I keep catching flights within hours of the window of opportunity closing and it’s not good for my health

I have been having trouble with staying too awake in the mornings. I sometimes wake up at 3am, 4am, 6am, and once I do, I’m tempted to check emails and see if there’s been “exciting developments”. Sometimes there is, and I think it’s feeding into a bad positive feedback loop.

Here is the latest one: I got very lucky with the Virgin Atlantic flights sale on points last night.

Two months ago I randomly stumbled across a Qatar Business availability in March 2025 using American Airlines points. 75k+$80 per person for Cape Town to Qatar to LAX, all in business! I booked it, and then started searching for the outbound flight.

A few days later I found a Atlanta-Qatar-Johannesburg flight through Qatar, at 95k+$200. It’s not the best deal.. but it’s okay-ish? The pricing is okay. (It’s saver, but buying through Qatar. Without an Avios transfer promo. And the date is also not the best. And I have to reposition from LA to Atlanta.) After much hesitation and discussing with P2 and going back and forth, I booked it, then I changed my mind the next day and cancelled it hoping for a full refund (24-hour rule). Qatar said that they don’t abide by the 24-hour rule, and deducted $50.

Instead, I booked a very meh LAX-JFK econ + JFK-AMS in AA business for 57k+$20 and waited for better alternatives. My thinking was I’ll arrive in AMS, sleep in Amsterdam one night, and catch the 10am-10pm AMS-JNB KLM flight in economy (15k+$190 booked through VS). I asked for advice on reddit and got into a debate with people bullying me to grab the 125k+$600 Virgin Atlantic flight business for LAX-LHR-JNB. I felt that 125k was too much.. especially given that the fees are already $600.

Then I did some math, and realized that the Air France business+KLM econ combo would still have $400 in fees. That made me rethink this a bit. $400 for a slow mix of econ and business vs $600 for business all the way with smooth & fast connections? That’s an easier choice.. except for the 125k part.

A month ago, in the middle of a trip through France, Air France dropped a lot of business seats at Saver rate, and I grabbed a LAX-CDG-AMS for 50k+$200. I was checking reddit at 4am when the news dropped. Adrenaline rush!

Then, last night Virgin Atlantic started a 40% sale. They are discounting Virgin Atlantic flights (not partner airline flights) 40% off. The catch is that it only applies to flights until December 2024 only, so it shouldn’t apply for my March 2025 trip. But I checked at midnight (when the sale starts) and the flight cost was indeed discounted, for some bizarre reason. Damn! Booked it immediately.

Two hours later, Virgin Atlantic realized that they set up their system wrong, and fixed it.

Final cost for two people:

  • 115k MR + $1,200 Virgin Atlantic Upper LAX-LHR-JNB
  • 150k AA + $160 Qatar Business CPT-DOH-LAX
  • $50 Qatar cancellation fee
  • $0 AA cancellation fee (twice)
  • $150 Air France cancellation fee

I probably need less positive reinforcement to checking my phone at 4am. Instead of.. whatever this is.