Ask the Vegas expert

This week, Boston's Logan airport finally gets a cell-phone parking lot—a parking lot where drivers picking up arriving passengers can wait for the passengers to call and tell them when they've landed. When New York's JFK airport added a cell-phone parking lot this summer, Erik Torkells blogged about the trend: "If your local airport doesn't have one of these lots, you should absolutely email them and ask why not. It means fewer cars clogging up airport roads, and cleaner air to boot. (The self-promoter in me needs to point out that cell-phone parking lots are one of the topics Brad Tuttle and I cover in How to Travel Now.)"

It's not easy being a costumed mascot...

As noted earlier this week, Southwest is changing its boarding policy. And as the blog Upgrade Travel Better has noted, Southwest's new policy makes it more important than ever that you check-in online as early as possible, if you want to grab the best seat. For a price, there's an easy way to check-in as early as possible: BoardFirst.com—a website not affiliated with Southwest—will automatically request an A group boarding pass from Southwest when that flight opens for online check-in 24 hours before departure. This service spares you the trouble of having to log on 24 hours before you depart to claim your place in a virtual line. The service costs $5 per boarding pass secured, or—obviously—$10 per roundtrip. The owner of BoardFirst.com declined an interview request about whether anything would change in its service in light of Southwest's new rules. Related: Southwest also stopped pre-boarding for families. See the firestorm of opinion at the L.A. Times Daily Travel Deal blog.