frequent flier miles. On the Tokyo - Newark flight I was disappointed to see come to an end, I enlisted the help of my travel agent to find flights on which I could burn up all of my Continental miles to upgrade my entire trip. It meant catching puddle jumpers to my final destination in Japan (Gifu), but a couple of short extra flights were a small price to pay for 27 hours of first-class legroom, fully reclining chairs, edible meals, entertainment and breathing space. If you stop reading at this point in the article, you almost need to know nothing more than this -- by hook or crook, try to get an upgrade. (Even Dr. Timothy Hosea, from whom you will hear below, offered this as his first and most important suggestion.) 2. Escape. You will want to have a rock-solid plan for frittering away several hours of your flight, and I don't mean working; staring at spreadsheets and writing proposals may burn up hours, but it does not make them vanish. You want these hours to disappear almost without a trace. Think headphones and Hollywood blockbusters. Getting a lot of work done is fine -- rarely do you have 15 consecutive hours without a phone or e-mail, so I encourage bringing some work -- but work will fail you when you get to the brutal middle hours of this ordeal. Headphones and Hollywood; don't stray from this. Spring for the airline's headphones, pay for and watch every movie,