manwillneverfly,
There are times when miss connects cause empty seats up front and things work out more smoothly when the gate agent (time permiting)puts people in those seats (we don't have to try to explain to all of the sliver, gold & platnium why we can't move them up even though there are empty seats. Really, we cannot move you and could get fired if we do it and we don't get the upgrade list so we don't know who was next anyway). Sorry they kind of blew you off, but since I don't know what all goes into ticketing, upgrades etc, I can't really say much more. An FYI, as far as I know, FAs only get official breaks on international flights over 8 hours, so you would not have to worry about that on most flights.
go_Gints,
Rules for flying differ for FAs and Pilots. For example, an FA can do MEM/LAX/MEM (in same day) but the pilots would change in LAX. Not sure what the exact rules are though.