Toeman,
I was in your shoes a couple months ago. I'm a little younger 25, but had all of the same questions. I've just returned from an 18-mo stint in Iraq as a firefighter medic and PSD medic. The one thing I learned from being out there is that you only live once.
If you are really serious about the whole thing then go for it! I checked out both Delta and ATP. I choose ATP hands down.
Delta was cool with all there showboating and “we're owned by the airlines thing”, but I found them to be quite a bit pricier. Don't get me wrong they do know what they are teaching and you get done quickly. But after talking to some of the instructors I found out some of them had to wait as long as three months to get hired on as an instructor. With ATP the lead-time was any where from getting hired right out of training to about two weeks, depending on the location.
ATP is also about half as expensive as Delta. Around $44,000 not including you PPL. Housing is included in that with the fast track-program. With Delta you could expect another $700 mo. Another HUGE advantage is that after your PPL almost all of your time is done in a twin. Delta only offered 24hrs. The people at ATP also seemed a little more relaxed. At Delta it seemed as if everything was always do or die.
Those are my experiences some people like delta more but for my bucks ATP was the one. Good luck and let me know if you have any other questions. A big thanks to everyone who contributes to the site. It has helped me more than you know
!