This is kind of fun in a twisted way...

I've been looking for airline tickets for the vacation from hell. My sister may be getting me flight benefits with her airline, but I'm feeling a bit of anxiety over the fact that I haven't heard from her that yay she did get a ticket so I'm scoping the fares out. I have absolutely no comprehension about how airlines come up with their rates. I also find it funny (or freaky) that the airlines in the worst shape have the most outrageous fares. It is no wonder no one will fly Delta when the best rate I could get with 3 stops was 400 bucks. If I wanted only 2 stops it jacked the price to over 900 bucks. And these seats were all coach. WHAT?! Continental airlines still apparently serves you food (which I typically can't eat because of the whole gluten free thing) but they want almost 700 bucks and 13 hours. Why 13 hours one may wonder. Because apparently in order to fly Continental you have to fly into a hub (which is typical). Their hub options... Houston Texas (which brings the trip down to only 9 hours but jacks the price up to almost 900 bucks) or... Newark. On what planet is it at all logical to send a person on the west coast to the east coast just to bring them back to the west coast. It just gets better as I scroll down their page. For over 2k, I can fly to Hawaii and back to LAX or for over 3k I can fly to Houston to San Diego to LAX. This flight I'm looking for is a 2 hour and 45 minute flight. Maybe these prices exist to remind me that really relatively speaking $360 isn't that bad for a flight to LAX. (Or maybe it is another sign from above I shouldn't go on this trip.) And although priceline seems like it could be a good idea, I just don't know if I can give up the control they want me to to get that 40% discount by naming my own price.