Air Unfair

Boy, it's tough finding a decent price for an international flight these days.

For weeks, I made frequent trips to atiflights, cheapoair, cheaptickets, orbitz, farecompare, travelocity, and various other websites (including air carrier sites but excluding Expedia, which I think kind of screwed me on a trip to L.A. last year). I noted the prices. The next day, some of the prices went down a few bucks. Then they all started going up and up. Were the rising prices ever going to fall?

I wanted the long leg to be a European airline, but when Delta offered a fare less than $700 per person (inc. taxes and fees -- yeah, I know!) I couldn't resist. Well, I resisted for a few days.

Were any of the other carriers going to discount their fees? Where was the site that showed the available vs. reserved seats on the British Airways flight I wanted? Should I wait until a couple of months out and watch for bargains or jump on this low fare now, 7 1/2 months out? Oh, the agony of indecision. I asked my husband, who was more indecisive than I was. I looked at all of our options on BA and Virgin Atlantic (inc. buying the international leg directly from the foreign airline and booking the connecting flights separately). I compared premium economy both ways to economy to premium out and coach coming back.

Finally, I noticed that the sale was ending at midnight. I had about four hours to make a decision. Tim and I talked. I checked all the flight sites again. Then I started filling out the online forms to order the tickets. Then I had to create a frequent flyer account for Tim. Then I had to start over. While I was considering seat options at seatguru, my booking session expired, and I had to start yet again. The clock was ticking. When I completed the order, I think I had just a few minutes to spare. I checked the site again after midnight and found that the price had jumped almost $160!

I still check all the sites occasionally, and I'm sure I will continue to do so for the next 7 1/2 months, just to torture myself.

And now, this week's episode of You Too Can Be a Winner.

This site is giving away a flash drive that's pre-loaded with child safety software. Now, instead of pinning a note to the inside of your kid's coat, just hook this flash drive to his/her backpack. If the child gets lost or has a medical emergency, it's got all the pertinent contact info stored right there. Of course, if your kid has a tendency to lose things, maybe it's not such a good idea. Who knows who might find the drive and how they could use that information.

Either way, an extra flash drive (or thumb drive or whatever you like to call yours; I prefer "spy device") always comes in handy.