Hello--

First of all, I apologize for any repetition in my post. I'm new to flyertalk and have come over from Fodors for advice. If there's a user-friendly searchable archive that I should be using instead, please let me know. When I tried the search option before, there wasn't enough space to enter all the terms for searching that I thought I'd need.

Here's the deal. I have recently gone from being a casual (3-5 times a year) flyer to someone who now travels two weeks/month for business. I want to make the most of my FF miles but I don't know where to start. I'm most interested in accruing miles for use toward upgrades and reward tickets. I currently am Silver status on Delta (and a Delta AMEX) and am approaching the silver status on NW. I also have FF account with American. The territory I cover from work ranges west from Massachusetts to MSP, then south to New Orleans, then up through the rest of the south and the eastern seaboard.

I don't make a lot of money and the company I work for is very small, so I need to be constantly mindful of my expenses--thus I can't pay full economy class fare when I fly. Where should I go from here? I know there must be tons of opportunities out there for me to be earning miles.

THanks in advance--and if I'm not already asking for too much, please be gentle with all of that acronym usage--I'm still learning.