Originally Posted by stnkbg1

Hopefully these aren't questions that have been asked a million times.

I've got a class start date scheduled in a couple months, and I'm trying to prepare myself for what life is going to look like for the next year or so. I have a home and a family that won't be moving, so most likely I'm going to be commuting for a while.

My questions are on the details of how this works. Lets say I'm based at ORD and have a trip starting tomorrow. I'm at home in sunny San Diego. First, do current pilots have a better way to look up flights than joe blow with an expedia account? Can you see which flights are full, or how full? Can you hitch a ride on ANY airline (assuming in uniform and commuting to/from work) or just those SkyWest partners with? How do you go about securing a seat? Anything else I should know or be prepared for?

We can probably skip over all the "commuting sucks" and "move to base" comments. We've all read them before and in my case even if I wanted to move, my fiance wouldn't, and my daughters mother would be overjoyed to not have to share her with me anymore. I also happen to love where I live and own my dream home, so I will just deal with whatever joys commuting brings. Thanks!