If we know three things about be they are:

1. I am ridiculously anal retentive
2. I would live on a plane, and travel to a different city everyday if I could afford it
3. I am a little nerdy

Below is a scanned image of 116 boarding passes of the 152 flights I have taken on an airline in my 210,167 miles in the sky. You can verify these stats at my flight log if you'd like (told you I was anal, and I am thinking you are changing the "little nerdy" to "a lot nerdy" right about now).


You know what I love about boarding passes? They each have a story behind them of a great adventure. In the picture above there is...

...moving out to college
...the flight I took right after 9/11/01
...going to my study abroad in Israel and the Middle East
...mission work in South Africa and Venezuela
...my job interview in Atlanta
...taking US Military Kids based in Germany and Japan to camps
...adventuring to Australia by myself
...countless weekenders visiting friends and loved ones

Above there are boarding passes in English, German, Dutch, Japanese, Greek, & Hebrew.

But never before have I had a boarding pass like this.

Hello to the new digital mobile boarding pass Delta is now offering to its passengers when flying out of certain airports.

The check-in process was so easy. I did it from my iPhone while sitting at a Gwinnett Braves game. Then showed up to the airport where TSA has a special box that reads the phone. Unfortunately, for this trip that's where the fun ended.

Upon trying to board my flight to Fort Lauderdale, I handed the gate agent my phone.

He looked at me and said, "I need your boarding pass, not your phone."

I responded, "this is my boarding pass."

He took a gradual look at it and said, "I can't use that. It will mess up the computer. What's your name?"

So alas, this wasn't my last non-digital boarding pass as the gate agent printed me a paper boarding pass and moved me along.

But that only slightly hampered the coolness factor, and hey for all I know, maybe there was something going wrong that day and it really would have messed up the computer.

If you fly Delta out of Atlanta, LaGuardia, Memphis, Minneapolis or Las Vegas you should see if you have better luck.

Also here's a tip: take a picture of the pass when you check in by pressing the Power button on the top and the Home button at the same time. You'll hear a clicking sound and then your boarding pass will be in your Photos "Camera Roll." This way you won't have to reload the boarding pass everytime you go to use it.

I always fly mainline airlines, but I have to say, Delta is really rising* to the top of the US mainlines. Their improvements in technology - including WiFi on planes and the Mobile boarding pass - not to mention in-flight trivia and live television on many planes really helps them soar* above the competition in my book.

*Puns intended

P.S. Remember everybody that I am in Key West starting tomorrow, but I have the new iPhone / Email blogging capability so check back often for photos and small blog posts. And in light of this post, to answer your question, no we aren't flying. CJ and Andrea and the kids are driving from Indiana to Atlanta. And then I am driving them from Atlanta to Key West. Although I love a road trip almost as much as I love being in the sky.