Airplane flights - minimizing pain and sitting

[pianogal]

By the way, for people booking flights... it can be difficult to book an extra 2nd seat. I've tried to buy an extra and had airlines cancel my extra seats w/out my permission. But they shouldn't... as they book extra seats for extra large people. If you are buying 3 seats, they won't let you do it... so the only thing you could do is do two one way purchases, and make them in a family member's name. The family member doesn't show up, you hope the airline doesn't have people waiting for free seats outside, and then you have your extra 3rd seat. If you do this roundtrip, the seat will be filled for the return flight... so you have to book two one ways for it to be optimal. You can also look in advance to see which flights are more booked than others on the seat selection map.