thank you very much for all your insights.

To OLD Gold : I have not used these two tickets to avoid Sat. night stay or something like that. They are two independent tickets which i happen to utilize only the outbound portion.

What bugs me that I was finally able to use the second half of one of these tickets. The fare basis is B.
It is CHEAPER than the K fare basis ticket. The latest answer I got from the Elite rep: "There are no K fare basis tickets anymore. This ticket is worthless." :-(
O, well.