk about themselves. In a networking environment, it is not hard to get a conversation going. In Ghana, nobody trusts anybody, so they give out as little information as possible. This leads to your white American asking a bunch of questions and getting one word answers in response. The better technique is to just wait until the meeting is over and you've given your promotional blur. Then those who are interested come over to you.

On Friday, we did have a virtual meeting on the grant where the Muslim Family Counseling Representative put his actual signature on the application, making it official. We're hoping we have everything we need to submit it today, Monday.

Off To Ghana Again

I sort of dodged a bullet as United Airlines (whom I'm flying this time) had system wide IT related stoppage yesterday. All seems on time today.

It is going to be an interesting trip given recent events. I've been working hard preparing for the trip as we want to greatly improve our fundraising effort this year and start building a true, sustainable business development system not dependent on me.

And we are in the last phases of getting a grant from Rotary International for recruiting and training AND we have a commitment from the Muslim Family Counseling Service in Ghana to be our partner. I will write more about this as I think it is pretty big deal for us. 

Have to rush to my first flight. More to come.

Disappointment

Not much newsworthy took place this past week. And the only thing that was, was a disappointment. 

Wife went into the foot doctor for X-rays on the status of her broken foot. One of the breaks has healed but two are still in process. This means another 4 weeks for her in the boot. 

She was depressed. I was depressed. But she's focusing on the instructions related to no foot movement to promote healing.

Grilled Lamb Redefined - With Pictures!

After my great success with grilling chicken last week, I was inspired to try the same technique with a large piece of boneless leg of lamb. This is another cut that I've had issues in the past getting to turn out decent. Only this time I photo documented the whole process!

The Marinade

This is a major part of the revised process as historically my efforts in this regard have been fairly banal.

Start with a lot of salt and a lot of whole black and white peppercorns

 

 The rest of the ingredients - Large amounts of garlic, fresh rosemary and thyme, olive oil, and red wine

Using a heavy duty mortar and pestle beat these until the peppercorns substantially breakdown

 

 Add a lot of garlic and beat until paste like

(please note we follow the 'Grandparent Cooking Conventions' whereby our directions are 'a bit of this', 'work it until it feels right', 'how much? enough'. And for crying out loud, I gave you picture above.)

Add your Rosemary and Thyme

Now beat like a maniac because breaking these down is a Mother

Beat in gradually the olive oil and red wine

 Prepare your chunk 'o' meat by cutting across it checkerboard style. This will allow the meat to lay flat and thinner so it will cook faster. The slicing will expose more surface for the marinade to infuse flavor.

Rub the marinade into the meat. Really give it a massage.

 

 Put in the fridge overnight

Next morning take it out at least 3 to 4 hours before you grill it so it gets up to room temperature.

(If your meat is too cold it will have a hard time getting to the proper internal temperature without the outside being charred.)

Take off most of the marinade.

 

 Cook using our foil underneath to protect from charring and brick on the top to get as much surface are on the direct heat method.

It only required 14 minutes to get to 140/145 degrees internal temperature, a nice medium rare.

 There was a nice char on the outside and great flavor throughout.

 So get your mortar and pestle, your brick and your foil and tackle those larger cuts of meat.

(And yes for certain relatives, I bet if you took a block of tofu, marinaded it thus, grilled in on a thick layer of foil with a brick on top it would come up pretty damn good.)

Theodora Update July 2025

We all know the catchy phrases:

If it were easy, everyone would do it.

No pain, no gain. 

I would offer that it the actual experience of driving for success can be a bit wearying. 

Since the February trip, things have been a bit rough. We went through another phase of client loss which led to finances being very tight. And my attempt to bring 'open book management' and more participation in responsibility for the business did not work.

Without going into too much gory detail, it was a very nice 'developed country' idea that ran onto the rocks of the reality of a very different culture, lack of strong local leadership, and a base of people who come from a traumatized background. I honestly thought we might implode. 

But things happen for a reason. 

My number one local director, a very experienced and strong business person who has both International and local Ghana experience, a person who has been key to our being legal in Ghana, stepped in and took charge. In his words, 'We tried doing things the American way. Now we are going to do things the Ghana way.' He has appointed one of the women to be the day-to-day manager and is providing mentorship to her. I have a couple of things I need to be doing.

• Training someone to be business development
• Get our fundraising organized and more consistent

Things have stabilized. We are adding clients again.

This was not a particularly 'fun' thing to go through (an understatement). But seeing a strong local presence say, "We cannot let this die" is an important breakthrough. It is not just a 'white guy's' project/vision anymore. Now we have local people who are truly bought in as proven by their actions. 

That's a pretty big breakthrough.

Grilled Chicken Refined

A number of years ago, I saw an article on grilling chicken over coals by cutting it in half and putting a brick on top of each half. The idea was to reduce the cooking time so you didn't have a charred outside and uncooked inside. I tried it and was relatively happy. But it often was overcooked, dry. I had issues with the outside getting too charred. And I wasn't happy with my flavoring marinade that didn't seem to add a whole lot of flavor. 

This last weekend I made a number of modifications to my recipe that resulted in a very most and flavorful bird. 

Marinade

I wanted to be sure I was packing flavor that would be tasted. I started by pounding black and white peppercorns in salt in my heavy duty Thai mortar and pestle. I added garlic, pounded more. Then HUGE handfuls of fresh rosemary and thyme from my garden and pounded a lot more. Finally, I added olive oil and white wine and pounded still more. 

I took this mixture and rubbed it into my split chicken (which I had made slits in the breast, thighs, and legs to aid in the flavor absorption and cooking time). I marinaded the chicken for almost 24 hours, occasionally taking it out to rub the marinade into the chicken.

Fire Set-Up and Cooking

My two main concerns were not having the chicken stick to the grate and avoiding the chicken drying our. What I did was not pre-heat the grates. I put them on over the coals just as I was ready to start. Then I put down a sheet of greased heavy duty aluminum foil. I put the chicken halves on, inner cavity side down first. I put bricks on top of each half. 

The use of the aluminum foil between the chicken and the fire was inspired (he says with extreme modesty). It kept the chicken from getting burnt on the outside. Juice from the chicken pooled on the foil, moistening the cooking chicken. Sticking was minimal.

Results

I cooked it on the inner side for 10 minutes and the skin side for 8 minutes. The chicken came out very moist and a good outside. I think it could have used 2 more minutes on the skin side. 

I am thinking I want to use this same technique on a piece of boneless leg of lamb.

Monsoon Reflections

I sit on the outdoor deck just outside the Man Tower. I am watching the sunset play its reds, oranges, and purples on the remnants of the thunderstorm we had a few hours ago. As is often the case during this season, there is a significant wind and I'm watching the trees sway in rhythmic harmony with the music I'm listening to through my headphones. 

I've working on my story as I do almost every night now. I keep looking up to see the next permutation of the colored light tableau in the sky, feeling the near perfect low 70's degree temperature, sipping my after dinner drink.

The Monsoon, the time when the summer heat causes the air over the mountains to rise, pulling moisture from the far away Pacific and Gulf of Mexico into our area. This then rises, cools and causes thunderstorms. It gives us humidity that is in the 35% range, three to four times the norm here in the desert. 

The days have a rhythm. There might be lingering moisture and clouds in the early morning. But it is usually clear and dry during the late morning and early afternoon. But you see the clouds building over the mountains. And by late afternoon, the storms come. Some times it is just a dribble. Sometimes it is serious rain. Then by mid evening it is all blowing off and the cycle will start again. 

This year we had a very dry winter, followed by a cooler and wetter spring. We only had a few weeks of the exceedingly hot and dry weather that usually marks May, June, and early July. Instead we got a much earlier Monsoon than usual. This has been a blessing for our garden, in particular, my tomatoes, cucumbers, chiles, and cooler loving herbs like parsley. I already have harvested some from all the above which is unheard of so early in the season.

The Monsoon. So lovely. So appreciated.

THE EPIC, COSMIC, SPECTACULAR REMODEL BEFORE AND AFTER POST!

I Was Wrong! 

I had a whole bunch of 'before' pictures. I just hadn't posted them when we started the project. 

When we started the project, I remember the two contractors saying confidently that this was a straightforward job and they should be able to knock it out in about a month. Well we are here at 4 and a quarter months and we're still not all the way finished. BUT, we are still going to do our before and after post because most of what's left is pretty small stuff. 

Living Room - Before

Living Room - After

Lounge and Library - Before

 Lounge and Library - After

 

 Front Bedroom - Before

 Front Bedroom - After

 (Sorry - Either a very bad picture because of bright back lighting or an astral plane image)

Oops - Somehow forgot to take 'Before' pictures of the Master Bedroom so only 'After' ones

Master Bath - Before

Master Bath - After

Small Bathroom - Before

Small Bathroom - After (including disco mirror and cosmic Japanese style toilet)

Small Upstairs Office - Before

Small Upstairs Office - After Man Tower Transformation

Large Upstairs Office - Before

 Large Upstairs Office - After (aka Eldership Bridge)

 Upstairs Exercise Room - Before

 Former Upstairs Exercise Room - After (use still to be determined)

 Other parts of house that were transformed but for which there are no 'Before' pictures

Three Cheers for the Impresario of our Remodel

WIFE!