I reccomend the red eyes to get back east from the west coast. I did FAT-LGA for a month and the red eyes into JFK were always my best bet (a day early of course). I would always have to fly to a larger airport like LAS to pick them up, but if you live in a city that has them already, they can be really nice. I didn't feel like I was wasting any time because I would have been sleeping during that time anyway. I still go back to FAT a lot, and I always take a red-eye back east. As far as I'm concerned, it's the best way to go.