Something very odd is happening in a few weeks: I'm flying somewhere.

No, really, for me this is highly unusual. Due to a mix of OTP issues on the western LD trains (Amtrak #6 has about a 50/50 chance of connecting with #30 right now; such a misconnect would foul up my week, and I would prefer not to have to repack for a flight on the fly if I can help it since packing for Amtrak is a bit more "relaxed"). So I ended up booking an A-ticket from SLC-ATL-MCO on an overnight flight (I leave at about 0100 and get into MCO around 0930).

(1) What should I expect? No, really...I've never flown first class before and haven't taken a commercial flight actually going anywhere in about four or five years.

(2) Should I even bother with SkyMiles? The program seems to be in a mess, the odds of me getting any sort of status are laughable; if the program has an expiry date on points/miles, it is more likely that I'd end up with the points just expiring unused.