Originally Posted by cockpitvisit

Your hint came a few minutes after T-36, so I missed the deadline (I had expected seat assignments at T-24).

At T-36, the only available seats shown were two middle seats, at $55 each.

At T-24, a few middle seats were available (for free), plus exit row seats in the row 38 for $99 each (window and aisle available).

A few minutes later, I looked again and saw a free aisle seat (47C). A worthier passenger must have moved from there into one of the preferred seats. So I grabbed it and now I have what I wanted - an aisle seat for free, but with a bit of uncertainty and worries in the process