Thanks everyone! I guess the trick is to just keep your eye on the prize when it comes to the pain of the long flight. As far as the comment about the entire flight over water, not a fan of nothing but water; like the idea of an available place to land should we need to...
My friend has some UA miles and informs me that 60,000 miles and $600 can get you upgraded to business to SYD. Now I'm sure we'd have to be creative to actually find availability, but holy hell, what a difference from what you can do with Delta. I think I'm going to get a UA CC and fly a few flights on UA. What a deal!