I flew up to DC on Southwest Airlines this week, but took American back. Southwest has (by law) the only non-stop flight from Austin to close-in National airport. Since it’s a 1,311-mile flight that’s over the 1,250-mile ‘perimeter’ flying limit from the airport, and so only specifically-granted exception flights can operate on the route. Normally the 1 p.m. departure time from Austin doesn’t work for me with Southwest, but I recorded the Central Air podcast before heading to the airport. For the return, I took a connecting flight back on American instead of the Southwest non-stop. I was able to leave earlier in the day, and it meant (if everything operated on schedule) I’d make it home for my daughter’s bedtime. Since I barely made my connection, and a couple of things I did along the way always surprise people, I thought it made sense to share the choices I made that helped me get onto my original connection – and also to ensure I had space on a backup flight home that night in case I didn’t.…