I can testify:All those horror stories are true.
After working for Evergreen, Tower Air and Tradewinds Airlines I got tons of similar stories.
Too lazy to write the long ones, here is shortie:

Home in Dallas, bachelor, on days off, phone rings:Crew Schedule:
How would you like to dead-head to Bombay, then pick up a trip to Europe, then Dead-Head home?
Sure, no problem, I can do that. (Had no other plans)
Got business class ticket on Pan Am or Lufthansa all the way to Bombay, nice ride, good food.
At the Juhu Beach hotel in Bombay I call CS and tell ‘em I am in Bombay. He ask what are you doing there...? Told him Joe sent me the day before. Uh, ok..stay there, don’t go anywhere.
So I sit around the pool and do gin and tonics for 3 Days, sample good good and talk to pretty girls, then the phone rings and and CS said “You can go home now”
They booked me a C class ticket back to DFW and 20 hours later I was home. No idea what that was all about but picked up a bunch of frequent flyer miles..